Export To VPF (Coverage)

Summary

Converts a coverage into either a Vector Product Format (VPF) Coverage or VPF Tile.

Learn more about the Vector Product Format

Usage

• The coverage must not have a mask file. Use the Clean tool to remove mask files.

• The coverage must have a projection defined or it will not be converted. The Arc/Info coverage must not have a mask file. Only Clean coverages will export.

• A full VPF pathname must be specified with Output VPF Coverage or Table.

• Pathnames are specified as vpfDatabase\vpfLibrary\vpfCoverage when the Input Coverage or Table type is set to Coverage.

• Pathnames are specified as vpfDatabase\vpfLibrary\vpfTable when the Input Coverage or Table type is set to Table.

• If the vpfDatabase or the vpfLibrary directories do not exist; they will be created.

• The Output VPF tile will be appended to vvpfDatabase\vpfLibrary\vpfCoverage\ specified by the Output VPF Coverage or Table and is only valid when the Input Coverage or Table type is set to Coverage.

• Projections must match between the library and the coverage being created.

• The VPF standard specifies only coverages in geographic coordinates. Using units of Decimal Degrees, on the WGS 1984 datum, you cannot clean a coverage that has units in Decimal Degrees. You should build the coverage in this case, or understand how cleaning will affect your coverage.

• In the default translation of a coverage to a VPF coverage, arcs become edges, polygons become faces, and nodes remain nodes. Feature attribute tables become feature tables with a 1:1 relationship with primitive tables. One exception is the annotation TAT, which becomes one primitive table plus as many feature tables as there are annotation subclasses in the coverage. Route and Section tables become unconnected "extra" tables.

  Other coverage tables are translated to VPF as extra tables, meaning that the tables are not needed to make up VPF coverages but should be maintained for the VPF to Coverage tool to translate all of the coverage information back to ArcInfo. If there are no VPF tiles, the extra tables are located at the coverage level; otherwise, they are located at the tile level. Extra tables that may be generated by the tool are TIC, SEC, RAT, LNK, TRN, ADD, and ADDRESS.LST. The naming convention is X_TIC, X_SEC, X_RAT, and so on.

• Learn about export conversion control files

Syntax

VPFExport_arc (in_cover, out_file, {tile_name}, {control_file}, {standard_table}, {index_table})

Parameter	Explanation	Data Type
in_cover	The input coverage that will be converted to VPF format.	Coverage;ArcInfo Table
out_file	The name of the VPF coverage or table to be created. The full pathname must be specified.	File
tile_name (Optional)	The name of the VPF tile to be created.	String
control_file (Optional)	A file that can be used to drop, add, change, or ignore items and other information during translation. The name of this file is defined by the user. Polycov.ccf, poly_cov_con, and conversionfile are all acceptable names. An input coverage defines feature translations for specified feature classes as well as specifies feature classes to be ignored. It can also be used to determine which values are to be filled in the database and library header files at creation.	File
standard_table (Optional)	Specifies whether nonstandard ARC/INFO tables will be converted. EXTRA —Translates all ArcInfo files to VPF. This option only needs to be used if the data being translated to VPF will be converted back to ArcInfo using the Import From VPF tool. This is the default option. NO_EXTRA —Prevents VPFEXPORT from creating extra tables when creating a VPF coverage. This option should only be used if the exported coverage will not be imported back to ArcInfo using the Import From VPF tool. VPFEXPORT considers files such as TIC and LAB to be extra files. These files are not necessary to create a VPF coverage.	Boolean
index_table (Optional)	Specifies whether to create a feature index table (FIT). NO_FIT —Do not create a feature index table. FIT —Create a feature index table.	Boolean

Code Sample

VPFExport example (stand-alone script)

The following stand-alone script demonstrates how to create a VPF coverage using an ArcInfo coverage.

# Name: VPFExport_Example.py
# Description: Creates a VPF coverage from an ArcInfo coverage
# Requirements: ArcInfo Workstation
# Author: ESRI

# Import system modules
import arcpy
from arcpy import env

# Set environment settings
env.workspace = "C:/data"

# Set local variables
inCover = "caligrat"
outFile = "C:/output/caligrat"
standardTable = "NO_EXTRA"
indexTable = "NO_FIT"

# Execute VPFExport
arcpy.VPFExport_arc (inCover, outFile, "" , "" , standardTable, indexTable)

VPFExport example 2 (stand-alone script)

The following stand-alone script demonstrates how to export two coverages to VPF and then create cross-tile topology for the VPF covereages.

# Name: VPFTile_Example.py
# Description: Exports two coverages to VPF format then builds tile topology
# Requirements: ArcInfo Workstation
# Author: ESRI

# Import system modules
import arcpy
from arcpy import env

# Set environment settings
env.workspace = "C:/data"

# Set local variables
inCover1 = "coastb"
inCover2 = "coastc"
outFile1 = "C:/output/vpfdb/wlib/coast2"
outFile2 = "C:/output/vpfdb/wlib/coast3"

vpfLibrary = "C:/output/vpfdb"
vpfStandard = 96
specCover = "ALL"

# Execute VPFExport
arcpy.VPFExport_arc(inCover1, outFile1)
arcpy.VPFExport_arc(inCover2, outFile2)

# Execute VPFTile
arcpy.VPFTile_arc(vpfLibrary, "", vpfStandard, specCover)

Environments

Current Workspace, Level Of Comparison Between Projection Files, Precision For Derived Coverages, Precision For New Coverages, Scratch Workspace

Licensing Information

ArcView: No

ArcEditor: No

ArcInfo: Requires ArcInfo Workstation installed