Using data that contains attribute relationships

ArcGIS provides many ways to associate features and records with each other in a geodatabase. In order to use and edit your relationships in ArcPad, you must define relationship classes in your source geodatabase.

The following types of relationships are not currently supported by the ArcPad Data Manager:

• Joins and relates (also known as on-the-fly relationships)
• Feature class to feature class
• Table to table
• Table to feature class

ArcPad is designed to run as efficiently as possible on mobile devices, hence is specifically designed to make best use of SQLCE database rules and table management. Because of this, data in ArcPad AXF files must adhere to generic database principles and a relationship must have a unique primary key.

ArcGIS does not have this strict database requirement. It has deliberately been designed to provide users with a great deal of flexibility. Users must be careful to ensure that geodatabase relationship classes that are to be checked out and used in ArcPad have a unique primary key. The field from the parent feature class, which is used by the relationship class to create the link between the parent and child tables, must contain unique values. If nonunique values exist, only the first record will appear in ArcPad.