Batch point generation not working

[JonStander]

I've been trying to map out a watershed for an area and I'm almost done, but the BPG button for ArcHydro (the little yellow X) isn't working properly. Apparently when I use it and click on a location a window is supposed to pop up that is supposed to create the batch point layer and where I'm supposed to name it "BatchPoint" followed by a second window where I name the actual point and put a description.  But currently when I click on a location it skips the first window entirely and just goes to the name/description window.  The "BatchPoint" layer doesn't seem to exist at all because I don't see it as a selectable file, nor can I find it anywhere else. Filling out the name/description window seems to do absolutely nothing. Is there something wrong with my installation or some other problem I don't know about?

Thanks in advance.

[MarkBoucher]

Have you verified that your target locations are correct?

[JonStander]

What do you mean?

[MarkBoucher · Accepted solution]

Arc Hydro uses "target locations". These are locations where the raster and the vector data is written when it is created. This keeps you from having to create folders and a geodatabase and also telling Arc Hydro where to put/get data. The BatchPoint features should be written to the geodatabase and dataset for the vector data. If these targets are not set correctly, Arc Hydro will possibly put the data in the wrong place and even overwrite a previous project's data!

Below is a copy and paste from a doc I wrote for myself a while back and just updated slightly to help keep target locations straight.

Hope this helps:

*********************************************************************************************************************

If you are starting a new mxd and adding the dem and vector layers to start your Arc Hydro project, Arc Hydro will set the Target Locations automatically and you don't have to mess with them.

If you want to check them they should follow the pattern below:

Given:

mxd path = C:\MyProjectFolder\

mxd name = MyProject.mxd

data frame name = MyDataFrame (The default is "Layers" in all mxds. If you change the data frame name BEFORE running any Arc Hydro function or else you will need to reset the target locations.)

You can check the target locations using the Arc Hydro tool bar menu:

ApUtilities>Set Target Locations>HydroConfig

• Map Level     Map Name:      MyDataFrame

     Raster target location path:      C:\MyProjectFolder\

     Vector target location:              C:\MyProjectFolder\MyProject.gdb

With these settings, the raster data is stored in a folder:  C:\MyProjectFolder\MyDataFrame and the vector data is stored in a geodatabase and feature dataset: C:\MyProjectFolder\MyProject.gdb\MyDataFrame

When you look under ApUtilities>Set Target Locations>HydroConfig should be the target location setup.

If you save the mxd and data to another location, you will need to make sure the target locations are corrected or else the results of the Arc Hydro functions will end up in the old target! This will be confusing for Arc Hydro and may lead to other errors.

There is a utility the resets the Target Locations. This is really handy. If you move the mxd and data, you can reset the target locations using the following utility:  ApUtilities>Additional Utilities>Reset Target Locations

[JonStander]

Thanks for the help!  But I actually fixed the problem through another (easier) method which I'll put here for posterity.

First, going to Watershed Processing > Data Management Watershed Delineation and setting the "Batch Point" option to "Null".

Second, going to ApUtilities > XML Manager and from there going to HydroConfig > TemplateView > ApLayers > ApLayer(BatchPoint) and right-clicking to get EditAttributes.  From there changing the name from BatchPoint to something else and saving that.