Is it possible to create fields in FGDB that will automatically populate with lat/long when feature is collected?

[DaveTewksbury]

Wondering if there is a field type that can be set to automatically populate a field with lat and a field with long when a feature is collected using Collector.

Also would like to create a field that creates consecutively numbered stations as they are collected. Looking to have the field essentially be previous station # +1 without having to manually input the number.

Appreciate any thoughts.

thanks

[BenGrod]

Dave,

As I understand it, both questions are not possible yet. I heard at the last conference I attended (March 2015) that Esri is working on a future Collector release which will append and populate all of the common GPS fields and readings you might associate with higher grade equipment (PDOP, Elevation, Latitude, Longitude, etc.)  At this point in time, if you want to autopopulate fields you would have to build the mobile application in ArcGIS Mobile and custom the data entry programmatically or perhaps the ArcPad route. Though I would be happy to be proven wrong if anyone in the community could point out the options or process to auto populate X/Y in Collector. Hope this helps and good luck!

[DaveTewksbury]

Thanks, I'll keep my eyes open for a future version of Collector.

Dave

[MiaogengZhang]

Collector doesn't support this capability yet. But if you have exported collected feature into File GDB or your data is in ArcSDE, you can take a look at Calculate geometry in ArcMap or Attribute Assistant (desktop solution) and see if it can apply to your workflow as a workaround.

[DaveTewksbury]

Thank you

Dave Tewksbury

GIS and Tech support

Dept. of Geosciences

Hamilton College

Clinton, NY

[BenGrod]

Miaogeng, thank you for the reply and confirmation. In line with this question do you have any knowledge that the next release will or will not included Lat/Long and elevation fields? Thanks in advance!

[MiaogengZhang]

Ben, next release focus on bug fix. It won't include Lat/Long auto-population capability.

[DaveTewksbury]

First off, thanks to everyone who has responded to this. Hopefully a new version of Collector will have these fields enabled.

Data exported from ArcGIS Online (AGOL) as a file geodatabase and opened in ArcMap will show latitude and longitude location of points when they are queried using the Identify tool. However there is no location data in the attribute table associated with the data. If lat/long data is needed I found that exporting the points from ArcMap as a shapefile, adding fields for lat & long to the shapefile attribute table and using calculate geometry to populate the cells with lat and long values worked. This attribute table can then be joined to the attribute table associated with the original file geodatabase to append lat/long cells to each of the points in the table.

As far as I have seen it is not possible to simply add fields and calculate geometry directly to the file geodatabase attribute table. You can add fields, but the calculate geometry function is grayed out.

Dave

[MiaogengZhang]

I am not sure why you can't calculate geometry directly from FGDB. That is out of my knowledge. FYI, I tried it with ArcMap 10.2.2 and it worked fine.

[DaveTewksbury]

Miaogeng,

Can you outline how your created fields that would calculate geometry in

FGDB. I found if I opened the attribute table of a feature class in the

FGDB exported to ArcMap that I could add a field but the calculate geometry

function was grayed out in the pulldown for the field. Also working in

10.2.2

thanks,

Dave