Esri Mapping Center - Ask a Cartographer

How to apply a stylefile to an Integer field

December 16 2008 | 2 comments
Categories: ArcGIS Methods, Symbology

Hi

I have symbols (fill, line and marker) which have a numeric name e.g. 4201 in a stylefile.

I want to use a field in my dataset, which contains the corresponding numbers as integer values, and use the 'Match symbols to Style' option in the layer symbology. However when i try and do Match Symbols it does not apply the symbology. I believe this is due to the name of the symbols being text in the stylefile and the field containing integer values. However I am not in a position to create an additional field in the dataset containing text versions of the field.

Please can you tell me how I can do this.

thanks

Mapping Center Answer:

If your data is in a geodatabase, you can use a Coded Value Domain on the integer field to assign descriptions that match your style's symbols names.

The other route you can use is to open your style with MS Access and you can easily (faster than in ArcMap) change the names of the symbols to match your integer values.

Reply to answer posted by Caroline Levey on Dec 18 2008 1:58AM

Thank you for your answer but I am not sure what you mean.
the names in the style file do match the integer values.....Integer value 4201 Name of symbol in stylefile 4201.
I cannot change the field type in Access as there are string values for names as well in the stylefile.

Unfortunately I am still using Shapefiles so the geodatabase option won't work - but very useful for future reference.

Do you have any more suggestions?

Options on editing the field posted by Jaynya Richards on Dec 19 2008 9:12AM

Wihout administrative rights to edit the original file, you are a little limited on what you can do. But here's an option: There isn't any way around it -- you must be able to edit the data in order to add the string field. So, how do you get that ability you might ask? If permissions are simply not granted for the original or it's just not possible, make a local copy of the shapefile, then do the edits to make the map work, and then ask to have that copy of the data replace the original so others can take advantage of the improvements you've made. Eventually your copy may become the defacto shapefile to use.

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