This comment applies specifically to the tools "Spatial Join" and "Dissolve"
in the toolbox of ArcGIS desktop. (I am running 10.3.1)
The interface to these tools allows one to aggregate fields (eg. take sum or mean or median or...) when multiple
feature classes are dissolved or when multiple target feature classes
match the criteria for a spatial join to a target class.
Sound good? Well, no, not really; not as implemented.
For each field that you wish to aggregate
you have to specify how you wish to aggregate it,
or whether to ignore it in the dissolve/join.
I have some Business Analyst (BA) datasets. I want to dissolve
the data by combining multiple census tracts into
a larger geographic area of my own definition.
The BA dataset has about 3000 fields.
Many of these are things like population counts
in various age ranges (hundreds of fields, if not thousands)
That means that I have to point and click myself
through 3000 fields specifying for each whether
I wish to ignore it or how to aggregate it.
Are you going to pay my carpal tunnel treatment bills?
Either my understanding of the python interface
is at fault, or that interface is totally unusable.
(Aside: And BTW why isn't there a tool to join
a target dataset to various source datasets
on a common field, but to aggregate the
data when there are many source records
matching the target record).
Would anyone from ESRI like to comment?
To get a response from esri, it would be best to contact tech support directly. This is a user forum and may or not be attended by someone from esri that may be able to help. If I am not mistaken, this advise has been issued before.
Well, I would be interested from a response from anyone
who has a workaround. It is hardly a bug.
Just a deficiency. Isn't this the place
for such comments?
Perhaps it is your example datasets that don't get attention There is this place.. Business and Commercial
which deals with related issues and even references the business analyst explicitly. Perhaps targeting that Place might even attract esri employees that are on its dev list. Just a thought.
Hi Robert,
Once you have your tract based polygon layer using Append Data would be the most appropriate to summarize Business Analyst dataset (BDS) layers. If you wanted to summarize tracts specifically to a polygon layer there are a couple of ways to go about it like creating a custom tract BDS layer with Custom Data Setup or temporarily modifying the hybrid apportionment method on the Data tab in Business Analyst preferences.
Regards,
Jason R.