Excel XY Data to Shapefile

[VicenteSolis1]

I have a question about Excel XY Data to Shapefile.  The Excel file I am working with has over 100,000 points, each with its own ID and lat/long.  When I convert the data to a shapefile, the shapefile does not show all information.  The data is crash data and for example, the IncidentID column's data is deleted when it converts to a shapefile. 

Any ideas how to fix this?  Thank you. 

[DarrenWiens2]

Lots of potential problems, but most common is spaces or other special characters in field names. Remove them in Excel and try again.

[VicenteSolis1]

The column that is was talking about is labeled "IncidentID", no special characters in it. 

[DarrenWiens2]

The field names must be good for all columns, not just the misbehaving one. In any case, see here for more: Formatting a table in Microsoft Excel for use in ArcGIS—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop 

[VicenteSolis1]

Problem solved, got it to work by saving it as a CSV file. 

[VicenteSolis1]

Darren,

I have another question now.  The CSV worked fine, a majority of data transferred without issue.  However, the data/time data didn't show up.  In Excel, the information is in m/d/yyyy h:mm.  Does GIS not accept this? 

[DarrenWiens2]

Hmmm... shapefiles definitely don't support the time component of date/time, but I would have guessed that it could parse out the date component. Either try exporting the CSV point data as a GDB feature class (which do support date/time) or parse out the date in Excel and try again, exporting to shapefile.

edit: on second read, does the date/time not show in CSV file when you bring it into ArcMap?

[DanPatterson_Retired]

Assuming the information was transfered in the csv file properly, if the destination output file was to a shapefile, no... if it was to a geodatabase, yes... Check the help topics on date and time for your version of ArcMap

[VicenteSolis1]

It doesn't show, it shows as Null. 

[VicenteSolis1]

I did transfer the point data straight to a geodatabase, that's where it showed up as Null.