Exercise 1: Setting up the production editing environment (Production Mapping)

Complexity: Beginner Data Requirement: ArcGIS.com Goal: Set up the editing environment, which includes the product library, as well as configure a metadata favorite.

To set up the production environment in Esri Production Mapping, you need to define the product library and the production database. The product library contains rules for displaying fields on the Create Attributes, Update Attributes, and Metadata Attributes windows. These rules are defined by field configuration settings and include the fields that have been defined as feature-level metadata. The production database is the editing workspace to which the rules are applied.

A metadata favorite is a group of feature-level metadata attributes that are present in your data and can be saved and reused during edit sessions. If you have a feature-level metadata attribute that can be manually populated, you can create metadata favorites based on different values for that attribute.

In this exercise, you are going to choose a product library and production database. After that, you are going to create a feature-level metadata favorite and customize it for the data in the Edit_Sample workspace.

Exercise 1a: Choosing the product library

In this part of the exercise, you are going to set the product library to define how the attributes in the Feature Manager are displayed and the validation rules that will be run.

See the Configuring product library for editing tutorial to learn how to configure the product library.

Steps:

1. Start ArcMap.
2. Click the Open button on the Standard toolbar.
3. Navigate to the installation directory for the Feature Manager tutorial and select the FeatureManager.mxd file.
4. Click Open.
5. On the main menu, click Customize > Production > Toolbar Settings > Editing.

   If the ArcMap Setting Change Warning appears, click OK.

6. Click the Product Library button on the Production Editing toolbar to open the Product Library window.

   A tree view of the product library appears.
Note:

If the product library workspace has not been previously set, it is automatically set when the FeatureManager.mxd file is opened.

7. Right-click Product Library and click Select Product Library.

   The Choose Product Library Workspace dialog box appears.

8. Navigate to the installation location for the Feature Manager tutorial and choose the EditSample.gdb file.
9. Click Open.

   A new Data Models level appears in the Product Library tree view under the Product Library level. You should also see additional levels under the Production Data level. If you expand all the levels under the Edit_Sample.gdb, you will see that the Edit (1.0.0.0) data model appears in bold. This indicates that any rules configured in the product library for the Edit (1.0.0.0) data model will be used when editing data with Production Mapping.

Your ArcMap session is now configured to use the validation rules stored in the product library you selected. In Exercises 2 and 3 when you view the attributes in the Create Attributes or Update Attributes windows or click Apply to validate an attribute combination, the information that will be used for your data’s display and validation will come from this product library.

Exercise 1b: Creating a feature-level metadata favorite

Feature-level metadata attributes are attributes on features that contain information about how the feature was collected or modified. Attributes are defined as feature-level metadata attributes in the product library. The product library you chose in Exercise 1a contains three feature-level metadata attributes: creation_date, operator, and originating_source.

In this part of the exercise, you will create a metadata favorite. When you start editing and set a metadata favorite, it ensures that the attributes for the feature-level metadata fields will be automatically populated as changes are made to features. In this exercise you are going to set the metadata favorite, and in Exercises 2 and 3 you are going to edit features to see these attributes populated.

Steps:

1. Click the Production Start Editing button on the Production Editing toolbar.
   Note:

   The Manage Features and Create Attributes, Update Attributes, or Metadata Attributes windows automatically appear when you start an edit session using the Production Start Editing tool.

   Tip:

   If the Create Attributes, Update Attributes, or Metadata Attributes window does not appear when you start an edit session, click the Show/Hide Attributes button on the Manage Features window.

2. Click the Metadata tab on the Manage Features window.
3. Right-click on the Metadata tab and click Use FCT Metadata to enable it.
4. Right-click on the Metadata tab and click New Favorite.

   The New Feature Metadata Favorite dialog box appears.

5. Type Imagery in the Name text box.
6. Type Features collected from image in the Description text box.
7. Click OK.

   The metadata favorite is added to the Metadata tab.
8. Click the Imagery - Features collected from image favorite.

   Notice that three attributes appear in the Metadata Attributes window: creation_date, operator, and originating_source. The creation_date field is not editable and displays #date#. This indicates that the field will automatically be populated with the current date and time stamp when a feature is created. Notice that the operator field is not editable and displays #username#. This indicates that the field will automatically be populated with your login name when a feature is created or modified. The originating_source field is blank.

9. Click the Field Value cell next to originating_source.
10. Type Satellite Imagery.

11. Click Apply on the Metadata Attributes window.

The attributes are now set and will be used when you create or modify features. You can use steps 4–11 to create additional favorites using different values for the originating_source field. When performing edits you can choose the favorite that matches your data.

In this exercise, you have defined the workspace for the product library and production database, which are the base for your editing environment. You have also created a metadata favorite using the feature-level metadata attributes stored in the product library. To apply the metadata to features, proceed to Exercise 2: Working with the Create tab.