Latest Contributions by JohnSobetzer

In some prior instances on the Forums it turned out Workstation was not installed.  No workstation, no coverage tools.  If it is installed, do you see coverage tools in ArcCatalog when looking at the System Toolboxes?  If yes but not in ArcToolbox then you may have to add them manually by using Add Toolbox.  If they don't show in ArcCatalog you might try a reinstall? ... View more

#NIM059032 covers a request to add something like the map series TOC page to DDP. I haven't submitted an enhancement request on the DDP print yet because I provided feedback on the 10.1 forums for just such a thing.  But I think I'll submit one and let you know if I get a NIM# out of it. You could submit something on the Ideas forum to cover both. ... View more

I'd be interested in your workarounds.  I've noted this in my feedback on 10.1 beta and there's been no suggestion of any solutions in that forum.  Mapbook allowed exporting to pdf through mapbook or through the standard File - Export, and the latter could be used to export at any extent, such as a bookmark.  Since DDP uses only the File - Export method and forces that to use its extents, there is lost functionality. If one doesn't have Page definitions or the similar clips on a layer, then a workaround might be to disable the DDP and export to a "custom" extent, and then not save the project to preserve the DDP.  But Page definitions are part of what makes DDP an advance. I also converted one of my index layers to points and tried moving a couple to get them to produce the altered extents I wanted, with the idea of switching between index layers in DDP, but that was hit or miss in my one attempt. As a side note reflecting the use of Mapbook as a kind of catalog, it had a nice TOC tab that allowed moving between its pages, being able to see the full page names, and turning pages off or on quickly, which DDP lacks. ... View more

I find it much better to use Google to search for help.  I type in the product and the issue, (e.g. ArcGIS 10 classic editing) and I usually find something from ESRI as well as from others.  Here is one result: http://blogs.esri.com/Support/blogs/supportcenter/archive/2010/08/20/setting-the-edit-and-snapping-environments-in-arcgis-10-to-the-classic-9-x-format.aspx The classic editing combined with Start Editing Context Menu in 9.3.1 manages to start editing and select the layer in a single motion right and left click, with the third click to pick the sketch tool.  When I'm in 10.1 I also have to click a button to open the Feature Template window, then click on the layer to edit, then click to select a tool (usually I have to also click a drop down to get to it) and then click to close the template window since it gets in the way.  Maybe I'm doing something wrong, I don't use 10 to edit for my real work for many reasons (such as tables) so perhaps I can be enlightened at least on editing. ... View more

It's also greyed out in my 9.3.1.  I used the Enhanced Shapefile Creator Arcscript in ArcMap to create new shapefiles with imported fields in 9x.  It won't install in my 10x which is unfortunate.  For existing shapefiles I would either create a new one and copy the features into it, or I take a copy of an existing one with the fields I wanted, delete its features, and then add new ones to it. ... View more

It really isn't a match without the vertices matching due to the limitations of precision, but snapping of the vertices that "matter" mixed with visual matching for other vertices or the edge between them might look good.  But if your question is how to make two lines actually edge match easily, you can try using the Integrate tool, setting up a topology and validating it, or if there aren't many inserting additional vertices and snapping.  In 9x there was a zipper tool.  Alternately you could try copying and pasting one line into the target and deleting the old or tracing the other line and if needed manually attributing the line or using spatial adjustment to transfer attributes before deleting the old. ... View more

This may also be present in 10.1 although one case hardly proves it.  I rarely use 10.1 for editing since I much prefer 9.3.1 for that, but I have used the trace tool on 10.1 a few times and twice ran into issues with it that surprised me.  If I had seen this thread I would have explored the matter more.  As it was in one case the cut polygon tool trace along another shapefile polygon just stopped and no matter what I did I couldn't get it to continue past that point.  I zoomed in some to see what the problem was but it didn't help.  After several failures I just did it on my 9.3.1.  In the second case, well that's so weird I'd have to test it again to believe it. ... View more

That is a nice explanation John correlating the new templates to the older procedures. It is quicker to set up editing in the classic mode if one has also installed the Start Editing Context Menu code.  Then all one has to do is right click on the layer one wants to edit, and click on Start Editing.  That selects the workspace and the target and makes it the only selectable layer to start, then one selects the tool and one is ready to go.  No additional clicking of tools, targets or windows to get out of the way.  Unfortunately this code goes into the Visual Basic editor and hence I didin't find any way to make it work in 10 even in classic mode.  It would be nice if 10 had something similar. ... View more

This may help some: http://blogs.esri.com/Support/blogs/mappingcenter/archive/2009/11/18/Using-the-Buffer-Tool-in-ArcToolbox-_2800_and-comparing-with-the-Buffer-Wizard-in-ArcMap_2900_.aspx ... View more

That's what I thought Jeff. but I wanted to make sure. I did some testing.  I am using the 10.1 beta.  The first script I had didn't include the line that begins with Print.  It produced geotiffs that were roughly compressed to 70% of the lengths in the E-W direction and somewhat rotated counterclockwise.  (When I first noticed this the helpful ESRI tech person indicated he was getting somewhat strange results and said he would look at it further to see if it was a bug.) Next I added the print line and nothing seemed to change in the result but I did see a message box indicating it was exporting page 1 then page 2, .... I used for my export width and heights numbers I got just using a straight export to geotiff at the resolution I wanted.  I wondered if the problem was in those numbers. So I exported a layout to tif and found the widths and heights from that and then used those in the script.  I got a much better result roughly compressed to 99% of the lengths in the E-W direction with a very slight rotation.  So now in my rather arcpy ignorant mind I'm thinking this really is the key to the problem.  Would that be it? If so my question to you is how does one determine what the widths and height parameters should be in order to get a perfect match of the geotiff to the original data? Having said all this, I note that it is still the View that is being exported to geotiff, not the layout.  Is there a method in ArcPy to alternately export the entire Layout to georeferenced tif so that the map legend gets included? ... View more

Should this produce a geotiff?  The sample I was given provided for geotiff tags and it also required export widths and heights which seems to match up with the notion of exporting a view.  But then again it failed to properly georeference the results. I can't seem to find any ability to control the quality & dpi of the result either in this sample.  It didn't seem to zoom to the extents either.  So I'm obviously missing something. ... View more

If you are using 9x you can get a wonderful Arcscript called Zoom through features/bookmarks and export to graphics file.  If will produce geotiffs and other rasters from the view, and other rasters or pdfs from the layout.  I would love to run it on 10x but I can't install it. If you are using 10x there is the possibility of using arcpy but the script that was nicely provided to me by an ESRI staffer produced odd results and it was determined there was a bug.  I don't know if the bug was in 10.1, both 10.0 and 1 or in the arcpy module. ... View more

If your tables share an attribute table field and value, you can join on that field. If you have many fields to add or update export to a new shapefile and delete the fields you don't want. If you only have a field or two to update, add them to the target shapefile and use the calculator to copy from the joined table to the new, then remove the join. If the tables share no linking fields, you could try a spatial join but that will need checking to be sure it worked properly with odd shaped polygons.  If the tables are by default sorted such that each row matches that in the other, you could make a copy of your shapefiles, and then open the dbfs in Excel (older than 2010) or Open Office's spreadsheet, and then copy and paste fields from the source dbf to the target, then delete the fields you don't want.  Don't sort and don't touch the shape field. One other possible option if your license allows, the shapes match very closely and you want to replace the entire table.  Use the Polygon to Lines and Polygon to Points (inside polygon checked) tools on both shapefiles.  Then use the lines from the target layer and points from the source to build new polygons with new attributes. ... View more

If Windows Explorer was used to copy the coverages from one computer to another, or otherwise move them around, the coverages can fail because the associated INFO folder isn't present or properly updated.  ArcCatalog should be used to move the coverages, or the coverages should be converted to e00 files, then moved (by Windows Explorer or ArcCatalog), then imported back to coverages.  So you might use ArcCatalog to delete the coverages on the machine where they are failing, and then use it again to copy the coverages on the computer that are functioning properly or to create the e00s to move over to where they failed. One complication.  Sometimes even ArcCatalog doesn't get rid of an INFO table properly so if copying the coverage fails you might look for a table that has the same name in ArcCatalog, perhaps with an xcode extension, and delete that, refresh ArcCatalog and then try to copy. ... View more

Don't use the mulitpart option or on your already existing dissolve, select all your lines and explode them. ... View more