Hands On Boosting Geoprocessing Productivity Why and how to organize geoprocessing projects Project Setup Checklist  Create a project folder. Give it a descriptive name and date.  Create a project toolbox. Give it a descriptive name.  Create a System Tools toolset inside the project toolbox.  Populate the System Tools toolset with the needed system tools.  Create a Project Tools toolset inside the project toolbox for custom tools.  Create the Project Folder Structure model in the ProjectTools toolset.  Set the Folder Location in the Project Folder Structure model to the project folder and run the model to create folders.  Set the Current Workspace to the indata folder and Scratch Workspace to the outdata folder.  Export all models to a graphic and save the graphic in the docs&pics folder inside your project folder.  Export all models to a Python script in the scripts folder inside your project folder.  Create a model report for all models and save the graphic in the docs&pics folder inside your project folder. By Barbara Bicking, Esri Product Engineer, Geoprocessing Team Editor’s note: ModelBuilder and the geoprocessing tools in ArcToolbox are designed to make users more productive. The author of this article introduces a simple workflow that helps make geoprocessing work easier and faster—even fun—and will make it more easily shared. Consistently using her methodology for setting up and documenting projects will eliminate questions such as Where was that tool again? Where did I stick that model? How did I do that? This exercise steps the reader through a fictional project. The workflow described is based on using ArcGIS 9.3.1 ArcCatalog with ArcToolbox, but the process is the same in ArcMap. It consists of five tasks. 1. Customize the ArcToolbox window. 2. Create a project toolbox with the system and custom tools needed for the project. 3. Create a folder structure for holding output from processes, documentation, and other project materials automatically using a model. 4. Set the project environment parameters. 5. Document the project. Getting Started The fictional project in this exercise is based on creating buffers around selected wells in a study area. 1. The first step is creating a project folder. Use Windows to create a folder, and name it BufferSelectedWellsInStudyArea. Use descriptive names for project folders, toolboxes, models, and script tools and use the same name for everything that pertains to a project. Documenting projects by using descriptive names is critical to productivity. Adding the date to file names(e.g.,BufferSelectedWellsInStudyArea_12Oct09) is also a good practice. 2. Start ArcCatalog and make the ArcToolbox window visible. Before changing the ArcToolbox window settings, save the default setting to a file. Continued on page 54 www.esri.com ArcUser Spring 2010 53 Select system tools and place them in the SystemTools toolset.