Weird computer problems: ArcView 3.2 and text file
I had difficulty for quite a while today trying to open a data table to be joined with a Shapefile. Through VMware I usually use ArcView 3.2 rather than ArcGIS 9.2 to save some memory. However, I didn’t expect to come across these obstacles. Now I write them down to avoid getting frustrated again next time.
1. I clicked on “Tables” in the sidebar of ArcView but it would only take data in dBASE format, which is not supported by Office 2007 anymore (for whatever weird reason that I don’t know);
Solution: Click on “Add” on the topbar instead. It then accepts dBASE, INFO, and Delimited Text.
2. I saved my data file as Tab-Delimited text and then turned back to ArcView. But this time I got an error message: “STOP: The file ’XXXXX’ is not valid.”
Solution: After 10 minutes did I realize that it was because the very first cell of the “.txt” table was empty. So I want to remind myself never to save Excel file in other formats with the first cell blank, or with “ID” which may cause another problem (Archive: Weird computer problems).
3. I finally opened the txt file, and I joined it with the Shapefile based on the indicator column “AdcodeXX.” Names of new variables showed up in new columns -- but the field were all empty.
Solution: It happened because the indicator column in txt was formatted incorrectly. For instance, a value should be “310000” rather than “310000.0” which failed to be recognized on the other side.
4. I tried to make “Graduated Color” map for one variable but failed to do it because the variable was not recognized in number format.
Solution: Convert Text to Numbers in Microsoft Excel and then re-save the dBASE file. If necessary, check data format and redefine the “named range” following this direction: Excel to dBase. Another trick I did sometimes is to create a separate dBASE file with the common indicator and additional variables that I need, and then to “join” it back on. (ArcView doesn’t mind opening a shapefile if multiple columns are called the same name in the dBASE file, but it cannot distinguish these columns by different places.)