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Why am I being asked to pay for XTools now?  It used to be free!

The original XTools for ArcView 3.x is, and will remain, a free extension. I do not have, nor have I ever had any involvement in, or control over, the extension that works with ArcView 8.x - formerly called XTools 3.0, now called XTools Pro 1.0.

XTools Pro 1.0 was written by an organization named DataEast (formerly TaigaGis), which I have no affiliation with. DataEast did ask me if it would be ok to use the XTools name on the proposed commercial product. My response was as follows:  

"My preference is that the XTools name be associated only with freeware. I have already seen some confusion on the part of the users between the two versions of XTools, and have some concern that adding a shareware version would add to the confusion. Xtools was a gift from me to the GIS community and that is how I would like to have it remembered, rather than as a commercial product.

Having said that, I do not own the XTools name and will not try to stop you from using it, if that is what you decide to do."

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I have a question about Xtools Pro 1.0, can you help me?

Questions about XTools Pro 1.0 for ArcMap (Arcview 8.x) should be sent to a company named DataEast at support@dataeast.ru.

Explanation:  The original XTools, for ArcView 3.x, was created by Mike DeLaune of the Oregon Department of Forestry and continues to be supported by him.  XTools Pro 1.0 for ArcMap (Arcview 8.x) was created by DataEast, a private company that specializes in converting ArcView 3.x Avenue code to ArcView 8.x VB code.

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How can I change the number of decimal places in the Acres and/or Hectares field?

XTools creates an Acres and/or Hectares field in the output theme from overlay operations, and in some other XTools operations. By default, these fields always have three decimal places.  Here is how you can change that:

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What can I do if XTools hangs while doing an overlay function?

XTools will hang when overlaying fairly large datasets.  The point at which datasets become "fairly large" varies with the users operating system and amount of available RAM.  

Earlier versions of XTools did overlay operations similar to the way they are done in the Geoprocessing Extension that comes with ArcView 3.1+:  Each pair of intersecting features from the input and overlay themes was overlaid and processed sequentially.  Newer versions of XTools use theme-level Avenue requests wherever they can be used in place of individual feature requests.

These two approaches have three major differences.  The new approach is significantly faster and much less prone to errors in the output theme, but it requires more RAM.  Larger datasets can use up all of the available RAM and thereby lead to a "hang" before the operation is completed.

So, what can you do about it?  Here are some options:

1.  Reboot, unload all memory resident programs, and try the operation again.

2.  If the Geoprocessing Extension has a similar overlay function, try it.

3.  Reduce the size of your datasets by tiling the data.

4.  Do the overlay operation in ArcInfo.

5.  Use the 8/99 version of XTools available here. Warning: This older version of XTools contains known bugs that I fixed in later versions, and it could well contain some undiscovered bugs as well. Although I am making the older version of XTools available, I will not be able to provide any support for the older version.

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At this time I have no plans to convert XTools to Visual Basic. 

ODF ArcGIS Upgrade status:

April 2, 2001

ESRI has released version 8.1 of ArcGIS. ArcGIS is a major revision of architecture and strategy. The aim
of the software is to provide a scalable suite of tools that share code to take advantage of new innovations.
Some of the new features that are available are the ability to rotate a plot of raster data, the ability to make
raster and vector layers transparent, and the ability to share licenses through a central license server.
ArcGIS also supports a new robust data model that allows for better vertical integration of data. An
example of how the Geodatabase would benefit ODF would be the integration of corner data, ownership,
public land survey, and vegetation. If a corner location moved due to a survey, all the other layers would be
adjusted automatically. Other examples include modeling of a road network or streams.

ArcGIS is a well-engineered advancement for the GIS industry, but our recommendation for ODF is that we
not migrate to this technology at this point in time for the following reasons.

1.The software is new and it may be a while before the bugs are worked out. 
2.The software currently only works on Windows NT & Windows 2000, which are not the ODF standard
operating system. 
3.The functionality we enjoy through the use of Xtools would not be available with ArcView 8.1. To get
similar functionality one would have to upgrade to ArcInfo 8.1 at a cost of $5,000 per license. 
4.To take advantage of sharing licenses ODF would have to purchase and share licenses centrally.
The cost of a floating license is 3 times that of a single seat, therefore we would have to get by with a
third of the licenses we presently use. 
5.ODF GIS users in the field would not be able to depend on Salem staff for technical support. 
6.The cost of a single ArcView upgrade is $600 plus a yearly maintenance of $500. 
7.ESRI has an existing install base of 500,000 copies of ArcView 3.X, they will continue to support this
product line, and may even make a 3.3 release.

My current plans are to continue with XTools development and support as long as there is a need for XTools, and as long as the ArcView 3.x line is in use in my organization.

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1. In the XTools Defaults Dialog, did you set default #1 to the map units of your input theme data? These must be the actual map units as data exists on disk.

2. In the XTools Defaults Dialog, did you set default #2 to the map units that you want to display in the output?

3. In the XTools Defaults Dialog, did you set default #6 (Always calculate Area, Perimeter, Acres (Hectares), Length) to "Yes", or did you run the "Calculate Area, Perimeter, Length, Acres, Hectares" tool after doing the operation?  One of these must be true for area calculation to have occurred.

4. If you ran the "Calculate Area, Perimeter, Length, Acres, Hectares" tool, were any of the features in the input theme "selected"? If any features are selected, then XTools operates only on the selected features. This means, for instance, that if you had one polygon selected in the input theme, the area calculation would have been done only on that one polygon.

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You are seeing what are called "multipart shapes". By default in ArcView, multipart shapes are created under certain conditions when intersecting shapes. A multipart shape is like a region in ArcInfo. Multipart shapes are not a problem for display and for most analysis. The only time they would be a problem is if you need to edit the attributes or spatial location of one part of a multipart shape, or if you need to know the sizes of individual parts of the shape. For that possibility, I included a tool named "Convert Multipart Shapes to Single Part" in the View XTools menu. This script allows you to break the multipart shapes into single part shapes.

In addition to the XTools overlay tools, multipart shapes are created by the Edit, Union Features menu option in the standard ArcView user interface. An example of multipart shapes can be found in the ESRI sample data. The state of Alaska in the states.shp shapefile is one example. Alaska has only one record in its table, but it has 32 parts including the mainland and 31 islands.

Note:  the 10/18/2000 and later versions of XTools allow the user to set a default that will cause XTools to do a multipart to singlepart conversion during every overlay operation.

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XTools and its documentation are provided as freeware, to be freely used in any way, shape, or form. Permitted uses include, but are not limited to, adapting the XTools code and documentation to meet your specific needs, using it in your own projects or those that you create for others, using it in training courses, and reproducing it in any form. In short, you are permitted to use XTools and its documentation for any legal activity.

XTools is NOT guaranteed to be free of bugs. Use it at your own risk and make sure that you always check the results to make sure that they make sense.

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When XTools is loaded in a project all of its scripts are accessible to the user. The general process is to figure out the name of the script you want, then import it into the project. The following example uses the XTools Erase Features function as an example:

 Figure out the name of the script you want:

1. Open a new Project, load the XTools Extension, and open a View.

2. Double right-click on the button bar or tool bar. This will open up the Customize Dialog.

3. In the dialog, scroll to the right until you see "&XTools".

4. Look down the list below "&XTools" until you see the function that you want the script for (in this case "Erase Features"). Click on "Erase Features".

5. The "Click" line will tell you the name of the script that runs when you click on the menu item. In this example it is "aanView.EraseFeatures".

1. Return to the Project window.

2. Click on the "Scripts" button and click on the "New" button. This opens a new script.

3. Click on the "Load System Script" Button or the "Load System Script" menu item under the "Script" menu.

4. Scroll down to the name of the script you want (aanView.EraseFeatures in this case), click on the script name, and hit the OK button.

5. The script will be imported into your project. Make whatever changes you need and give the script a new name in the Script Properties dialog.

Note: The XTools overlay script  calls 5 other scripts: aan.Sub-LogFile, aanView.Sub-MakeTheme, aan.Sub-ShapeFileDelete, aan.Sub-Multi2Single,  and aan.Sub-CalcSize. You will need to import those scripts into the project if you want your new script to be able to operate without XTools loaded.

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Give as complete a description of the problem as you can, along with the exact wording of any error messages. If the problem occurs with a specific set of data, send along a zip file containing a copy of the data and let me know exactly where to look so that I can see the problem. The more completely that you describe the problem, the more likely it is that I will be able to duplicate it on my computer.

Other information to include:

• Type of computer you are using.
• Operating system on your computer.
• Version of ArcView that you are using.
• Language version of ArcView (English, German, French…..)
• Creation date of the version of XTools that you are using (The XTools creation date is found by clicking on the XTools Extension name in the Extensions dialog.)

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Xtools works greatly better in AV 3.1 than in 3.0a and it works somewhat better in AV3.2 than in AV3.1. The reason for this is that ESRI has been progressively fixing bugs in the Avenue programming language that XTools is built on. ArcView 3.0a was bad enough that I strongly recommend upgrading if you want to use XTools for any significant amount of complex overlay analysis. Here are links to two benchmark tests evaluating Xtools against ArcInfo and ArcView 3.2 against ArcView 3.1:

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With two exceptions, XTools has not created any reported problems for users of other language versions of ArcView.

One exception is that some non-English language versions triggers an error when using the Buffer function. The Buffer function in XTools presents a list of map units for the user to choose from. One of those units is "Meters". Some non-English versions of ArcView, however, use "Metre" instead of "Meter. This causes a problem if "Meters" is selected. The symptom of the problem is that an Av-array error message is received: "AV-Array: Index 1 not in Area [german:Bereich] 0...9. "

Work Around:

1. Make a copy of XTools.avx and put it in a safe place.

2. Open up the original XTools.avx with a word processing program that has a "search and replace" function.

3. Replace all of the occurrences of "Meter" with "Metre" and save the file.

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Yes, for version 10/18/2000 and later of XTools.  For earlier versions,Area, Perimeter, Acres (Hectares), and Length calculations will not work for data in decimal derees.

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No, and I have not seen any free ArcView extensions that include ArcInfo-like Build and Clean functions. However, you might want to check out SSIArcPoly at the following web location:

The cost is reasonable and they do have a free trial available.

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There are six main differences between XTools and equivalent functions in the Geoprocessing Extension:

1. XTools updates area, perimeter, acres (or hectares), and length fields. The Geoprocessing Extension does not.

2. For functions other than Clip and Erase, XTools allows the user to choose which specific fields will be in the output file. The Geoprocessing Extension puts all fields into the output file.

4. In a timed test on sample data, the XTools ran significantly faster than the Geoprocessing Extension.

5. The Geoprocessing Extension has a nicer user interface.

6. The Geoprocessing Extension is supported by ESRI.

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You most likely got this message because you are attempting to use the 10/1/99 version (or later) of XTools with ArcView 3.0a or older. Starting with the 10/1/99 version,  XTools uses a dialog created with ESRI's Dialog Designer Extension. The Dialog Designer Extension comes with ArcView 3.1 and later versions. The Dialog Designer Extension adds a new AVDLog object to ArcView. The error message is ArcView 3.0a complaining that it doesn't know what this AVDLog object is.

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The problem occurs with earlier versions of XTools when the user has a non-English version of Microsoft Excel. In the English version of Excel, data locations are identified by row (R) and column (C). When XTools transfers data to row 3, column 8, for instance, it sends a Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) Poke command to place the data at R3C8. Excel identifies data locations differently in other languages, however. For instance, in German "Row" and "Column" are "Zeile" and "Spalte" , so the correct Poke command would identify the data location as Z3S8.

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The principal author is Mike DeLaune, Oregon Department of Forestry.

Buffer Selected Features is from Jim Peroutky. I picked it up off the ESRI site and made a couple of minor changes.

The Convert Shape To Centroid script is by Marco Boeringa.

Mike Schuft wrote the Make One Polyline From Points tool

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Suggested format.  Use an appropriate year and version number for previous and future versions.

DeLaune, M.G. (2000).  XTools ArcView Extension (Version 10/18/2000).

OR: Oregon Department of Forestry.

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