{"id":167121,"date":"2010-04-28T18:08:29","date_gmt":"2010-04-28T18:08:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/?post_type=blog&p=167121"},"modified":"2018-12-18T11:54:41","modified_gmt":"2018-12-18T19:54:41","slug":"xyz-file-into-arcmap","status":"publish","type":"blog","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/products\/arcgis-desktop\/mapping\/xyz-file-into-arcmap","title":{"rendered":"XYZ file into ArcMap"},"author":4331,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_searchwp_excluded":""},"categories":[22941],"tags":[38411],"industry":[],"product":[36991],"class_list":["post-167121","blog","type-blog","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mapping","tag-mapping-center","product-arcgis-desktop"],"acf":{"short_description":"How to plot my xyz file into beautiful color contouring lines along with coast land relief","flexible_content":[{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"

Question:<\/strong>\u00a0How to plot my xyz file into beautiful color contouring lines along with coast land relief<\/p>\n

my data in xyz as ex. 83.23566 17.23456 3.6
\n83.23568 17.23459 4.2<\/p>\n

longitude latitude depth<\/p>\n

i would like to plot this single file into arcmap and should have complete control to modify and make contour map<\/p>\n

-pls help<\/p>\n

Answer:<\/strong>\u00a0The online help topic is called \u201cAdding x,y coordinate data as a layer<\/a>\u201c. You will need to perform following steps in order to get the final output (i.e. contours):<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. If the X,Y,Z data are in textfile format, then open the file in Excel and in the Text Import Wizard, chose Delimited as the\u00a0Original Data Type.\u00a0 Click Next and set the delimiters (tab, space, semicolon, etc\u2026) and then complete the rest of the dialogs for the wizard. Save the file in Excel format.<\/li>\n
  2. Open ArcMap and browse to the location where you saved the Excel file you saved in Step 1 and open that file.<\/li>\n
  3. On the top bar menu, click\u00a0Tools then click\u00a0Add XY Data.\u00a0 Browse to the location of the Excel file, and\u00a0select the fields that contain the x and y coordinates.\u00a0 Then set the coordinate\u00a0system. Click OK to add this as a temporary layer to your map.<\/li>\n
  4. To make this a permanent feature class, you can export it.\u00a0 Right click on the layer name in the Table of Contents, click Data and then click Export\u00a0Data\u2026<\/li>\n
  5. Make sure the Spatial Analyst extension is enabled.\u00a0 Using the\u00a0Topo to Raster<\/a>\u00a0tool you can create the topological surface.\u00a0 You will need to use the POINTELEVATION option for the input data type. Once the surface is created, you can generate contours.<\/li>\n
  6. Use the\u00a0Contour<\/a>\u00a0tool in the Surface toolset of the Spatial Analyst toolbox.\u00a0Choose as the Input the surface you created in Step 5 and provide the other required parameters. This will generate the contours.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Formerly a Mapping Center Ask a Cartographer \u00a0Q & A.<\/em><\/p>\n"}],"authors":[{"ID":4331,"user_firstname":"Aileen","user_lastname":"Buckley","nickname":"Aileen Buckley","user_nicename":"abuckley","display_name":"Aileen Buckley","user_email":"abuckley@esri.com","user_url":"","user_registered":"2018-03-02 00:15:57","user_description":"Dr. Aileen Buckley is a cartographer researcher and Senior Principal GIS Engineer at Esri. I'm on the ArcGIS Living Atlas of the World Team, making, writing, and talking about maps. 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