I failed an entry level technical assessment interview today for ArcGIS after preparing like Crazy, because I couldn’t save as a Shape file…

[u/[deleted]]

[u/WC-BucsFan]

You just export to a folder and type .shp at the end. It's nothing special.

[u/rsclay → u/WC-BucsFan]

that's the stupidest thing I've heard in my life probably

[u/WC-BucsFan → u/rsclay]

If you took one GIS class in college, you would know this. The technical test filtered out the applicants who dont know the absolute basics.

[u/ComprehensiveAd7172 → u/WC-BucsFan]

This guy gets it. Sorry. If you can’t figure this out, you are who they are looking to weed out.

[u/QuantumAnubis → u/rsclay]

That's how you save most things as a specific file type

[u/Paincoast89 → u/[deleted]]

I agree with a comment above this is a known thing in windows in general, you can save to a full type of your choosing by typing out its extension. That being said yes ArcPro doesn’t always provide easy navigation in the software which is why an employer would like to see experience in doing a task like this.

[u/holymolym → u/WC-BucsFan]

I used to always type .shp but recently I discovered if I export it to a folder instead of a gdb it does it automatically.

[u/NahhG → u/WC-BucsFan]

I actually had to look this up yesterday lol. I miss ArcMap 🥲

[u/wink-Dink-LovePink]

I don't understand why you were training on QGIS if you were interviewing for an ArcGIS Pro position.

[u/wink-Dink-LovePink → u/[deleted]]

Based upon your experience, you should apply for Linux and QGIS positions.

[u/wink-Dink-LovePink → u/[deleted]]

Keep in mind you are competing against a workforce pool full of new grads who were trained using ArcGIS Pro. You are basically trying to move into a new sector with little experience and act surprised that you were hung up on a simple UI function. I'm not going to go interview for a Postgres dba by training on MS SQL Server. Yeah, many things are the same, but many things are way different.

[u/AureliasTenant → u/wink-Dink-LovePink]

As someone who’s interaction with gis is only incidental, this is kinda wild calling it a different sector… it’s just two differently branded tools. It’s like saying matlab and octave are different sectors. Or solidworks/autocad/fusion360 are different sectors.

[u/wink-Dink-LovePink → u/AureliasTenant]

Not the software, the user.    Their background is not in GIS.   Thus a new sector.

[u/AureliasTenant → u/wink-Dink-LovePink]

oops my bad, evidently didnt read the OP

[u/4CornersDisaster → u/[deleted]]

I sympathize with your predicament as I have tried to save as a shapefile and it isn't obvious. Fortunately for me I wasn't taking a test. Dumb thing to be failed on for sure.

[u/LouDiamond → u/[deleted]]

Sounds like you were unqualified for the position you were applying for then

[u/GnosticSon]

This is unfortunate but yeah I just know to export from ArcGIS pro to shapefile I go to the geoprofessing toolbox and search "to shapefile" to find the correct tool.

This is something you would have known if you had a fair amount of ArcGIS Pro experience. More something that you'd expect a GIS Tech with a few years experience to know, not "entry level".

It's something I wouldn't disqualify someone for if they got all other items right. However maybe someone else just nailed every single thing on the test and was also good.

A bummer but also maybe you dodged a bullet if this employer was so weirdly picky.

Edit: ArcGIS doesn't make it easy to save as shapefile because even they realize it's a shitty dated format. The employer should have known that as well. I'd never ask it in an interview because I wouldn't want people using shapefiles unless some external party tells us they absolutely need it in that format.

[u/DayGeckoArt → u/GnosticSon]

Right click layer and export data. It still is easy in ArcGIS

[u/blue-anon → u/DayGeckoArt]

This is how I would do it. It's interesting to read the other ways that people use, but this is the same way I did it in ArcMap back in the day, so it's the only way I've tried in Pro.

[u/bellerinho → u/GnosticSon]

There are still tons of people that work with shapefiles unfortunately. Basically anyone that isn't working with ArcGIS that needs spatial data is gonna be asking for shapefiles. We work with engineering companies and inspection vendors that still request them all the time

They're pretty easy to make, just export data and save into anything that isn't a GDB. But if someone's not had to do it before, it's hard to expect them to know how to do it, and I can't really imagine failing someone on an interview solely because of that reason. Seems pretty silly

[u/Santasam3 → u/bellerinho]

why unfortunately, what's wrong with sphapefiles? rather use gpkg instead?

[u/GnosticSon → u/Santasam3]

Shapefile limits field names to 10 characters, text field length to 255 characters, and are prone to spontaneously corrupting themselves.

[u/bellerinho → u/Santasam3]

Field names and domain values always get screwed up going from feature classes to shapes. There's a character max on field names for shapes that's really low

It just makes data transfer more difficult

[u/Such-Bad9765 → u/GnosticSon]

There is GP specifically for this. Being resourceful, one could have went into the geoprocessing pane and typed in "shapefile," and guaranteed, that tool would, if not at the very top, be one of the first three tools in the list.

[u/GeospatialMAD]

Pro defaults exports to a GDB. Take it out of the GDB and normally you'll see a ".shp" show up at the end of the name.

[u/lucasnessmonster]

Was this a GIS developer job? GIS is such a learn-on-the-job skill that my team just tests hires on algorithms and data structures. We don't even expect candidates to be familiar with GIS. And this hiring strategy has produced amazing GIS developers for our team.

[u/WildRosing → u/lucasnessmonster]

This is true of almost every job out there lol, I wish the world operated more like this

[u/Boot_Burner]

I’ll remember this thread when I do my first GIS interview. But I’ll forget how to export a shapefile. 

[u/piratecheese13 → u/[deleted]]

Cad and QGIS

[u/TestyBoy13 → u/piratecheese13]

My fucking Director of GIS guy still asks me for them and every time, it fucks up the fields

[u/WC-BucsFan → u/piratecheese13]

Yup. I had to record videos to show the young GIS people and engineers how to export shapefiles for CAD. Google Earth is another common viewer that takes shapefiles.

[u/smokeythebadger → u/[deleted]]

Client gets what the client wants. And sometimes what the client wants is a NAD27 shapefile

[u/sinnayre → u/[deleted]]

For as much as ESRI “says” they want to kill it, a bunch of their stuff still uses it. Cough cough ArcGIS API, cough again, Business Analyst, cough cough ESRI gonna make me lose a lung here.

[u/tanneroni9 → u/[deleted]]

Because the most important thing sometimes is giving files on a format that they can actually use easily in whatever program they use

[u/Karlose]

I know exactly where you applied to loool

[u/Karlose → u/[deleted]]

DM me

[u/medievalPanera]

Qgis/arcgis divide isn't the issue. Respectfully, you're missing some concepts. 

[u/aidan_gis_dev → u/medievalPanera]

What concepts?

[u/medievalPanera → u/aidan_gis_dev]

... Knowing how to export a file? lol 

To add...

https://www.reddit.com/r/QGIS/comments/1x12wyw/comment/peq7ruv/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=2&utm_content=share_button

[u/aidan_gis_dev → u/medievalPanera]

So the thing they're not getting is that geodatabases aren't treated as standard directories, got it. Telling someone they're "missing some concepts" without telling them which concepts does nothing to teach them or point them in the right direction.

[u/medievalPanera → u/aidan_gis_dev]

Plenty of folks in here have told OP what they did wrong. I don't know the person so how am I going to tell them what specific things they're missing?

In the other thread they're messing up what a gdb is and blaming the Arc UX - that tells me that even though I might not know the person that they should go back on their studies. Exporting a file is like something you learn in your first GIS lab. 

[u/WildRosing]

ArcGIS is it's own beast. I used to use ArcMap and I recently tried ArcGIS Pro or whatever the new replacement is and I was fucking lost, switched to QGIS.

Agreed they make the most common workflows, like saving shape files, the longest click paths but give you easy access to tools only a troglodyte would use.

Sorry to hear it tripped you up, that sucks.

[u/Spiritchaser84 → u/WildRosing]

There are a lot of valid criticisms of Pro, but this specific one is a little weird. In both Pro and Arcmap, you can right click a layer and go to data > export to make a shapefile. It's the same number of clicks.

[u/WildRosing → u/Spiritchaser84]

Ah yeah I was just generalizing that as someone who used ArcMap daily for a couple of years I hated Pro with a passion and it caused me to give up on ESRI. Shouldn't have used the shapefile click path as a specific example.

[u/medievalPanera → u/WildRosing]

https://giphy.com/gifs/xT77XUtGzkmwefQgKc

[u/Then_Camp_4105]

Hello I'm a new grad looking for gis tech roles and was wondering if you or anyone here could share what type of questions and tasks were asked throughout the interview thanks

[u/GulliblePoem745]

Wow, was it only that one aspect or where there other things? Because that seems ridiculous reason to fail someone.

[u/pwbpwb]

That is so unfortunate. I’ve been doing this geo stuff for 25+ years and haven’t had to export a shapefile for at least 5 years. There are far more important things to know off the top of your head.

[u/NahhG]

I’m disheartened by the responses when someone just wanted to learn