Introduction to ArcPad Studio

ArcPad Studio provides tools to work with ArcPad customization files (for example, applets, default configurations, and layer definitions), script source code files (VBScript, JScript, and Python), and ArcPad AXF files. You can create and edit ArcPad customization files and script files in ArcPad Studio. ArcPad AXF files can be viewed and queried in ArcPad Studio, but they are created in ArcGIS using the ArcPad Data Manager extension. The ArcPad Studio tools are shown on the following toolbar:

By default, XML-based ArcPad customization files (applets, default configurations, and layer definitions) and ArcPad AXF files are displayed as a tree diagram in the Tree View.

For ArcPad customization files, the tree diagram directly relates to the underlying XML structure of the files. ArcPad XML elements and attributes are displayed as branches in the tree. See the following screen shot:

You can edit files very quickly by double-clicking elements and attributes. There are also various editors to speed up development and editing of ArcPad XML files by providing a graphical environment. The Toolbar and Form editors are examples of these.

You can also view and edit the underlying ArcPad XML directly in the XML view. Click the Toggle button to toggle between the tree view and the XML view. See the following screen shot of the XML view:

For ArcPad AXF files, the tree diagram relates to the schema, data, and relationships in the ArcPad AXF database. The tree contains three main branches: Feature Layers, Feature Tables, and Data Tables. It also has two additional branches: Files and Properties. You can interact with tables, columns, relationships, files, and properties by right-clicking an item and clicking one of the commands. See the following screen shot of the ArcPad AXF tree diagram:

VBScript source code files (.vbs), Python source code files (.py), and JScript source code files (.js) are displayed in a text editor that employs script syntax coloring. You can edit and compile your scripts from this environment. See the following screen shot: