Next to SQL, ODBC or Oracle connections, it is also possible to build up an ArcGIS connection. With an ArcGIS connection you can directly access GIS data in a Personal Geodatabase, a Filebased Geodatabase and in SDE. For more details on the ArcGIS connection see chapter ArcGIS Connection.

 

 

Click on New Connection … to add an ArcGIS connection. From the Select Type of Connection dialog, choose the ArcGIS connection.

 

Define a name for the connection and click on the Build… button.

 

Choose the Workspace Type. As metioned, you have three GIS Workspace type to choose:

•Pgdb (Personal Geodatabase)

•Fgdb (Filebased Geodatabase)

•SDE (ArcSDE Database)

 

Select the data source where your database is located.

 

Now you have defined all necessary settings for the ArcGIS connection and are ready to test the connection. Click on Test Connection and then click on OK.

The connection string of the ArcGIS connection was filled in automatically.

 

Click OK. The connection has been established. Now you can add the data sources. Click on New Data Source … and choose the ArcGIS connection from the data source dialog.

 

In the Select data dialog we recognize that our Feature Classes are not listet as tables, only the database tables are listed. The Feature Classes are missing because the Select Statement has to be done manually. For tha,t click on the button New Query.

 

In the New data source dialog define a name for the data source (e.g. houses). We know that the Feature Class we need, has the name “HFL”. Therefore, the select statement looks as followed:

Select * from HFL

Click on the button Retrieve Columns to get the columns of the Feature Class. After that click the OK button.

 

You get back to the select data dialog. Now the new table is listed and you can choose it, by enabling it.

 

After that the data source is available as data source in the Dictionary tab of the designer, and you work with the data.