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hi What are valid rules for name of feature class or table in ArcGIS. Is there any supporting document some body know which can explain all the limitation in ESRI platform. In ESRI support site i am kind of lost. Thanks

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Depends on what datatype you are using, eh? – Chad Cooper Mar 2 '11 at 15:29
I am using shape file and file geodatabase – iRfAn Mar 2 '11 at 15:33
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something poorly documented: don't use a number for the first character of a dataset. – Kirk Kuykendall Mar 2 '11 at 15:38
This is exactly my problem, i am trying to use number for the first character of dataset, no problem in shape file but file geodatabase is giving me error – iRfAn Mar 2 '11 at 15:43
Sorry, but trying to solve a similar problem: while importing in gdb, how do I add date before the name? ex: name.shp -> 120706_name feature class – Luca Moiana Jul 6 '12 at 7:58

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up vote 12 down vote accepted

It's in the documentation: Defining feature class properties

Specifically:

Names must begin with a letter, not a number or special character such as an asterisk (*) or percent sign (%).

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This question has been answered by Swingley above... But, in terms of automating this procedure, you could write a script that implements the IFieldChecker.ValidateTableName method. If i remember correctly it returns a corrected name with invalid characters replaced with underscores.

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I am aware of validateTableName but here is my situation, i have shape files "1-Digit postcode.shp, 2-digit postcode.shp" and when i use validateTableName on these two shape file i will get result for both "_Digit_postcode.shp". I think i need to write my own function for this table name validation. – iRfAn Mar 3 '11 at 8:18
it's been a whole so correct me if i am wrong but if you use the workspace parameter, you should in fact get "_Digit_postcode.shp" and "_Digit_postcode_1.shp" – Jakub Mar 4 '11 at 13:04

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