An overview of running data checks

Checks are tools that allow you to validate your data based on specific conditions. Some of the checks allow you to search for conditions, such as polygon slivers or cutbacks, while other checks allow you to search for features that have spatial relationships with each other. For example, you may want to find buildings that have been mistakenly placed on water features.

Learn more about the checks available with Data Reviewer

Deciding which checks to run on your data

It is customary for people using Data Reviewer to have a product specification, such as Vector Map 1 or TopoMap, that the data must be validated against. For instance, a specification may require buildings to be at least 25 meters from a road. The Geometry on Geometry check can be used to find any buildings that are less than 25 meters from a feature in the road feature class.

There are also checks you can use to ensure your data does not contain any invalid features. This includes features that do not have the correct number of vertices for their geometry type or have a null extent.

Configuring the checks

There are some general steps to be followed when you are configuring checks. These steps include the following:

Choosing an area of interest on which to run the check

After the check has been configured to search for the conditions you have specified, you need to choose the extent the check is going to be searching.

Features to Validate dialog box

You can choose one of the following options:

If you are validating data in a versioned geodatabase, you can also choose to run a check only on features that have been edited. When you check the Changed Features Only check box and run the check, features in the current version are compared to the parent version to identify what features have been changed. This option can be used in conjunction with any of the others above.

Viewing and managing check results

After an individual check is finished running, you can either browse through the results or write them directly to the Reviewer table.

Reviewer check records

The Browse Results option allows you to browse through each record in the map using the Browse Features dockable window. With this method, you can look at each record and decide whether or not to write it to the Reviewer table. If there are multiple parts to a feature, you can also look at its individual parts.

The Write to Reviewer Table option automatically writes all the records to the Reviewer table. With the example above, there would be two new records created in the Reviewer table.


9/16/2010