ArcGIS Pro – Solving the ‘Failed to Load System Tools’ Error in Geoprocessing

arcgis-proerrorgeoprocessingtoolbox

I updated my ArcGIS Pro to the latest version, and after opening a project and clicking on the Geoprocessing tab I get an error that starts

Failed to load system tools

which is then followed by a long traceback along the lines of

\Toolboxes\Intelligence Tools.pyt Traceback (most  recent call last):
File "<string>", line 28, in <module> File "c:\program
files\arcgis\pro \ResourcesArcToolbox\Scripts
\GenerateBlindSpotAreasToolClass.py", line 24, in...

and so on (the error text was long and not copy-able so I've just typed in the first few lines from my screenshot). After I click OK I'm presented with a blank Geoprocessing Pane where there would normally be a list of the Toolboxes available in ArcGIS Pro

enter image description here enter image description here

I found a Technical Support page for the error on the Esri website – Error: Failed to load system tools – which suggests the following differing solutions or workarounds:

  1. Modify the proenv.txt file to match the environment specified in
  2. ArcGIS Pro Clear cache
  3. Reinstall ArcGIS Pro

Each step had instructions which I followed, but even after trying all three steps (including resinstalling ArcGIS Pro 4 times!) the error persisted and I was still getting the error.

What can be done to get my ArcGIS Pro Geoprocessing Pane to work correctly again?

Best Answer

Disclaimer:

This solution suggests you Delete a folder from your Program Files folder. It doesn't take into account any add-ins, configurations, or other files that may have been installed into your ArcGIS Pro folder. Please save these somewhere first before proceeding! And if you're unsure Stop Now!

The Solution that worked for me:

Despite following the instructions given on the Technical Support pages Error: Failed to load system tools and Localized and silent install options - Uninstall ArcGIS Pro, the solution required me to do a little more cleanup.

My theory is that the ArcGIS Pro arcgispro-py3 Conda environment is not fully/correctly updated if it still exists when you update or reinstall ArcGIS Pro, so removing that environment and cleaning up any other leftover ArcGIS Pro files before reinstalling seems to help.

  1. After Uninstalling ArcGIS Pro, open Windows Explorer and browse to C:\Program Files\ArcGis. There is still a Pro folder here even after uninstalling ArcGIS Pro.

    enter image description here

  2. Delete the Pro folder

    enter image description here

  3. Once the folder is gone, reinstall ArcGIS Pro once again.

  4. Start ArcGIS Pro and open the Geoprocessing Pane again - it should now load successfully and display all the toolboxes as expected

    enter image description here

Potentially using Conda to remove or rename your arcgispro-py3 Environment so that a new install can proceed unhindered may work, however I didn't try this so I can't say for sure.

Related Question