The ArcPad Team Blog

Unofficial stuff from the team behind the World's leading mobile GIS platform

Friday, July 30, 2010

Export AXF data to Shapefile or Excel Spreadsheet

Data in an AXF file can be exported to shapefiles using tools in ArcPad Studio.In this example I opened Riverside.axf sample file in ArcPad Studio.Right click on the Poles feature layer and click on the “Export…” menu item.Then in the “Export to Shapefile” dialogue window I can type in the name for this shapefile and save it.









If only a DBF file is needed for Poles layer, I would right click on the “Poles” sub-layer and select the “Export…” item. Then save the DBF file in the “Export to DBF file” window. The DBF file can be opened and viewed in MS Excel.






There's another way to view AXF data in Excel.
We need to open the AXF data table first in ArcPad Studio.



Then right click on the data table and select the “Export to Miscrosoft Excel” item. Excel program is automatically opened on your computer and the data is shown in the spreadsheet now.



Tuesday, July 27, 2010

ArcPad project wins a ESRI UC 2010 SAG

The ESRI SAG Awards often fly under the radar - there is a very long list, and the titles often don't give anything away about what the project actually was about.

This year our friends at ESRI Muscat were instrumental in securing a SAG award for the Ministry of National Economy in Oman - CONGRATULATIONS!

ArcPad was at the core of this recently completed Oman building and establishment census. Customization was a key part of this project and the ESRI Muscat team pushed ArcPad and ArcPad Studio to the max to deliver an exemplarily software and hardware solution for this project. Some key elements of the customization were:
  • Custom check-out tools that packaged the required features and layers for each user for each day
  • Every form was completely bilingual
  • Forms intelligently represented attributes from complex relationships in human understandable manner (not in database order or style)
  • Forms enforced complex business rules (eg: ‘if this field x populated with value y, do not display fields a,b,c, else, a,b,c are mandatory’)
The system was designed to support approximately 300 field workers spread across over 20 offices, and all data was synchronized to a central enterprise GIS.

Did your ArcPad project win an award too? I'm sorry we couldn't find it in the list - please tell us about your ArcPad successes!

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

ArcPad 8.0 Service Pack 4 is available for download

ArcPad 8.0 Service Pack 4 is available for download at ESRI's support website:

http://resources.arcgis.com/content/patches-and-service-packs?fa=viewPatch&PID=26&MetaID=1628

Service Pack 4 addresses four very specific issue only:

  1. There is now an increase in available memory whilst running ArcPad, particular noticeable on VGA Windows Mobile devices
  2. JPEG2000 images are now loaded incrementally avoiding critically low memory states
  3. (Layer) extension developers can set their layer to be dynamic or non-dynamic (missing in 8.0.0 – 8.0.3)
  4. GPS on Windows XP rugged tablet PC’s can now be turned off successfully using the GPS Activate/Deactivate tool

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

ArcPad in UC2010 Plenary

Here's a couple of screen shots from Jack's plenary presentation highlighting ArcPad's place in the ESRI suite.
Hear & See Jack's full presentation @ www.esri.com/uc

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

UC2010– Advanced Customizing Sessions




Good News!


The ArcPad - Advanced Customizing of ArcPad Solutions sessions have been confirmed for the ESRI UC2010.



Session 1: Wednesday July 14 @ 08:30am - 09:45am - Room 30E


Session 2: Thursday July 15 @ 1:30pm - 2:45pm - Room 30E (encore session)


Learn to move beyond simple forms and toolbars.

Elvin and Gareth will show you how to build mobile GIS applications using ArcPad 10.

In-depth discussion of various topics plus many tips and trick to enhance your ArcPad experience.








Wednesday, July 07, 2010

ArcPad Cool Ten @ ESRIUC


Thanks Glenn for publishing and enhancing our

10 Cool ArcPad things to do at 2010 ESRIUC.


Find the ArcPad team at the mobile island or at any of the sessions
and share your experiences.

Friday, July 02, 2010

ArcPad 10: Compatibility with ArcGIS 9.3 and ArcGIS 10




Now that ArcPad 10 is available for download, here is a quick reminder about the compatibility of ArcPad 10 with ArcGIS 9.3 and ArcGIS 10.


ArcPad Data Manager:


At the time of the ArcPad installation, if you have ArcGIS 9.3, the ArcPad 8.0 Data Manager will automatically be installed. If you have ArcGIS 10, the ArcPad 10.0 Data Manager will automatically be installed.


The ArcPad 10.0 Data Manager is only compatible with ArcGIS 10.


ArcGIS Server ArcPad Extension:


The ArcGIS Server ArcPad Extension was first released with ArcPad 8. If you are using ArcGIS Server 9.3, you will require the ArcGIS Server ArcPad 8 Extension. If you are using ArcGIS Server 10, you will require the ArcGIS Server ArcPad 10 Extension.


At the time of the ArcPad installation, if you have ArcGIS 9.3, the ArcGIS Server ArcPad 8 Extension will automatically be installed. If you have ArcGIS 10, the ArcGIS Server ArcPad 10 Extension will automatically be installed.


Both ArcPad 8 and ArcPad 10 can synchronize with either ArcGIS Server ArcPad Extension release.


For more information about ArcPad 10 please visit the ArcGIS Resource Centre or refer the ArcPad 10 Help.

Thursday, July 01, 2010

Basemap Image Tiles for ArcPad 10


You can create a basemap for ArcPad 10 from any ArcGIS map by using image tiles.
This post explains how to do this in 5 steps:
  1. Preparing your map in ArcMap.

  2. Publishing your map to ArcGIS Server.

  3. Creating image tiles for your map.

  4. Subscribing to your map in ArcPad 10.

  5. Copying your image tiles to ArcPad.

Step 1: Preparing your map in ArcMap
Your map must be in ArcGIS Online Web Mercator projection (WGS_1984_Web_Mercator_Auxilary_Sphere). This is because ArcPad 10 currently assumes data is coming from an ArcGIS Online Web Mercator service. Open your data in ArcMap and open the Data Frame properties. You will fine Web Mercator under Predefined > Projected Coordinate Systems > World > WGS 1984 Web Mercator (Auxiliary Sphere).



Step 2: Publishing your map to ArcGIS Server
I'll assume that you have installed ArcGIS Server and have some familiarity in publishing maps. For our purposes, there's nothing special in this step, use your favour technique to publish your map with ArcGIS Server, i.e. either from within Catalog or through the ArcGIS Server Manager.



Step 3: Creating image tiles for your map
You'll need to create ArcGIS Online compatible map tiles for your service in Exploded storage format. This can be achieved through the following steps.
  1. Use Catalog to manage your ArcGIS Server

  2. Right click on your service and select Service Properties

  3. Click Caching tab

  4. Click Using tiles from cache that you will define below

  5. Click on "Load tiling scheme from ..." and select "ArcGIS Online / Bing Maps / Google Maps"

  6. Scales from "1:591,657,527.591555" down to "1:1,128.497176" will be prefilled for you.

  7. For now, delete every scale except for the top 3, i.e. keep "1:591,657,527.591555", "1:295,828,763.795777" and "1:147,914,381.897889" (so that we can create the tiles and test them in ArcPad).

  8. Change the Storage Format from "Compact" to "Exploded".

  9. Click on "Create Tiles..." button and follow the wizard.

  10. Verify that the tiles are created by opening File Explorer on your ArcGIS Server machine and checking the C:\arcgisserver\arcgiscache\(yourmapservice)\Layers\_allLayers folder and you should see subfolders "L00", "L01", "L02" each containing some image tiles.

Step 4: Subscribing to your map in ArcPad 10

  1. Start ArcPad 10.

  2. Select "Add Data from Server..."

  3. Ensure the Service Type is "ArcGIS Online Service"

  4. Enter the URL of your website, i.e. http://yourwebsite.com

  5. Click on the Refresh services button

  6. Select your map's service

  7. Click Ok

  8. You'll be prompted to save the (yourmapservice).nmf file (Note where your saving this to)

  9. At this stage, some map tiles may begin to download from ArcGIS Server to ArcPad

Step 5: Copying your image tiles to ArcPad

Recall in Step 3 we created the image tiles and verified where they were in ArcGIS Server. The ArcGIS Server tiles are in the same tile cache format that ArcPad uses so you can bulk copy the tiles so that you'll always have an offline copy of the tiles in ArcPad.

  1. Open File Explorer

  2. Navigate to the folder where you saved your (yourmapservice).nmf file

  3. Show Hidden Folders (In Windows 7, Organize > Folder and Search options > View > Show hidden files, folders and drives).

  4. Open the hidden service folder for your map service

  5. Note the directory structure looks like (yourmapservice)\Layers\_allLayers

  6. Copy the directory from your ArcGIS Server machine's C:\arcgisserver\arcgiscache\(yourmapservice)\Layers\_allLayers folder

And that's it, now you have a complete offline copy of the tile caches. Now that you're happy, you can create more scales by repeating Step 3, 4 and 5 but keeping more than the top 3 scales. (You'll need to click on Delete Cache in your Map Service properties before you're allowed to recreate it with more scales).

When you're happy with the tiles, you can deploy this to your device. You should deploy both the (yourmapservice).nmf file and the entire (yourmapservice) folder tree. If you don't deploy the (yourmapservice) folder tree you'll need to have a data connection on your device so you can download the tiles on the fly.

Register for ArcPad Special Interest Group


Hi everyone,


If you are heading along to the lil' shin dig we're throwing for the launch of ArcPad 10 next week in San Diego, we welcome you to register for the ArcPad Special Interest Group. This session is designed to allow you, as users, to discuss your issues/wants/needs for the product rather than listen to someone from the ArcPad waffle on.




The session will be held on Wednesday 14th July, 16:30 – 17:30 in room 31B. Please email Kerry Somerville – ArcPad Product Manager to register for this.




We look forward to seeing and even more importantly, hearing from you!