Week 4 Lab: Attribute Data Manipulation and Building Geodatabase

Finish all tasks in Chapters 6 and 9 and follow the instructions of the “geodatabase exercise #1”. Answer and submit all questions listed at the end of this exercise.

Task Directions

Chapter 6

Task 4, Step 3: After clicking OK, you will be asked if you want to create an index. Indexing is a way to make searching more efficient in a data base. What it does involves the creation of a lookup table containing information of the "sorted key field" and the record number associated with the sorted record. Given the fact that sorting is the most
time consuming process in a huge database, the use of indexing greatly improves DB query performance. Click “Yes.”

Task 5, Steps 4-6: Clear the selection before coding the next elevation range.

Chapter 9

Task 4, Step 1b: open each of the tables and the attribute table for mosoils. Try to predict the key fields that will be used in the Relates that will link all of this data. This will help to make the subsequent steps make more sense.

Task 4, Steps 2 and 3: This can get confusing. It may help to draw a diagram of the tables and the keys before proceeding.

Geodatabase Exercise #1

This exercise asks you to use a predefined Geodatabase UML (Unified Modeling Language) to create a schema on an existing geodatabase. A database schema defines the physical implementation of database models. You need to examine the difference between the original and redefined geodatabases.

Click here to go to the instruction page for this exercise.

Questions

1) Explain how you would determine the key fields for a Relate if you needed to relate several tables.

2) Compare and contrast methods and results for Tasks 1 & 2 in Chapter 6.

3) What’s the difference between a Join and a Relate? When is one more appropriate than the other?

4) Chapter 6, Tasks 5, 6 and 7 all give methods to create new attribute data. Summarize each method and comment on when you might prefer that method.

5) Chapter 9, Task 4: What kind of willow is found in areas of frequent or occasional flooding?

6) Make up a problem for which the operations in Chapter 9, Task 6 would be useful.

7) In Geodatabase Exercise #1, what have changed after you apply the UML on the geodatabase? Make a table that lists the five feature classes: HydroEdge, HydroJunction, MonitoringPoint, Waterbody and Watershed and list the attributes that were added to these feature classes by the process of applying the ArcHydro schema. Explain the purposes of applying a UML to create a schema on an existing geodatabase.