Show a custom tool's description in the tool search results of the Geoprocessing pane

Question

I have a custom toolbox (.tbx) added to my favourites and so to find a specific tool within the toolbox, I 'd search (Tools > Favorites > [Type tool name] and then hopefully see the description of the tool in the results display but doesn't seem to display the metadata. Let's say I have a tool called 'Create Raster Extent Polygon' and I enter 'extent' in the search to get the result I need. It doesn't seem to display the tool description even though I have added information in all of the fields in the metadata page of the custom tool. Is there a way to show the tool description for custom tools similar to the inbuilt Esri ones? (See image for the custom tool example and the Esri tool that shows a nice tool description).

JohannesLindner · Answer

Sooooo....

I use the default metadata option, which seems to be "Item description".

Like you, I just tried creating a new python toolbox, editing the metadata of the default tool and searching for that tool. Didn't work:

Then I remembered: For my work, I programmed quite a few tools (e.g. input forms). Because the tools were in constant development, I didn't want to manually edit the metadata each time I changed some parameters. So I created a custom Parameter class and gave the Tool class some extra attributes and wrote a function that creates the tool help files automatically.

def Parameter(*args, **kwargs):
    """Wrapper for `arcpy.Parameter` which allows for a custom attribute `description`.

I can't just inherit from `arcpy.Parameter`, because arcpy is a wrapper for C classes and when I tried, it didn't work as expected. Using a wrapper class and forwarding all the methods and attributes would be too cumbersome. That's why this is a function that returns an `arcpy.Parameter`, using python's dynamic typing to add a custom attribute (which does noting in the underlying C code).
    """
    try:
        desc = kwargs["description"]
        del kwargs["description"]
    except KeyError:
        desc = ""
    p = arcpy.Parameter(*args, **kwargs)
    p.description = desc 
    return p

# Toolbox.pyt
class Toolbox(object):
    def __init__(self):
        """Define the toolbox (the name of the toolbox is the name of the
        .pyt file)."""
        self.label = "Toolbox"
        self.alias = ""

# List of tool classes associated with this toolbox
        self.tools = [Tool]

class Tool(object):
    def __init__(self):
        """Define the tool (tool name is the name of the class)."""
        self.label = "Tool"
        self.canRunInBackground = False

# attributes for automatically creating the metadata
        self.description = "This is a test tool."
        self.usage = "You can't do anything with this tool."
        self.search_keys = ["test", "another_tag"]

def getParameterInfo(self):
        """Define parameter definitions"""
        params = [
##            arcpy.Parameter(name="parameter", displayName="Parameter", datatype="GPString", parameterType="Optional", direction="Input"),
            Parameter(name="parameter", displayName="Parameter", datatype="GPString", parameterType="Optional", direction="Input", description="This parameter does nothing."),
            ]
        return params

def isLicensed(self):
        """Set whether tool is licensed to execute."""
        return True

def updateParameters(self, parameters):
        """Modify the values and properties of parameters before internal
        validation is performed.  This method is called whenever a parameter
        has been changed."""
        return

def updateMessages(self, parameters):
        """Modify the messages created by internal validation for each tool
        parameter.  This method is called after internal validation."""
        return

def execute(self, parameters, messages):
        """The source code of the tool."""
        return

def create_tool_help_files():
    import os
    import datetime
    import xml.etree.cElementTree as ET

today = datetime.datetime.now().strftime("%Y%m%d")

for tool in Toolbox().tools:
        tool_instance = tool()

metadata = ET.Element("metadata")
        dataIdInfo = ET.SubElement(metadata, "dataIdInfo")

# ESRI metadata
        esri = ET.SubElement(metadata, "Esri")
        ET.SubElement(esri, "CreaDate").text = today
        ET.SubElement(esri, "CreaTime").text = today
        ET.SubElement(esri, "ArcGISFormat").text = "1.0"
        ET.SubElement(esri, "SyncOnce").text = "TRUE"
        ET.SubElement(esri, "ModDate").text = today
        ET.SubElement(esri, "ModTime").text = today
        scaleRange = ET.SubElement(esri, "scaleRange")
        ET.SubElement(scaleRange, "minScale").text = "150000000"
        ET.SubElement(scaleRange, "maxScale").text = "5000"

# tool metadata
        toolMeta = ET.SubElement(metadata,
            "tool",
            xmlns = "",
            name = tool.__name__,
            displayname = tool_instance.label,
            toolboxalias = "")
        ET.SubElement(toolMeta, "arcToolboxHelpPath").text = "c:\program files\arcgis\pro\Resources\Help\gp"

# Tags
        searchKeys = ET.SubElement(dataIdInfo, "searchKeys")
        tags = getattr(tool_instance, "search_keys", [])
        for t in tags:
            ET.SubElement(searchKeys, "keyword").text = str(t)
        # Summary und Usage
        summary = ET.SubElement(toolMeta, "summary").text = getattr(tool_instance, "description", "")
        usage = ET.SubElement(toolMeta, "usage").text = getattr(tool_instance, "usage", "")

# parameter metadata
        paramMeta = ET.SubElement(toolMeta, "parameters")
        parameters = tool_instance.getParameterInfo()
        if parameters is None:
            parameters = []
        for p in parameters:
            param = ET.SubElement(paramMeta,
                "param",
                name = getattr(p, "name", ""),
                displayname = getattr(p, "displayName", ""),
                type = getattr(p, "parameterType", ""),
                direction = getattr(p, "direction", ""),
                datatype = getattr(p, "datatype", ""),
                expression = getattr(p, "name", ""))
            dialogReference = ET.SubElement(param, "dialogReference").text = getattr(p, "description", "n/a")

# Credit
        idCredit = ET.SubElement(dataIdInfo, "idCredit").text = getattr(tool, "credit", "My employer
My Name
My mail address")

# some more general metadata
        idCitation = ET.SubElement(dataIdInfo, "idCitation")
        resTitle = ET.SubElement(idCitation, "resTitle").text = getattr(tool, "label", "")
        distInfo = ET.SubElement(metadata, "distInfo")
        distributor = ET.SubElement(distInfo, "distributor")
        distorFormat = ET.SubElement(distributor, "distorFormat")
        ET.SubElement(distorFormat, "formatName").text = "ArcToolbox Tool"
        mdHrLv = ET.SubElement(metadata, "mdHrLv")
        ET.SubElement(mdHrLv, "ScopeCd ", value = "005")
        mdDateSt = ET.SubElement(metadata, "mdDateSt",Sync="TRUE").text = today

# write XML
        directory = os.path.dirname(__file__)
        toolbox_label = os.path.basename(__file__).replace(".pyt", "")
        ET.ElementTree(metadata).write("{}.{}.pyt.xml".format(os.path.join(directory, toolbox_label), tool.__name__))

# execute the file from IDE to automatically create the tool metadata files
if __name__ == "__main__":
    create_tool_help_files()

And it works:

Please don't ask me why...

MattHowe · Answer

Yeah I tried exactly the same thing and the description didn't show in the search results. Interested to see what @JohannesLindner reports back with re the metadata standard.

David_Brooks · Answer

Scratch that, i just tried with a brand new toolbox, created a blank script and edited the Summary in item description, and nothing.