Latest Contributions by Suzanne-Boden

Updated January 16, 2017 Given that technology—the Internet, e-commerce, smartphones, the behemoth that is social media—has dramatically changed consumer and personal behavior over the last decade, it's no surprise our professional lives have evolved. For many of us, what we do at work and how we do our work have changed a great deal. At the same time, more and more organizational leaders have grasped the business value of getting geospatial content out of a department silo and into the hands of knowledge workers using ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise and a variety of enterprise applications. As a result, many GIS professionals are being asked to share. Of course, the profession as a whole is a generous lot, so sharing itself is nothing new. What's new is the ease with which things can be shared. The ArcGIS portal has become an integrated content platform that supports enterprise GIS workflows and the information needs of both GIS and non-GIS professionals, collaborative working groups, and the public. When there are many potential content consumers, the question of what to share needs to be carefully considered. If you're in the process of crafting a sharing strategy for your ArcGIS portal (an ArcGIS Online organizational site or an ArcGIS Enterprise portal website), here are three tips to help the process along. 1. Prioritize Consumer Relevance While you could share all types of geospatial content, that may not be feasible or desirable. When faced with an overwhelming number of choices, site users may opt out. Feature the content that your organization's users are most likely to be interested in. Like you, site users will be most interested in content that helps them do their work faster, easier, and better. Think about your organization's structure (or constituents) and imagine you're a content consumer. Why have you come to this site? What are you hoping to do with the content you find? For an analyst with the market research group, maps showing customer and physical business locations, demographic data, and drive times might be highly desirable. Templates for branded web apps could also be useful. Make a list of frequently requested items. How many times does your team create the same or very similar information products for different groups? Share that content. If you've ever thought to yourself, "If the folks in [department X] only knew how our data could help them!" Well, now's your chance to showcase your data to school the non-GIS teams on the value that geographic insight brings to their projects. Once you've settled on what to share, decide how to share it. It may make sense to create hosted feature layers for data that will be especially popular. Learn how to create a hosted feature layer 2. Provide Guide Posts Never underestimate the power of clear directions. Think about your favorite e-commerce sites. How do they direct you to products? Their home pages likely have prominent links to: The latest products The five or ten most popular products Recommended items for specific use cases ("Dorm essentials for your new college student!") Adopt these familiar methods to enhance your ArcGIS Online organization's or enterprise portal's home page, your front door if you will. A front door should be welcoming, but quickly passed through. You want visitors to enter the living space and join the party. The home page description section is a great (visible) place to add links that will guide users to the relevant content you've shared. Learn how to configure your home page description 3. Teach Them to Fish Who better to help the masses create accurate, impactful maps and apps than a GIS professional? Your ArcGIS Online organization is a rich source of authoritative content However, a lot of people may not know exactly how to use it at first. You can help content consumers get up to speed by adding frequently asked questions and tips from the GIS team on your organizational site. Of course, you should always document essential information in the item properties, including: Who created the data and when? What is the data's accuracy? Explanation of numeric attributes shown in a map legend or table (unless the data is clearly unambiguous) Access and use constraints Here's a good example of item properties for a web map. To make sure consumers see this information, you can get creative. The Open Data DC app effectively provides key information about the app right inside the app. As you're documenting your content, support searching, which is how people find things these days. Create a set of standard tags—both geographical and topical—and consistently apply them. Learn more about item properties By sharing relevant content and helping consumers understand how the content can be used to shed new light on their work, you extend the benefits of GIS well beyond its current boundaries. Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the point where the work produced by GIS professionals is being widely viewed as a strategic organizational asset. Carpe diem. Related training: Is your team just getting started with an ArcGIS Online organizational site? These courses are designed to help administrators, content producers, and content consumers be productive right away. ... View more

This is the third post in a three-part series on creating geoprocessing models in ArcGIS. If you've read the previous posts in this series, you've got modeling basics down and you know how to add model parameters to support easy reuse and scenario testing. In this post, you'll learn some techniques to do more with less—effort, that is.  List Variables In the last post, you learned how to make a tool parameter a variable, and turn a variable into a model parameter. By default, a variable stores a single value. However, it's possible to store multiple values in a variable. When you do, the variable is called a list variable. When a list variable is connected to a geoprocessing tool, that tool and all downstream processes (all the processes that depend on the tool's output) will automatically execute once for each value in the list. That's right: when you define a list variable, model tools automatically know to process each list item. Using list variables is like running geoprocessing tools in batch mode—with the major advantage that you have to enter the list of values only once to achieve multi-tool processing. Consider the model below, which automates a typical data management workflow. This model creates a file geodatabase, converts a shapefile to a geodatabase feature class, removes duplicate features, defines the coordinate system for the feature class, and outputs a layer with selected features. Notice the model even has two parameters. It's a complete workflow that works great when a single shapefile needs to be processed. It falls short, though, when multiple shapefiles need to be processed. The model would have to be run manually multiple times to process all the shapefiles. Wouldn't it be better to run the model once and have all the work done? Creating a list variable will accomplish this. To create a list variable for this example: Right-click the Feature Class to Feature Class tool input variable and click Properties, then click "A list of values." Click OK. Double-click the variable to open it and enter each value. More about list variables Inline variable substitution With list variables, tools run multiple times to process each input. By default, however, the tool output names will be the same—which means all but the last list item's outputs will be overwritten. To overcome this, use inline variable substitution. There are two types of variables that can be substituted in processes: model variables and system variables. To use a model variable for inline variable substitution, just enter the variable name surrounded by percent signs. The system variable %i% is often used to add a unique, sequential number to the end of output names. List item numbering starts at 0 (the first item's output name will have a 0 appended). For this example, you would open the Feature Class to Feature Class tool and add a lowercase i surrounded by percent signs to the end of the output feature class name (ASAM in this case). Using the system variable ensures the model will correctly process and create the three outputs needed. However, the output names are not descriptive. You could rename them later, but why not automate that work now? Model-Only Tools ModelBuilder includes a set of tools that are available only for models that will be run inside ModelBuilder (i.e., they won't work when the model is run as a tool). The Parse Path tool allows you to separate an input path into its component parts, then reference those parts in downstream processes. In this example, the Parse Path tool is a better alternative to using a system variable for the model processes. It allows the input shapefile names to be used in the output names instead of cryptic numbers. Note: For processes that create intermediate data, using a system variable is a good solution when output names must have unique names but you don't need to worry about those names causing confusion. To add the Parse Path tool:  Click the Insert menu > Model Only Tools > Parse Path. From the model window, open the Parse Path tool. For Input Data Element, choose Input Shapefile. For Parse Type, choose Name, then click OK. Connect the Parse Path output (Value) to the Feature Class to Feature Class tool as the Output Feature Class. When you hover over the Feature Class to Feature Class output element, you can see that the three outputs now have names corresponding to the input shapefile names. This will make the model outputs immediately understandable to the people who need to work with the data. More about model-only tools Preconditions Did you notice that the Input Shapefile element now links to two tools—Parse Path and Feature Class to Feature Class—and that Parse Path isn't part of the main model workflow? When a model contains separate but related processes, the order in which those processes execute is unpredictable. You can control processing order by setting a precondition. In the example, the potential exists for the Feature Class to Feature Class process to run before the Parse Path process...which means the model outputs will be overwritten as each list item is processed. To ensure the Parse Path tool always runs before Feature Class to Feature Class, make the Value element a precondition to the Feature Class to Feature Class tool. To set a precondition: Right-click the Feature Class to Feature Class tool and click Properties. In the dialog box, click the Preconditions tab and check Value. Click OK. Any model element can be set as a precondition to a model tool, and tools can have more than one precondition. More about setting preconditions Go Ahead, Model It By visually mapping workflows, automating time-consuming tasks, and supporting rapid "what if" scenario testing, models are a valuable tool to help GIS professionals work more efficiently and collaboratively. With a solid understanding of modeling basics and a few advanced techniques in your back pocket, you may find yourself jumping at opportunities to build models in ArcGIS. Because besides being geoprocessing workhorses, models are...fun. Related posts: ModelBuilder 101 ModelBuilder 220: Add Flexibility For hands-on practice with ModelBuilder, this e-learning course is recommended. ... View more

This is the second post in a three-part series on creating geoprocessing models in ArcGIS. ModelBuilder 101 covered five steps to create a basic model. One of the main advantages of building a model is the ability to quickly test multiple scenarios. This post shows how to support scenario testing when a model is run as a tool. Confused about what running a model as a tool means? In the ModelBuilder application a model appears as a visual diagram. Outside of ModelBuilder you can run a model from a tool dialog box (double-click the model in the ArcMap Catalog window).  In ModelBuilder, you can open any tool, change its settings, and quickly run the model again to explore alternative scenarios. That's great, but convenience matters too. When running a model as a tool, you can explore alternative scenarios by changing model parameters—all at once, in one place. Let's talk the P-word. "P" Is the Key Uh oh. Now what? Have you ever opened a model tool and seen the statement, "This tool has no parameters"? Maybe you closed the dialog box thinking the model had a fatal error. Time to clear up the confusion. That statement is information, not an error message. The model will run fine as-is, meaning it will run using the inputs and criteria specified by the model creator. You can't change anything. Go ahead and click OK to run the model. Model parameters are things that can be changed. If they exist, you will see them when you open a model tool. So what can be changed using a parameter? Just about anything—inputs, outputs, and tool-specific parameters. A good way to learn how to work with model parameters is to create a model, add its tools, and set the tool parameters as usual. After the model is built (and saved), think about what criteria you would want to change when running it in the future. Running a model using different input data is a common need. Adding a parameter can meet that need. The input to the Create Folder tool is a model parameter. Allow for ChangeTo make a tool's input a parameter, in the ModelBuilder window right-click the input element and choose Model Parameter. It's that easy. The letter "P" above an element indicates it's a model parameter. Tip: When you make an element a model parameter, the element name will display in the model tool. Element names can be cryptic, so a good practice when adding a parameter is to rename its element so that model users will understand what is expected. To rename an element, right-click it and choose Rename. Here, the Create Folder tool input was renamed to "Set your workspace folder" (the original name was a folder path). With the new name, it will be clear that you can browse to a different workspace if you don't want to use the default location. To make a tool parameter into a model parameter, first make the tool parameter a variable, then set the variable to be a model parameter. The Create File GDB tool has three parameters: Location, File GDB Name, and Version. Suppose you want the ability to assign a different geodatabase name each time the model is run (perhaps you'll be creating multiple geodatabases as part of your project). File GDB Name is now a model parameter. In the model window, right-click Create File GDB, click Make Variable > From Parameter > File GDB Name. The variable is added to the diagram with an arrow connecting it to the Create File GDB tool. To make the variable a model parameter, right-click it and choose Model Parameter. Now it too has a "P" above it. In this case, "File GDB Name" is self-explanatory, so there's no need to rename the element. Descriptive parameter names help model users know what to do. To support testing multiple scenarios, now suppose you want to be able select subsets of features for processing. In the example model, the Feature Class to Feature Class tool is used to convert a shapefile of ASAM incidents to a geodatabase feature class. The tool has two parameters that make sense to designate as model parameters: Input Features (required) and an optional Expression parameter used to define a subset of features. Input Features is the location of the shapefile on disk, which could vary. Right-click the Feature Class to Feature Class tool and click Make Variable > From Parameter > Input Features. Right-click the Input Features variable element and choose Model Parameter. Repeat this process for the Expression parameter. Both of these model parameters will benefit from being renamed. Model parameters exposed in the model tool. After saving the model, close ModelBuilder and open the model as a tool to see the parameters. Tip: If you don't like the display order of the parameters in the model tool, you can reorder them in ModelBuilder (Model menu > Model Properties > Parameters tab). Notice the help text on the right side of the model tool. This is the Description text from the Model Properties dialog box.Less Is More By allowing certain criteria to be changed, parameters increase model usability and are a valuable technique to explore what-if scenarios. However, as with anything, it's important to exercise restraint. Setting too many parameters defeats the other main advantage of a model—to simplify and speed up a geoprocessing workflow. Remember, you can always open a model in ModelBuilder to tinker with individual tool settings and run the model to explore the result of your tinkering. Add parameters only for items you or others are likely to find most useful, such as the option to specify different input data or modify a key analysis tool setting. Put the rest of the model elements on auto-pilot. In the next installment, you will go beyond basic techniques and learn some model power moves. Related posts: ModelBuilder 101 ModelBuilder 360: Amp Up the Automation Picture This: A Model for GIS Automation ... View more

Getting Started with GIS has been the most popular Esri web course for several years. It's free and a great learning tool for those brand-new to GIS. You can use ArcGIS for Desktop trial software to complete the course exercises if you don't have access to a paid license. ... View more

This is the first installment in a three-part series on creating geoprocessing models in ArcGIS. In this post, learn the steps to build a simple model.  ModelBuilder has been called a visual programming language or a tool to make "visual scripts." I like to think of ModelBuilder as a tool to map a workflow, and a model as a workflow map. Like a map: A model can be navigated (it has direction built in). A model uses shape, color, text, and symbols to represent and communicate about its features. A model reveals data relationships that can spark ideas and collaboration. Invaluable for conducting sophisticated spatial analyses, models are everyday workhorses too. If built with reuse in mind, they can be your go-to shortcuts to get a lot of work done. If you've never created a model in ArcGIS, here's what you need to know to get started. Take the five-step approach: Plan the workflow Create the model shell Add tools and specify parameters Validate the model Run the model 1. Plan the Workflow Obvious, but...before creating a model, know what you want it to do. List the data input, identify the required geoprocessing tools, and describe the desired output. If the workflow is simple, just think it through in your head. For more complicated workflows, you may want to sketch everything out on paper or a whiteboard. If you're not sure which tool to use or what a tool's required inputs are, check the geoprocessing tool reference. 2. Create the Model Shell In ArcGIS, a model has to be stored inside a toolbox. Creating a toolbox is simple. Right-click a folder in the ArcMap Catalog window and choose New > Toolbox. Right-click the new toolbox and choose New > Model. An empty model window opens. Now set some key model properties. Click the Model menu > Properties. In the General tab, check on the option to store relative path names. Using relative paths prevents headaches down the road if data gets moved around. Also, set these: Model name — the filename; no  spaces allowed. Label — the plain-English name; displays in the ModelBuilder titlebar and in the Catalog window. Spaces are fine. Description — briefly explain what the model does. This will be a helpful reminder to you later and essential information if you share the model. 3. Add Tools and Specify Parameters With the basic setup done, now comes the fun part. You can't beat ModelBuilder for easy drag-and-drop building and tinkering. But hang on a sec, it's useful to understand some ModelBuilder vocabulary. A model consists of one or more processes. A process consists of three elements: input data, a tool, and the tool's output. Each output becomes input to the next  process. Just like when you run a geoprocessing tool outside a model, if your input data has selected features or records, the tool processes only the selection. The output of each model process (except the last) is called intermediate data. When you run a model inside ModelBuilder, intermediate data is automatically saved. If you don't need it, you can delete it by clicking the Model menu > Delete Intermediate Data. When you add a tool to a model (by dragging/dropping from the Catalog window or using the Insert menu), its output element is also added and both elements are white. In model parlance, white means "not ready to run." You need to double-click the tool and set its parameters. Tip: In a tool dialog box, a green dot means the parameter is required. Once you set the tool parameters, the input element displays and the process is colored, Oz-like. As you add processes, the model window may fill up. Use the Full Extent button, followed by the Auto Layout button to see the big-picture view and zoom in and out as needed. Be sure to save the model periodically as you build it. To add the final model output as a layer to the map, right-click it and choose Add To Display. Otherwise, you'll have to manually add it to the map. 4. Validate the Model After you've added all the tools and set all their parameters, it's time to ensure the model will run properly. Validation is easy (click the Validate button or Model menu > Validate). During validation, if there's an error, processing will stop at the first process that requires a fix. Figure out what's wrong, make the fix, then validate again. Repeat if necessary, then save your work. 5. Run the Model You have two basic options to run a model: Within ModelBuilder (click the Run button or Model menu > Run) Outside of ModelBuilder as a tool or service Running a model as a tool or service has distinct advantages for collaboration and sharing. We'll cover model tools in the next post in this series. It's fun to run a model inside ModelBuilder. As the model progresses, each process turns red and then gets a drop shadow. The drop shadow indicates the process has completed correctly. If a process turns white, that means something needs to be fixed and the model stops running. If you've validated, this shouldn't happen. Maybe Run It Again A model's final output may raise a question. For example, suppose a model process created a 20-meter buffer around a feature. After examining the model output, you wonder what would result if you used a 50-meter buffer instead. To find out, simply open the buffer tool, enter the new distance value, and run the model again starting at the buffer process (right-click the buffer tool and choose Run). Because you're not altering preceding processes, you don't need to rerun the entire model.  This is the beauty of a model. It's a perfect medium to explore and test what-if scenarios. Note: If you delete intermediate data before changing a parameter, you'll need to rerun the model from the beginning. Like scripts, models are encapsulated workflows. Once built, they can be reused as a fast alternative to manually performing a set of individual processes. You can build a model to automate any geoprocessing task or series of tasks, from the complex to the straightforward. Now that you've learned the steps to create a simple model, you may be ready to take it to the next level. In upcoming posts, we'll dive into more advanced modeling techniques. Related posts: ModelBuilder 220: Add Flexibility ModelBuilder 360: Amp Up the Automation Picture This: A Model for GIS Automation ... View more

Making a story map is an excellent opportunity to be creative, challenge your inner cartographer, and demonstrate GIS skills (and add pizzazz to your LinkedIn profile while you're at it). If you haven't yet made a story map, this four-step process may help you get started. Number 2 in the process is to plan and execute your data strategy. This step is critical but can get glossed over in the creative excitement to make a cool map. It's time to give it some time in the spotlight. A lot of story maps are focused narratives about geographic places, features, and current or historic events. When considering data to support a story map project, pay particular attention to three items. Locational Accuracy Currentness Understandableness Locational Accuracy The story map topic determines how locationally accurate your data needs to be. If you're making a map tour or shortlist, odds are you're showcasing point features. Depending on the real-world features represented by the points, map viewers may have accuracy expectations that you'll want to meet. Keep in mind that the prettiest, most topically engaging map is a dud if the features shown are far from their real-world locations. Suppose the topic is a local garden tour and the source data is a list of the participating homes' street addresses. The map is large-scale and uses a basemap that includes streets, parcels, and building footprints. In this case, map viewers will reasonably expect the house points to be on the correct city block and on the correct side of the street. If the points are not displayed at that level of accuracy, it detracts from the story map. If you don't know which side of the street point features fall on, let the ArcGIS Online map viewer's geocoder do the work for you. Save addresses, GPX coordinates, or lat-long coordinates in a text or CSV file, then upload the file to the map viewer. If you're making a map tour in which images and text are the meat of your story, you probably don't need submeter accuracy. It's perfectly fine to represent an entire street as a single point feature. As long as the points are reasonably close to the real-world locations, the story works. Currentness Unless you're presenting a historical topic or a temporal analysis of a current issue, seek out current data. You can find lots of up-to-date, authoritative maps and data on ArcGIS Online. If you use obsolete data to present a current topic, you run a high risk of creating a misleading or totally inaccurate story map. For example, using 1990 U.S. census data as the basis for a story map about current U.S. demographics is a do-not because more current census data is readily available. In this case, the 1990 data is obsolete. On the other hand, if the topic is how U.S. demographics have changed over the last 20 years, using 1990 census data in conjunction with 2000 and 2010 census data is the sound approach (and the Swipe or Map Series story map apps would work well). In this case, the data is old but not obsolete. Understandableness This possibly invented term relates to the usability index of your data, meaning can users interpret it at a glance or do they need to metaphorically lean in and squint? This item creeps into step 3 territory (create the web map), but an important part of planning your data strategy is thinking about the final presentation. Often, preprocessing data speeds up assembly of the end product. A story map is a focused narrative, so delete any fields or features that aren't relevant to that narrative. Conversely, if your data doesn't include all the detail you want to present, add one or more fields with the desired information (e.g., text descriptions, website URLs, image URLs, or category codes to base feature symbology on). You may need to split attributes stored in one field into separate fields to enhance usability of feature pop-ups. After you've finished preparing your data for story mapping, you're ready to add it to a web map, which you'll then share to become the foundation of a story map app. As mentioned previously, using the ArcGIS Online map viewer is an easy way to create a web map. You can upload a service, zipped shapefile, TXT file, GPX file, or CSV file. Note: When using an ArcGIS Online public account to create a story map, you can upload a maximum of 250 features at a time. If your dataset includes more than 250 features, reduce the number of features or split the dataset into multiple files and upload them separately (first plan out how to group the features into a logical set of map layers). If the data you want to use for a story map is stored in a geodatabase feature class and you aren't able to (or don't want to) create a service, it's easy to export the feature class to a shapefile. In the ArcMap Catalog window, right-click the feature class and click Export > To Shapefile. In the Feature Class to Feature Class dialog box, you can build a query to export only certain features and you can remove fields that you don't need. Shapefile text fields have a 254-character limit. If the source feature class has a text field that stores more than 254 characters, the text on the web map will be truncated. Always examine your source data carefully and make any necessary adjustments before exporting. Symbology plays a big role in data understandableness, particularly when it comes to quantitative (numeric) data. Exercise caution when mapping quantitative data—it's easy to unintentionally use symbology that turns perfectly accurate numbers into an inaccurate view of reality. For example, pie chart symbols are often used incorrectly to symbolize data that does not represent part of a whole. When presenting quantitative data, a good practice is to cite the data source. At a minimum, document who collected the data and when. You could add this information to the story map introduction panel, legend, feature pop-ups, or another appropriate text element. One final tip that has nothing to do with data: Be sure to add your byline and perhaps a custom logo to the story map. After all your hard work, you deserve the recognition and map viewers will appreciate knowing who created the story map. True beauty comes from the inside, so goes the saying. When it comes to maps, true beauty comes from accurately located, current data, presented understandably with valid symbology. Planning and executing your data strategy may take a little time and effort, but the reward is an authoritative map that will engage and educate. In other words, a story map that's beautiful both on the outside and on the inside. Related post: Four-Step Process to Make a Simple Story Map ... View more

Updated January 26, 2023 ArcGIS Online is where people go to create and share maps, explore the foremost collection of geographic information (in the world!), and do analytics on the web. Its support for easy collaboration across department lines offers organizations enormous benefits. Maybe you've been meaning to get up to speed with ArcGIS Online, but just haven't found the time. Well, no more excuses. There are lots of options (many free) to build up your personal knowledge base and professional toolkit. In fact, in less than one day, you can make amazing progress. Here are four ways to make that happen. 2 hours: Take a web course — Hands-on practice, quizzes, and conceptual material are all conveniently packaged together to help you understand and correctly execute focused tasks in ArcGIS Online. If you pass the quizzes, you get a certificate of completion to show your boss. 8 hours: An instructor-led course is perfect for time-challenged professionals who want to soak up the key information they need to enhance their work products or support their organization's ArcGIS Online organizational site. In just one business day, learn essential concepts, pick up time-saving tips, get hands-on practice with typical workflows, and ask questions and get answers directly from an Esri expert. 15 hours: Enroll in a learning plan. Esri experts have curated a set of resources for you that teach common ArcGIS Online workflows. As your schedule permits, use the plan's low-time-commitment e-Learning resources to explore the ArcGIS Online capabilities you're most interested in. While completing the learning plan is a great way to develop well-rounded knowledge, no one says you have to. Sample as much or as little of the plan resources as you like. Six weeks: Take a MOOC (massive open online course). Going Places with Spatial Analysis is a fun way to get familiar with ArcGIS Online, develop valuable spatial analysis skills in a supported environment, and earn a certificate of completion you can proudly share with your social networks. The course is divided into six sections, with about 2-3 hours of new content shared weekly. With plenty of options to suit diverse learning styles, learning ArcGIS Online has never been easier. What are you waiting for? ... View more

Updated February 11, 2020 Story maps are popular. Their visual, interactive nature makes them a great medium to share interesting information about a place or topic and spark discussion on real-world issues. To make a classic story map, you start with a web map. There are lots of ways to make a web map and just as many ways to make a story map. In fact, if you're using the new ArcGIS StoryMaps, you may or may not use a web map—that choice is up to the storyteller. This post shows a simple process to make a classic story map. The KISS principle is my preferred approach whenever possible; overcomplicating things makes it hard to get stuff done. I found a simple way to make a web map. Here's a simple four-step process to craft a story map. It goes like this: Choose your story topic. Plan and execute your data strategy. Create a web map. Share the web map as a story map. Step 1: Choose Your Story Topic A story communicates something. Being concise is one key to effective communication, so for a story map, it's essential to choose a discrete topic and useful to narrow the topic down to a core message. Learning a new skill is often easier (and more fun) when you practice with a project that's personally interesting. Once you've mastered the skill, you can apply it to work projects. Visitors to the Esri Training Center in Redlands get a printed piece listing local restaurants (with a map of course). That piece inspires an interesting story map topic (to me). The core message (inspired by the 3/50 project) is, despite being a fairly small town, Redlands has an impressive selection of local dining options. If you need help choosing a topic, the Story Map Gallery is a great source for inspiration. Step 2: Plan and Execute Your Data Strategy "Data strategy" may sound complicated, but all it means is decide which layers and attributes to include. It's important to choose only the most relevant layers—overloading a map with extraneous data muddies your story (remember, be concise). For this practice project: Layers: Restaurant locations and a basemap for context are all that's needed. Attributes: Restaurant name, address, description, and a web page URL. Basemap: One of the free high-quality ArcGIS Online basemaps will work great. To execute the strategy, assemble the data and choose a geographic data format. The format depends on the tools at your disposal. If you use ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap and ArcGIS Enterprise, you can author and publish GIS services that are built from feature classes, imagery, or other geographic data. The advantage of using a service is that, as the underlying data changes, updating a web map is easy (you just republish the service, then refresh the map). If you don't have access to tools to create a service, you can use the easy-button method: add data stored in shapefiles, text files, CSV files, or GPX files to the ArcGIS Online map viewer. You can also manually draw features in the map viewer. Since this example showcases only 14 restaurants, it's easy to create point features to represent the restaurants. I'll just create a shapefile, then add it to the map viewer (here's another useful learning strategy: practice with manageable datasets; otherwise, you risk getting derailed by data challenges). When creating a shapefile for use in a web map, select the WGS 1984 geographic coordinate system and the Web Mercator Auxiliary Sphere projected coordinate system, the same coordinate systems used by commonly available basemaps. This will improve web map performance. The map viewer requires that shapefiles be zipped (for small datasets that don't have detailed geometry, just zip the DBF, SHP, SHX, and PRJ files). Step 3: Create a Web Map When the data is ready, add it to the map viewer to create a web map. Go to www.arcgis.com and sign in to your ArcGIS Online organizational account or public account. Click Map at the top of the window. Zoom to the area of interest and choose a desired basemap from the gallery. Click Add > Layer from File. Browse to the data file and add it. Depending on your data, you may choose to use generalized features or keep the original features. For a small number of simple points, keep the original features. You can display point features on the map with a single symbol, as a heat map, or with unique symbols based on an attribute value.   For this practice story map, each restaurant should have a unique symbol. I can easily accomplish this by selecting the Unique symbols drawing style, then choosing the attribute to show. For the attribute, I'll choose Name and then click the Options button to select the symbol colors, shape, and size. After making the selections, click OK in the Options pane, then Done in the Change Style pane. If you want to adjust the symbology later, in the Contents pane mouse over the layer name, click the small down-facing arrow next to it, then click Change Style. If the story map will include a legend, make sure your layer names are easily understood. You can rename a layer in the Contents pane by clicking its down arrow, then clicking Rename. With the symbols configured, it's time to configure the pop-ups. When you click a feature on the map, you see a pop-up window with a default display of attributes. You can easily change the defaults to suit your story map needs. In the Contents pane, click the layer down arrow, then click Configure Pop-up. In the Configure Pop-up pane, the pop-up title is already set to the Name attribute, which is good. To customize the pop-up contents, in the Display drop-down list, choose "A custom attribute display," then click Configure. In the Custom Attribute Display dialog box, click the Add Field Name [+] button and choose the attributes you want shown in the pop-up. You can order and format them as desired. A nice feature is the ability to link an attribute to a web page. In this example, there's an attribute that stores URLs. I can use the custom attribute functionality to display the same link text in all the pop-ups instead of individual (and long) URL strings. Here's how: In the dialog box, select the attribute that contains URLs, then click the Create Link button. In the Link Properties dialog box, select and drag the attribute up to the URL field. Enter link text (e.g., "View web page") in the Description field. Click Set, then OK. After configuring the pop-up content the way you like, save your pop-up changes, then save the web map. You will be prompted to enter a title, tags, and summary. This information will be propagated to the story map, so give it some thought. Step 4: Share the Web Map as a Story Map Now you have the story map foundation. ArcGIS Online provides a collection of web application templates (including classic story map templates). Using a template simplifies the work. To use a template, you have to share your web map. In the map viewer, click Share. If you have an ArcGIS Online public account, you need to share with everyone. If you're using an ArcGIS Online organizational account (or free trial) and you have permissions to share content, you can share the map with everyone or with an existing group. Click Make a Web Application. Browse through the available templates. You can preview how your web map will look in different templates by clicking the down arrow next to Publish and clicking Preview. If you like a template layout overall but want to make some changes to enhance your story map, you can download the template and use the readme file instructions to configure the changes. You will need access to a web server (and some basic HTML and JavaScript skills). If you like a template as-is, click Publish. In just a short amount of time, I have a link to a simple story map I can share with the world. More importantly, I've developed skills I can use in the future to create story maps on other topics. Telling stories has always been an essential way humans communicate and share knowledge. A story told through an accessible GIS map lens is a new way to communicate, and a powerful medium to share geographic knowledge that informs and influences. Related post: Commonsense Tips for Story Map Data Want to learn more tips, techniques, and best practices to make story maps AND get hands-on practice? Check out Creating Story Maps with ArcGIS. ... View more

We've said before that the process to create a certification exam is rigorous and time-consuming. In fact, we get a lot of questions about how exam questions are developed. Who writes them? Who validates them? Why does it take so long? To answer these questions, here's a high-level overview of our exam development process. Like many IT certification programs, we use a third-party consultant for test development. For each certification, we hold a series of workshops, one of which is the question development workshop. To this workshop, we invite a group of subject matter experts (SMEs) from across Esri, psychometrician facilitators from the consultant, and facilitators from our certification team who monitor consistency. The group gets together in a room to write and review questions, collaborate on appropriate wording and scenarios, and debate each question's merits for measuring specific knowledge. For each item, a committee of 5-7 SMEs has to agree on both its technical accuracy and its congruency to the skill being measured (to make sure it tests what it's supposed to test). After the workshop, the collection of questions undergoes a psychometric review, a copyedit, a style edit, and is then assembled into the beta exam question pool. When the beta period is over, the psychometricians analyze the results and select questions that are proven to reliably measure the skills and knowledge a qualified candidate for the certification has. When you take an exam at a testing center, you are presented with 95 or so questions from a larger pool of the final questions. So that's the overview of how certification exam questions are created. Now here's an inside view from one of the many smart people who's participated in the exam development process. Nana Dei, geodata development technical lead with Esri Support Services, acted as a subject matter expert for the Enterprise Geodatabase Management Associate exam. In an intensive four-day workshop, Nana wrote, researched, collaborated, debated, and discovered that creating exam questions is easier said than done. What knowledge and experience did you contribute to the exam development process? Nana: I’ve worked on a number of databases since early 2000 including MySQL and Oracle, which led me into SQL Server and ArcSDE. After joining Esri in 2008, I started working on SDE geodatabases, which helped me build a stronger foundation and in-depth knowledge into the workings of a geodatabase. This knowledge helped me effectively communicate and assess questions and answers in the exam development process. Describe your experience with question writing. What was it like to have your questions debated during the process? Nana: Placing myself in the shoes of the test taker was one of the things I thought about while writing questions. A question can be easier or difficult depending on how it is phrased. When writing a question, I thought about a test taker taking the exam under time constraints and feeling pressure. How would they react when reading this question and answering it? It was great to have the other SMEs think out loud during the question writing stage. Debating the questions was fun. It was important to gather different perspectives on particular concepts. It helped me modify the question or come up with stronger answers. What were your expectations going into the certification development process and how did they change as the workshop progressed? Nana: Initially, I thought it would be easy to write questions. Finding the correct answer to a question was pretty easy, but coming up with incorrect answers for each question was difficult for me. I think I spent a lot of time coming up with [psychometrically acceptable] wrong answers. Has the experience of participating in the workshop influenced how you do your work today? Nana: It taught me to be more conscious about not having any ambiguity when explaining a concept or scenario, to be clear and not leave things open to interpretation. In the geodatabase world, there are multiple ways to reach a destination; each method may have slightly different modes of operation even though they will all lead to the same destination. It is always important, I feel, to be on the same page with the person I am discussing a situation with. If we are not on the same page, the entire knowledge transfer will not be effective. Knowing what you know about the exam development process, what would you say to those who want to achieve certification? Nana: Study for the exam. Leave no stone unturned. Ensure that you know and understand the concepts being tested. What was the most valuable or rewarding part of being a contributing subject matter expert? Nana: During the exam development process, it was rewarding to have other SMEs value my input. I really enjoyed the collaboration with different SMEs. The input by all members of the team made it feel as if we were unified in our approach to reach the goal. The fact that I went through the exam development process and demonstrated my knowledge in the technology—you have to have a level of knowledge to come up with possible scenarios, questions, and answers—was very rewarding. After the exam development process, I feel other employees see me as a go-to person for that specific technology. What value you do you see in Esri technical certification? Nana: I think it’s a very good indicator that one is familiar with that technology and that a person can effectively communicate in that subject area when called upon to explain a concept or give help in a specific scenario. It would look good on a resume when applying for jobs because it shows the person really cares about personal growth in that area. The technology changes over the years, and we need to keep up. ... View more

Updated March 11, 2015 While I work at the motherland of GIS services and web maps, I don't have ArcGIS  Server or even a web server installed on my local machine. Odds are, many of you don't either. For me, getting set up with a virtual machine configured with all the right software is completely doable...but not done. Things came to a head recently when I wanted to visualize some Excel data on a web map. Of course, I could bring the Excel data into ArcMap and visualize it there, but I wanted to make a web map so I could easily share it with coworkers who don't use ArcGIS in their day to day. Lacking the ability to publish a map service myself, I opted to go the minimalist route—that is, use the ArcGIS Online map viewer. If you have access to an ArcGIS Online organizational account, you can map your data right inside Excel using Esri Maps for Office. A viable alternative for those without an organizational account is to add a .csv file (text file of comma-separated values) to the map viewer and save the map to their ArcGIS Online public account. An Excel spreadsheet is easily saved as a .csv file. To be mapped, the spreadsheet must have fields that store location data—latitude and longitude values, GPX coordinates, or addresses. I wanted to visualize the locations of individuals in the U.S. who attended the Creating Hosted Map Services with ArcGIS Online live training seminar. Understanding the geographic distribution of our viewers is useful to evaluate seminar broadcast times. All I had to do to create a web map was follow these easy steps.Step-by-Step Example Open the Excel spreadsheet and save it as a .csv file. Go to www.arcgis.com and sign in to your public or organizational account. Click the Map link at the top (or bottom) of the page. In the map viewer, zoom to the data's extent. Keep the default Topographic basemap or click the Basemap Gallery button and choose a different basemap. To the left of the Basemap Gallery button, click Add > Add Layer from File, browse to the .csv file, then click Import Layer. (If you're using Firefox or Chrome, you can just drag and drop a .csv file into the map viewer.) Note: You may get prompted to specify which fields contain location information (e.g., your address or lat-long field names). There is also a 250-feature limit when adding .csv files to the map viewer. Point features can be drawn on the map with a single symbol, unique symbols based on an attribute, or as a heat map. To quickly see the point distribution, I'll choose to use a single symbol for all the features. Clicking Select under Location (single symbol), then Done displays the points on the map. In less than two minutes, I'm visualizing my data as points on a pretty map. I can click each point and see the associated data from the Excel spreadsheet in a pop-up. Easy. Except... I only want to show certain columns, and I don't like the names of those columns. I also decide I'd like to symbolize the points by self-reported industry. I can address all of these issues right in the viewer. In the Contents pane to the left of the map, mouse over the layer name and click the arrow next to it, then click Change Style. Under Choose an attribute to show, choose the field that stores the values you want to show. For the drawing style, select Types (Unique symbols). In the symbol preview, I notice an industry category named Other. For my purposes, Other is the same as no data. It's easy to change the Other symbol label. Click Options, click the label next to the Other symbol, then type a new label (No Information is more understandable for this map). If I wanted, I could click the symbol and assign a different symbol to distinguish this category. Click OK, then Done. Takeaway #1: Explore your data and decide how you want to present it before putting it on a map. In the map viewer, it's easy to change the display properties, but you can't modify the data itself. So, in just a few more minutes, I've mapped viewer distribution and self-reported industry. Next, I'll configure the pop-ups. In the Contents pane, click the arrow next to the layer name again and choose Configure Pop-up. Enter a descriptive pop-up title or select an attribute to use as the title. Click Configure Attributes and uncheck fields you don't want to display, then make sure the fields you do want to display are checked. You can also use the arrow buttons to reorder the fields. Be sure to type a friendly alias for each field that will display, then click OK. At the bottom of the Configure Pop-up pane, click Save Pop-up. Now when I click points on the map, I see only the information of interest. I also notice something. When I zoom in to a large scale, the Topographic basemap gets very detailed. Building footprints and local streets display. Some of my symbol colors blend into the basemap features. Switching to the Light Gray Canvas basemap is a quick solution. This basemap, with its subdued colors and less detail at large scales, is a better backdrop for my data. Takeaway #2: Before deciding on a basemap, explore it at large (and small) scales to understand the level of detail and assess its appropriateness for your mapping purpose. It's important to choose symbol colors that will stand out against the basemap at various scales. Finally, I want to show time zones on the map. I don't have a layer of time zones but I'll search ArcGIS Online content to see if anyone has shared this data. Click Add > Search for Layers. In the Find text box, type time zones, choose to search in ArcGIS Online, then click Go. The search results include several time zone feature services. After adding one of them to the map, I change its symbology to unique symbols so each zone will have a different color and I increase the layer transparency value so the time zone features don't obscure the other data. In less than 20 minutes, I've "mappified" my Excel data and added context to it. To generate a link to the map that I can embed in a web page, e-mail, or social media post, I just need to save the map to my public account, add a title, some tags, and a brief description, then share the map. Takeaway #3: There are lots of ways to create, save, and share a web map these days. If you don't have access to software for creating GIS services, you're not out of luck. Creating a high-performing web map with the ArcGIS Online map viewer really is an easy—and useful—method. Related posts: Commonsense Tips for Story Map Data Four-Step Process to Make a Simple Story Map ... View more

Python is one of the most popular languages used to script ArcGIS tasks, maybe because it has a relatively low learning curve and it can do a lot. Python is integrated into ArcGIS Desktop. You can create Python add-ins and toolboxes and in ArcMap you can directly enter Python label and MapTip expressions instead of having to load a script file. It's nice to have these options. Amidst all the Python love floating around, some have said ModelBuilder is the forgotten hero of the ArcGIS automation world. They contend that ModelBuilder deserves a bigger share of the spotlight that's shining on Python. I've always found GIS professionals to be visual thinkers who embrace scripting, so it makes sense they would use both Python and ModelBuilder to do their ArcGIS work (and many of you likely do). But if there is a Python vs. ModelBuilder debate, I'll stay neutral by saying that both are valuable and have their place. When an older child angrily accuses them of favoritism towards the unwanted intruder, wise parents know to respond, "We love your little brother just as much as we love you." And so it is with ModelBuilder and Python. Both are tools to automate GIS analysis, data management, and mapping workflows. Unlike Alex and little Sam, they can even play nicely together (you can add a Python script tool to a model, and you can export a model to a Python script). I've heard ModelBuilder called a "visual programming language." This is an interesting way to think about it as it's true there are many things you can do in ModelBuilder that mirror programming techniques—such as creating variables, iterating (looping) through a set of data, setting preconditions, and nesting submodels inside a larger model (similar to calling another script from inside a script). Let's shine a little light on ModelBuilder just in case it is feeling left out. Why might you want to create a model? Visualizing Workflows A model is extremely useful when designing and sharing a workflow, especially when it's complicated. You can always draw on a whiteboard, but dragging and dropping tools into a model scores efficiency points—you can dynamically build and adjust the workflow as you're thinking it through. You can easily rearrange model tools and elements and add text labels to document the flow and datasets being created. When collaborating with others, communicating about a workflow using a model is more effective than reading and scrolling down through a script. A model is like a map—it's a graphical medium that engages people and enhances understanding. You can even export a model to a graphic or PDF file and bring it along to a meeting as a handout. Exploring Results and Testing Scenarios Because you run a model from inside ArcGIS Desktop (ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap), you can examine the results immediately. In this way, a model is part of the daily fabric of your GIS work. If the model output creates a new question to investigate, all you have to do is change a model parameter (e.g., switch out a tool's input dataset or value) and rerun a process or rerun the entire model, then explore what that yields. With a script, it's certainly doable but not as easy to work iteratively like this. You have to open the script file, find the lines of code that need to be edited, make the edits, save the script, run the script, then possibly open ArcMap and add the output and maybe some other layers for context. To make things easier, you can start by loading the script into the Python window in ArcGIS and go from there. Identifying Problems One of the cool things about a model is that you can eyeball its progress as it runs. As each process executes, the tool flashes red and a drop-shadow displays under its elements when the process completes. You can immediately tell where an error occurred in the model because it stops processing there. Just find the first process that doesn't have a drop-shadow. After correcting the error, you can continue running the model from that point—you don't have to go back to the beginning. Just right-click the tool element in the process that failed and choose Run. Identifying the location of a problem in a script is not always as fast. Applying Skills You Already Have The most obvious reason to create a model over a script is that you lack scripting skills, whether Python or any other language, and you don't want or can't afford to invest the time to learn scripting. Though these days it's fairly easy to acquire basic Python skills. From Esri alone there are free tutorials, presentations, training seminars, and free and low-cost web courses. ArcGIS geoprocessing tools output Python code snippets you can examine to learn from and then modify to suit your needs. Basic Python skills don't cut it, however, if you need to automate an advanced workflow. Models chain together and run geoprocessing tools, so if you are a GIS professional who uses ArcGIS, more than likely you already have the skills required to create a model. Setting up a model correctly requires time and planning, like any other task. You have to understand your data, environment settings, tool parameters, and desired outputs. There are nuances and more advanced capabilities of models that you may need to educate yourself about, but again there are lots of resources to do so (see the list at the bottom of this post). In the end, the choice of whether to automate an ArcGIS workflow using a script or a model comes down to what you feel most comfortable doing. Python is a logic-driven text-based tool and ModelBuilder is a logic-driven visual tool. When feeding your culture appetite, sometimes you want to read a great novel and sometimes you want to look at a beautiful painting. Similarly, there may be times you want to write a script and other times you want to create a model. The beauty of ArcGIS is that you can easily do both, right inside ArcGIS Desktop. Related posts: ModelBuilder 101 for ArcGIS Pro ModelBuilder 101 (ArcMap) Resources to learn more about ModelBuilder: Esri training options ArcGIS Help (ArcGIS Pro, ArcMap) Resources to learn more about Python scripting: Python website Esri training options for Python ... View more