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Find Centroids (Map Viewer)

The Find Centroids tool creates point features that represent the geometric center (centroid) of multipoint, line, and polygon features.

The output is a hosted feature layer with point features.

Example

A GIS analyst wants to perform a preliminary review on wind farm applications to determine those that overlap or are in view of wildlands. To create the viewshed for each wildland area, the analyst must first create point features to represent each wildland. The Find Centroids tool can be used to create centroids within each wildland area.

Centroids for wildlands in Scotland

Usage notes

Find Centroids includes configurations for input features and a result layer.

Input features

The Input features group includes the following parameters:

  • Input layer specifies the multipoint, line, or polygon layer for which centroids will be created.
  • Centroid location specifies where the output centroids will be located. If True geometric centroid (default) is specified, the output points will be located at the true centroid, including where the true centroid falls outside the bounds of the input features. If Contained within each input feature is specified, the output points will be located at the nearest point to the actual centroid while remaining inside or contained by the bounds of the input feature.

    Centroids contained within input features and true geometric centroid
    The difference in result layers is shown when the true geometric centroid is returned (first image) or centroids are contained within input features (second image).

Result layer

The Result layer group includes the following parameters:

  • Output name determines the name of the layer that is created and added to the map. The name must be unique. If a layer with the same name already exists in your organization, the tool will fail and you will be prompted to use a different name.
  • Save in folder specifies the name of a folder in My content where the result will be saved.

Limitations

Simple point features cannot be used to create centroids.

Environments

Analysis environment settings are additional parameters that affect a tool's results. You can access the tool's analysis environment settings from the Environment settings parameter group.

This tool honors the following analysis environments:

  • Output coordinate system
  • Processing extent
    Note:

    The default processing extent in Map Viewer is Full extent. This default is different from Map Viewer Classic in which Use current map extent is enabled by default.

Outputs

This tool creates an output hosted feature layer with point features.

Licensing requirements

This tool requires the following licensing and configurations:

  • Creator or GIS Professional user type
  • Publisher or Administrator role, or an equivalent custom role

Resources

Use the following resources to learn more: