Background data not transfering from desktop to Trimble Yuma

KatherineZander · ‎01-25-2012

EDITED TO ADD A FIX:
I reached deep into the bowels of my .apm on the Yuma, and added the background layers to the display. For some reason, the background layers did transfer over in the copy of the directory, but did not tranfer over as a layer in the .apm. Their symbology is still intact, thankfully. Is this the nature of the beast? Or is there a setting I am not using that would save me the bother of doing this? --KZ

P.S. Don't you just hate figuring out the answer right after you give up and ask for help?
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ORIGINAL POST:
Hey there! I am a newbie at ArcPad and SDE. We've converted from personal geodatabases to SDE to allow for versioning data collected in the field with our new Trimble Yumas. We are taking our Yumas out for their inaugural data collection very soon, but I am having some trouble displaying background data. I have a number of featureclasses in the .amp that are all within the same SDE featuredataset, and they are editable. I also have two featureclasses from personal geodatabases that are being used solely for background information and are not editable (exported as background .axf). They all display on my desktop computer, and (obviously) are listed as layers in my ArcPad desktop.

However, when I copy the ArcPadData directory to the Yuma, only the editable featureclasses are transferred. The two background featureclasses are not even listed as a layer. This is true for all five of our Yuma's, each with their own versioned DataForArcPad directory.

This makes me think that background .axf layers are not stored in the same directory as everything else that makes an .apm work? Yet, when I look in the DataForArcPad directory, I see an BackgrounLayers.axf file.

Am I missing some essential step to get these from desktop to Yuma?

The basics: Desktop and Yumas both running ArcPad 10.0.2 . Desktop running Windows XP 64 bit, Yumas running Windows 7.

Thanks for any help.

Katherine Zander
US Bureau of Reclamation
Boulder City, Nevada

JuanLuera · ‎06-11-2012

Katherine,
I wanted to follow-up to your recent post, I wanted to see if you were still encountering these issues. Have you looked into upgrading to ArcPad 10.0.4, which is our latest version of ArcPad. This does not sound like average issue that we encounter within support, but I would suggest logging a incident with us and you can reference me within the webform if you�??d like. We will be happy to work with you and troubleshoot this issue here, within Support Service. Gracias!

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KatherineZander · ‎05-23-2017

Very late to respond, I hadn't seen this until now. Juan, I found the answer soon afterwards. I believe I was saving to the .axf instead of the .apm. Newbie mistake I've been using ArcPad for years now, and really like it. It is so much more customizable than Collector. Wish you guys could either move ArcPad onto iOS (which IT is pushing us to do), or make a new product supported like Collector that has the customizable features to it. As it is now, we are moving to Collector because of IT issues and it just looks like ArcPad is going away (boooo!), but the transition is taking over a year to try to make the program work for us.

IngridHogle · ‎05-23-2017

I feel your pain wrt ArcPad being phased out. I don't know if you're aware of this product, so I thought I'd let you know that I have my eye on AppStudio for ArcGIS. I hope it may become an option for smarter-than-Collector data collection in the future. Right now it seems mostly focused on data display, at least in terms of the out-of-the-box templates available.

KatherineZander · ‎05-23-2017

Yes, I am aware of it, and was really excited to test it out when I saw it in action at the '16 UC. It requires a level of coding expertise to make it work for us that I haven't been able to find the time to develop or at least test out, though. ArcPad certainly requires coding to do what we do with it, but that's just customizing, not building an entire app! But, thanks for the nudge. I think it's time to start playing with it. Thing is, ArcPad does it all - such a shame to have to go back to the drawing board!