Community

Snapping tool problems

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03-31-2016 02:06 PM
GuyRand
by
New Contributor II
‎03-31-2016 02:06 PM

​I have this question posted in another forum, but I'm not getting any responses, maybe someone can shed some light on my issue....thanks in advance.

I have never really been able to figure out the snapping tool.  I am trying to using the snapping toolset available in ArcMap 10.2.1.  I like this one because I am trying to snap to a midpoint of a line.  I started out trying to do this in a layout view, and I found some posts that said it would only work in the data view.

So I jumped to the data view, and I have created a rectangle from the Drawing toolbar.  Now I want to strike a line from the midpoint of two sides of the rectangle dividing it in to fourths.  I have tried turning snapping on, off, setting all the various snaps....end, mid, and so on, and so on.  I just cant get anything to snap.  I am not really clear if the snaps will work with elements drawn from the Drawing toolbar like lines and rectangles, or if it just works with entities from my feature classes.  I have seen posts saying it will work with both.

I have tried messing with the size of the snap box, it appears it only takes pixels in the new toolset, and I have tried a small #, a large #, and a really large #.  I also read some posts on classic snapping.  I see how to use it, but it appears to be limited to endpoint, vertex, and edge.  What about midpoint?  I really need the midpoint at the moment.  I am not sure if classic snapping was that limited or not.  Oh yes, I can't get classic snapping to work either.  I see how to set all the snaps in the various snapping toolsets, but it's like snapping is not turned on.  The new snapping toolbar has a very clear way of telling if snapping is on or not, and let me tell you, I'm confident I've got it turned on.  I've spent all morning trying to figure this thing out.  I've searched posts, blogs, and searching for support from ESRI online forums.  Any help you can lend is greatly appreciated!!!!

Thanks,

Guy

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4 Replies
DarrenWiens2
by MVP Honored Contributor
MVP Honored Contributor
‎03-31-2016 02:10 PM

As far as I know, snapping only works between geographic features, not graphic elements. Can you post links to those that suggest otherwise?

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DanPatterson_Retired
by MVP Emeritus
MVP Emeritus
‎03-31-2016 03:07 PM

Darren the thread was in a duplicate in Community Help.  It had no responses, so it has been removed.

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DarrenWiens2
by MVP Honored Contributor
MVP Honored Contributor
‎03-31-2016 03:11 PM
I am not really clear if the snaps will work with elements drawn from the Drawing toolbar like lines and rectangles, or if it just works with entities from my feature classes.  I have seen posts saying it will work with both.

I was more interested in seeing posts that claimed you could snap to graphics.

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ChrisDonohue__GISP
by MVP Alum
MVP Alum
‎03-31-2016 02:56 PM

Things that I have found that can get weird with Snapping in ArcGIS 10.2.1:

  • In Snapping Options, the Tolerance setting can be very important.  10 pixels seems to work well, but at some scales the value will have to be increased or decreased.
  • If there are many layers or the mxd has been worked on for quite a bit of time, the snapping seems to flake out after a while.  Start a new mxd and pull in only the layers you need for the next bits of edits.
  • If one zooms in to around 1:10, snapping sometimes seems to stop working as one approaches 1:1.  This can get frustrating when one is manually trying to split a feature like a thin sliver in situations where it is not appropriate to automatically all of it to one polygon or another by topology or geoprocessing.

Chris Donohue, GISP