Introductory Exercises for GIS Using ArcMap & ArcCatalog

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The above buttons from left to right are:Pan (no zooming)Zoom to full extentZoom-in (fixed amount)Zoom-out (fixed amount)Return to previous extentThese other icons are also used to zoom in and out.The zoom to full extent is convenient when you havelayers from different geographical areas. For example,clicking on this in a view with Middlefield soils andConnecticut roads turned on would zoom so that bothlayers would be fully visible in the display. If you havezoomed in too far, the fixed zoom out will get you backto a recognizable extent while staying centered in thesame place.Creating a New Shapefile from Selected FeaturesWe want to create a boundary shapefile that represents only the town of Middlefield. We canaccomplish this by selecting features from the Connecticut-wide Towns data layer and saving thatselection as a new layer.Turn off all layers except the Towns layerIn the table of contents, right click on the layer name and select “Open Attribute Table”The attribute table for the layer will be displayedDouble click the “TOWN” column header. This will sort the data by town alphabetically.Scroll down to “Middlefield” and click the cell in the far left column (grey box) corresponding tothat row. This will select the desired row and it will be shown highlighted in blue.Right click on highlighted row in the far left column and select “Zoom to Selected”. This willchange the map display to show the selected town. Keep in mind that you can move the attributetable if it is in the way.In the table of contents, right click the Town layer again and select “Selection”, then “Create Layerfrom Selected Feature”. This will add a new layer file to the table of contents named “Townsselection” and it will be displayed in the map view. A layer file (.lyr) is a type of data layer thatstores source data and data properties (i.e., it references another file, rather than being a standalonefile).Now we want to save this selection layer file as a new shapefile to use as a template for clipping data.12
In the toolbox window, select “Conversion Tools”, then “To Shapefile”, then “Feature Class toShapefile (multiple). This will open a dialog box for the tool.Select the new layer (Towns selection) from the dropdown list in “Input Features”. It will beadded to the list below the dropdown list.Select the Output Folder by clicking the folder icon. Navigate to the folder where you want tosave the new shapefile, then click “Add”. Keep in mind that you want the folder name to bedisplayed in the “Name” box, so you may need to navigate up to that folder from the default. Thefull file path will be displayed in the Output Folder box.Click “OK”Once the tool is complete, add the new data layer (follow “Add Data” process you completedabove). The file name will be Towns selection.shp.Turn off all other data layers to see just the Middlefield polygon you just created.There will be two layers in the table of contents with the same name (Towns selection). The layerat the top of the list is the layer you just added (the new shapefile) and the second layer is the layerfile that is dynamic and dependent on the selection from the Connecticut-wide Town layer. Deletethe second layer in the list with this name (the dynamic layer file), leaving just the newly createdshapefile, by right clicking on the layer file in the table of contents and selecting “Remove”.Extracting DataWe can now “clip” or crop the data from the other Connecticut-wide data using the Middlefield templateyou just created. Clipping has two benefits: 1) your presentation maps will not include extraneous dataand 2) your file size will be smaller (assuming you remove the larger scale data files after the clipping,of course).In the toolbox display “Analysis Tools”, then “Extract”, then “Clip”. This will open a dialog boxfor the Clip tool.Select the Hydrography layer from the dropdown list of Input Features.Select the Middlefield shapefile you created from the dropdown list under Clip Features. Set the file name and file path for the output by clicking the button next to “Output FeatureClass”. Save the file in your “Middlefield” folder and name the file Middlefield_hydro" Leave the XY tolerance blank and click “OK” to run the tool.13
Page 1 and 2: Introductory Exercises for GIS Usin
Page 3 and 4: Now scroll to the section labeled
Page 5 and 6: Using ArcCatalogArcGIS shapefiles c
Page 7 and 8: Click “Add”, then “OK, then
Page 9 and 10: Navigate to the correct directory a
Page 11: Notice that ArcMap asks whether you
Page 15 and 16: There are several lakes found throu
Page 17 and 18: Click on the edge of Beseck Lake in
Page 19 and 20: Part II: Locating Prime Farmland in
Page 21 and 22: Prime Farmland Soils Prime Farmlan
Page 23 and 24: You have now located and effectivel
Page 25 and 26: Choose Aggregated Farmland and Buff
Page 27 and 28: You have now identified the most su
Page 29: Each element can be edited individu

Introductory Exercises for GIS Using ArcMap & ArcCatalog

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