Latest Contributions by ChrisDonohue__GISP

I suspect Route Analysis would be the best option: Route analysis—Help | ArcGIS Desktop  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

If you want to create a new feature class of just the selected features in a feature class: Creating a New Layer from Selected Features  If you would instead like to create a Selection Layer: ArcGIS Desktop Help 9.3 - Using selection layers  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

It is not immediately obvious, but with Generate Near Table one joins the resultant table back to the original inputs based on the Object IDs in each respective file. For example, the output table will have a field called INPUT_FID.  This Joins to the OBJECTID in the feature class used as the Input Features when running the Generate Near Table tool. The output table will also have a field called NEAR_FID.  This Joins to the OBJECTID in the feature class used as the Near Features when running the tool. Generate Near Table—Help | ArcGIS Desktop  (note - the header in this topic says ArcGIS Pro but the information is the same for ArcGIS Desktop) Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

What Joshua Bixby proposed is the probably the easiest way to do this.  As an alternative, if you are comfortable with Modelbuilder, here's a model that would probably work after some modification to the specifics of your data.  As a preliminary step, one would manually join the offices to your projects layer before running the model.  Then the model selects each office from the office feature class and the projects with the same office and just runs a Pointdistance on each.  Finally, the Pointdistance values are joined to each offices file, resulting in a feature class for each office with only the projects for that office and their distances. This model worked with the test data I threw together.  Note that you may also be able to skip the Copy Features function in the model.  I added it as a way to check the intermediate data. Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

Another option is Generate Near Table—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  I guess a big question going forward with this is the sorting down of the results to just the applicable projects for each office, as many of the possible solutions (Pointdistance, Generate Near Table) would provide output of all the Offices to all the Projects, generating one large table, which would be unwieldy. Is there currently in your data field(s) that identify information on which Projects belong to which Offices?  If that relationship mechanism could be identified, it may be very possible to generate the desired output so it is limited to just the projects for each office; however, we would need to know how that is structured so as to come up with an effective solution.   Possibilities include employing Modelbuilder or Python as part of the data processing.  For example, one could loop through each office and only find the distance the projects associated with that office.  Again, it would be dependent on how the data is structured. What is ModelBuilder?—ArcGIS Pro | ArcGIS Desktop  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

I know there is a way to do the next step, I just am blanking on it at the moment (need caffeine) In the meantime, here's some general CAD to GIS info in case that triggers some ideas: Strategies for loading CAD data—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

Is the infrastructure static over time?  Or to say it another way, are there a set number of assets you have to change and they are they the same each year? ie large numbers of assets are not being added and subtracted.  If things are relatively static, you could start out by doing a one-time creation of an asset feature class based on each assets spatial location.  Then create a UniqueID field in the feature class and assign unique ID's to each feature in your feature class.  In your Excel spreadsheet give each asset would have the same unique ID (you can export your feature class the first time as Excel to get this set up). Also, provide a field to record your Inspection attributes. If things are more dynamic, you would do the same as above but need to add additional steps in the process to deal with features that no longer exist and to deal with adding in the new spatial locations. So after you do the updating of the Excel worksheet in the field, one could a table Join to append the Excel worksheet to the assets Feature class to transfer the latest information into GIS so the mapping can be done. Essentials of joining tables—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  Note - I would suggest saving off the joined file so as to make the Join permanent, as there are a few issues that come up from time to time when trying to symbolize data off a feature class that has been joined. Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

For the first part of your challenge, finding the CAD datasets in a folder can be accomplished by using an Iterator in Modelbuilder.  In this case Iterate Datasets looks like it will do the trick (See example in link): Examples of using iterators in ModelBuilder—Tools | ArcGIS Desktop note that even though the link takes one to an ArcGISPro help page on Iterators, the process is the same in ArcGIS Desktop (Esri documentation goof?) The key in using this iterator is to set the "Dataset Type (optional)" setting to CAD. Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

If I can suggest it, there is one more bit of functionality that I've seen in other tools that could be added to really make this rock.  How about adding an icon to the toolbar with the mouseover of "Buy Tim a drink" and the related functionality to allow users to make that happen.  Of course, you would have to make a design choice of your preferred beverage  Thanks for all the coding and the willingness to share it with the community! Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

I have not tried this option, but it might do what you are looking for: Using the interactive feature and record input controls—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

I'm also curious if someone has developed this (though I don't have an immediate need).  A year ago when we had a related thread on NextGen 911 it seemed like there was not alot of action by anyone to implement it yet.  Maybe that has changed? Next Generation 911 (NextGen) rollout?   Addressing  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

Not sure if this is what you are after, but I'll throw it out there: If the issue is that the lines are roughly parallell and close but not coincident, one solution to make them coincident so one could then follow up and dissolve them down to a single line is Integrate: Integrate—Data Management toolbox | ArcGIS Desktop  Caution - this tool alters the original data (i.e. does not make a new output like most geoprocessing tools do), so be sure to save off copies of your original data as backups.  Also, one typically has to do several trial runs to find the best XY Tolerance setting for use in the tool to provide the maximum effect with the least distortion. Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

Solutions to this depend on which rasters are being deleted - the final outputs or the intermediate files: If the rasters that are being deleted are the ones created along the way as part of the processing ("intermediates") and you want to keep them, one can arrange to have them retained in a few different ways.  Check out this topic to get a feel for how Modelbuilder handle file retention and some methods of keeping the intermediate files from being deleted: A quick tour of managing intermediate data—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  If the rasters being deleted are the final output, that issue can often be resolved by giving each final output an unique output filename (which differ from the input file names and other output file names).  In-line model variable substitution can be put to use here as one way to provide distinct file names  (See Example #2 in link below): Examples of inline model variable substitution—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more

A couple of ideas to play with: One possibility is to use an In-line Variable Substitution:  (See Example #1 in the link) Examples of inline model variable substitution—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  Another possibility is to use the Modelbuilder Environments: With the model open in Edit Mode, click on the word "Model" on the top left, then Model Properties..., Environments Tab, then in the list hit the plus sign next to Workspace to expand the listings.  Then put a check in the one you want to modify and hit the "Values" button. On the window that comes up, click on the word "Workspace" in the left to open a place where you can browse for the workspace. Also, if the issue is that you want the tool user to be able to browse to a different workspace each time the tool is run instead of it being set to the same workspace all the time (ie instead of "hard-coded"), you can set up Modelbuilder so the Parameter is Exposed.  If this is done, the tool will require the user to supply the location of the workspace each time it is run. Exposing tool parameters as variables—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop  Chris Donohue, GISP ... View more