Lab 10 - Flow Mapping

Here is my map and Process Summary from this week's "Flow Mapping" lab.

Process Summary:
1)              Read the lab materials
2)              Added the world.shp and states.shp shapefiles to the mxd
3)              Added scale, neatline, north arror etc… to the mxd
4)              Exported this out to an Adobe Illustrator file
5)              Ordered my layers in Illustrator
6)              Applied countries to each of the regions that will be addressed in the map.   Chose to include Greenland as part of Europe color-wise based on its Wikipedia article
7)              Ran my calculations on my Excel data to determine my line widths
8)              Added my lines to the map.   I felt that one of the things that the chapter emphasized that I didn’t see on some of the other blogs was the concept of making sure the line widths kind of added up together to form the new line width.   I tried to do this but it involved making my custom “arrowhead” instead of the built in ones that Illustrator provides.    Logistically I couldn’t get all my arrows to come into one place, so I broke it into two arrows coming into the US.
9)              Cleaned up the various map elements to get it ready for submittal
10)          Completed Metadata
11)          Uploaded to Dropbox and Blog

Lab 10 - Data Editing in ArcGIS

Here is the map and Process Summary for this week's assignment.

Process Summary:
1.       Read entire lab summary
2.      Answered Q1
3.      Opened ArcCatalog
4.      Created a Shapefile and played with the properties to see what can be done to it after creation
5.      Opened ArcMap
6.      Added the GulfCounty_Roads and GulfCounty_Parcels to my MXD
7.      Made sure the editor toolbar is active
8.      Answered Q2
9.      Started an Edit Session
10.  Did my select by Attribute to locate and zoom to the two parcels
11.  Performed the Merge
12.  Edited the Attributes of the newly merged parcel
13.  Saved my Edits and Stopped Editing
14.  Selected based on the Owner Name Attribute being equal to Gulf County
15.  Exported this selection out to a Shapefile and added it to the MXD
16.  Opened the attributes for the new shapefile
17.  Added a new field called “Acres” as type double to the attributes
18.  Answered Q3
19.  Used the “Calculate Geometry” tool to add the Acres to the shapefile
20.  Used the field calculator to set the rounding.
21.  Used the Definition Query tab of the properties to filter out parcels over 20 acres
22.  Answered Q4
23.  Added the map table VICD.dbf to the MXD
24.  Created the Join based on the Parcel ID with the County owned layer.
25.  Did a select by attribute to show the vacant parcels (two)
26.  Exported this out as a SuitableParcels shapefile
27.  Started an editing session and chose the Roads Layer to edit
28.  Selected the road by its FID attribute and zoomed to the feature
29.  Edited the road that was out of place.   Experimented with the various snapping tools.
30.  Answered Q5
31.  Saved my edits
32.  Added the new road for the subdivision using the Create Features button.
33.  Set the attributes for the new road.
34.  Saved the edits and stopped editing
35.  Edited the Metadata
36.  Started preparing the map for the deliverable
37.  Added an inset map to show general location
38.  Submitted work to dropbox and the blog

Lab 9 - Isopleth Mapping

Here is my map and Process Summary for this week's lab.

Process Summary

1)               Read entire lab first
2)               Copied my data from the R: drive to the S: drive
3)               Opened up the Georgia.ai file in Illustrator
4)               Created a new layer called CONTOURS
5)               Looks like there is very little data in the lab to tell you how to complete this lab.   Looks like we are supposed to use the textbook to create this assignment.
6)               Did my required reading and understood a lot more about the process.
7)               Used Illustrator to create the contour lines, primarily using the pencil tool
8)               Worked on labeling and creating the standard map features.
9)               I modified the scale bar (while maintaining the scale) to end at 50 instead of 100 miles
10)           I transformed the size of the diagram to use more space
11)           Answered the lab questions and filled in the metadata
12)           Turned in the assignment and posted to my blog.

Vector Analysis II

Here is my map and process summary for this week's assignment.    It was nice to fire up Python since the programming aspect of GIS is where I think my career path will eventually take me.

PART III: Process Summary Details
1.      Read entire lab (found this to be very helpful)

2.      Copied the data from the R: drive to my S: drive

3.      Started ArcGIS

4.      Added the “roads” data layer

5.      Opened up the Toolbox -> Analysis -> Proximity to find the Buffer tool

6.      Set my Output Feature class to be S:\IntroGIS\Week 9 -Vector Analysis II\Roads_Buffer.shp

7.      Added the Water shapefile to my MXD

8.      Added the “buffdiff” field to the attributes

9.      Selected all the lakes by the TYPE attribute and set the buffdist to 150

10.  Switched selection to lakes and set the buffdist to 500

11.  Cleared all selected features

12.  Created my next buffer and set to be saved as S:\IntroGIS\Week 9 -Vector Analysis II\Water_Buffer.shp

13.  Turned on the Roads and Roads_Buffer layers to see it all at once.

14.  Opened the ArcPy window

15.  Answered Q1

16.  Set up my command and ran it

17. Saved my work

18.  Answered Q2

19.  Added the fields to the Buffer layers and set them to equal 1

20.  Set the union tool parameters

21. Ran the tool

22.  Answered Q3

23.  Completed my union then set up the “Select By Attributes” to select the features where both of the inside buffers = 1.

24.  Exported the selection then added this back to the map.

25.  Turned off all layers except Roads, Water, and Buffer_Union_Export

26.  Answered Q4

27.  Added the conservation_areas to the project.

28.  Answered Q5

29.  I ran the Multipart to SinglePart tool

30.  Added the area column and noticed that the units are in square meters.

31.  Answered Q6

32.  Prepared the MAP jpeg and Process summary to turn in.



Lab 8 - Proportional Symbol Mapping

Fellow Argonauts,

Here is my submission for Week 8.   I struggled more with this lab than I have with the other labs.   It really makes me appreciate the power of ESRI's ArcGIS software to automate some of these features rather than doing them by hand like I did this week.



Process Summary

1)               Copied the data from the R: drive to my S: drive
2)               Read through the entire lab once to see what I’ll be doing
3)               Watched the Shape Tools video about Illustrator
4)               Started ArcMap
5)               Added the WHO European region to the map (from ArcGIS Online)
6)               I struggle with the process of re-projecting this.   I discussed it with a few students on the forum and finally Anne posted that you actually have to re-open the system fresh and add that re-projection as the first item in order to see the benefits of it.   Good to know for future labs and real-world use !
7)               Visited the wineinstitute.org site and went to the statistics area to download the PDF for the World Wine Consumption by volume
8)               Copied all of the data in to the Excel spreadsheet that was provided.
9)               Prepared my map for export to Illustrator by setting up my scale bars, titles, information, neat lines, etc…
10)           Exported to Illustrator
11)           Opened in Illustrator
12)           Set up my layers
13)           Arranged the Map in Illustrator to clean up some non-essential countries (Greenland, etc)
14)           Worked on my Excel file to calculate next
15)           Set the SQRT column
16)           Entered a fomula to compute the MAX of the column and then used this to help build the column with the parameter size.
17)           Placed my circles in Illustrator.  
18)           This lab fought me every step of the way.   If there was something wrong to be done, rest assured I did it.   I guess that is why I am taking these classes, to learn.

Intro to GIS - Vector 1 Lab

Here is my Process Summary for this lab:

Process Summary:

1.        Copied my Zip file over from R: to my S:\IntroGIS\Week 8 - Spatial Analysis Vector 1 directory
2.       Start ArcMap and open up the MXD
3.       When I saw the queries that they wanted (within 2000 feet of a school, etc…) I decided to test myself and see if I could do the query by myself.    I determined my answer for Q1, then I went back through this section step by step to see if my numbers matched.   Nope, I made a big mistake in my calculations because I was Adding my selection to the existing selection rather than selecting from within the results.
4.       Answered Q1
5.       Next created a Layer of the selection and renamed it to “Parcels Nearby” and hid it
6.       Next did the Enterprise Zone Query
7.       Answered Q2
8.       Next displayed the superact_risk_features layer
9.       Preformed the query.   Answered Q3
10.   Displayed the Flood Zones
11.   Cleared my Selected features
12.   Set up the query to see which parcels intersected the flood zones
13.   Performed the search by attributes and verified that there are 666 parcels in the flood zone.
14.   Pulled up the statistics to generate the Q4 answer
15.   Next, opened up all the layers under water.
16.   Performed a JOIN and saved it to the Lab7Data.gdb as JOIN_OUTPUT
17.   Did the Summary on the BASIN information
18.   Answered Q5
19.   Next worked on the spatial join to find the name and location of the nearest risk features to each of the water wells
20.   Answered Q6
21.   Worked on MetaData
22.   I found this lab to be a great introduction to some of the power that is available to the ArcGIS Analyst.    As a database guy myself, I still find myself saying “wow” when I think of the possibilities of integrating this power into my tabular systems.