"Error 000260: The SE_SPATIALREFINFO object was not initialized" when copying a feature class with a custom coordinate system from a file geodatabase to a PostgreSQL enterprise geodatabase on Amazon RDS

Error Message

When attempting to copy a feature class with a custom coordinate system from a file geodatabase to a PostgreSQL enterprise geodatabase hosted on Amazon RDS, the process fails with the following error:

Error
Error 000260: The SE_SPATIALREFINFO object was not initialized.

Cause

This error occurs because Amazon RDS does not support the installation of the ST_Geometry library required by ArcGIS. Instead, RDS uses PostGIS as the spatial type. Feature classes with a custom coordinate system are not fully compatible with this setup, which causes the copy process to fail.

Solution or Workaround

To work around the error and successfully transfer the data, follow these steps.

1. In the catalog pane, right-click the enterprise geodatabase and select New > Feature Class.

2. On the Fields tab of the Create Feature Class pane, click Import to import the schema from the original feature class.

3. On the Spatial Reference tab of the Create Feature Class pane, select the same custom coordinate system used by the original feature class. Continue to create the new feature class.

4. Use the Append tool to copy the data from the original feature class to the newly created one.

5. Open the attribute table for the new feature class to verify that all records were copied successfully, and confirm that the coordinate system matches the original layer.