Programming ArcGIS 10.1 with Python Cookbook

Appendix A. Automating Python Scripts

In this chapter, we will cover the following recipes:

• Running Python scripts from the command line
• Using sys.argv[] to capture command-line input
• Adding Python scripts to batch files
• Scheduling batch files to run at prescribed times

Introduction

Python geoprocessing scripts can be executed either outside ArcGIS as a standalone script or inside ArcGIS as a script tool. Both methods have their advantages and disadvantages. Up to this point in the book, all our scripts have been run either inside ArcGIS as a script tool, or from a Python development environment such as IDLE, or the Python Window in ArcGIS. However, Python scripts can also be executed from the Windows operating system command line. The command line ...