In GIS. The professor told us what they expect on the disk, but not how to actually create the disk with all of the needed files so the map will open on any computer in ArcMap. I'm *hoping* someone here knows how to do this.

3/28/2007 9:55:12 AM

I've used ArcMap and done alot of GIS and don't know what you are talking about.

3/28/2007 10:02:38 AM

I'd guess he probably just means to make sure all your source data is available on whatever disk you're turning in. Local shapefiles, grids, or whatever else you're including vs. internet or network based links to geodatabases and/or gis services.

Make sense?

3/28/2007 10:06:07 AM

One of the things that you need to do to accomplish this is to go to the file/map properties and check the box to use relative data paths. Then you just need to make sure you include all of your shapefiles along with the arcmap file and maintain their origional file structure. Your instructor should have given detailed instructions on how to do this. Otherwise, the instructions are probably in your online tutorials.

3/28/2007 10:51:27 AM

^Not at all. You'd be surprised at how vague this course is with assignments. And it's online, so it's not like I get in class instruction. >.<

I'm going to go in a fiddle with it and hope it works.

3/28/2007 12:13:40 PM

Quote :

"Making Projects Transportable ArcMap map documents (*.mxd files) contain all of the information defining the layers, data frames, layouts, scripts and graphs that you are working on in a particular project; however, they do not contain the data itself. Instead, the map document stores the name and disk location (i.e., the pathname) of the data - its source. Changes to a map document do not affect the data source, except for specific functions such as adding fields or editing shapes. To make a map document “transportable” (i.e. readable and usable on another computer) the map document file and all the relevant data files (e.g. *.shp, *.dbf, *.sbn, *.sbx, *.shx) must be copied together. You must therefore keep track of all the data you use and layers you create carefully. There is another complication in transporting a map document from one machine to another or onto different disk drives (floppy or hard). When defining your project, ArcMap records the absolute pathname of all the data files used by default. For example, reference may be made to your “world94.dbf” file as: “u:\assign1\world94.dbf”. This directive will not be understood if you (or we) attempt to open your map document from a different computer even though you have copied all the files to a floppy disk. To fix the problem you must instruct ArcMap to record the location of data files using the relative pathname - the list of folders traversed to reach the data files starting from the location of the map document itself. For example, if the map document resides in the folder “assign1" and the data files reside in a folder within “assign1" called “world”, the pathname stored would be “\world\world94.dbf”. If all of the files are in the same folder (not a bad idea), the pathname is simply the file name. To have ArcMap reference data using relative pathnames, use the pull-down menu: (Files > Map Properties), click the Data Source Options button, select “Store relative pathnames” and click “OK”. Note: Pathnames, including the names of map documents and spatial data sets, should not contain spaces or unusual characters such as #, @, &, *, etc. Use the underscore character _ to create spaces in names if needed. Although ArcMap allow spaces in names, the spaces create problems for certain functions. Thus it is wise to avoid them entirely."

3/28/2007 12:20:09 PM