Offline maps: What exactly do I need?

Anonymous User

I need offline street and satellite elevation maps with routing for about a dozen countries. I have a few questions:

1. I understand that I need ArcGIS Publisher. But what version of ArcGIS Pro do I need? Pro Basic, Pro Standard, or Pro Advanced?

2. After I create the offline maps that are accessible through Unity, do individual users need ArcGIS subscriptions or are those offline maps covered by my subscription?

3. Is there any documentation or examples of how I access these offline maps from within Unity?

4. Does it matter whether maps are online or offline for routing? 

5. Do individual users need ArcGIS subscriptions to do routing, or can I use my API key?

Thank you,

ReinD

Nicholas-Furness

Hi @Anonymous User 

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I need offline street and satellite elevation maps with routing for about a dozen countries. I have a few questions:

1. I understand that I need ArcGIS Publisher. But what version of ArcGIS Pro do I need? Pro Basic, Pro Standard, or Pro Advanced?

The Publisher extension for ArcGIS Pro is only needed if you want to create an offline map package for anonymous use in our Field Apps such as Field Maps. Map and scene packages (MMPKs/MSPKs) combine multiple data sources and layer definitions in one ready-to-read map or scene definition, and ArcGIS Maps SDKs for Game Engines cannot yet read them.

Instead, the Game Engine SDKs can read Scene Layer Packages (SLPKs) and Tile Packages (TPKs/TPKXs), each of which provides data for a single layer, which you can use to construct your ArcGIS Map. Those SLPKs, TPKs and TPKXs can be created in any version ArcGIS Pro (without a Publisher extension). You can use ArcGIS Pro to create a Scene Layer Package of 3D Object data or Integrated Mesh data, or a Tile Package of basemap data or LERC-encoded elevation data.

2. After I create the offline maps that are accessible through Unity, do individual users need ArcGIS subscriptions or are those offline maps covered by my subscription?

They do not, no. Just distribute and use the SLPK/TPK/TPKX files and consume them in your app. As always, make sure you're honoring the data usage rights for the data you're including in your offline packages.

3. Is there any documentation or examples of how I access these offline maps from within Unity?

Yes... https://developers.arcgis.com/unity/maps/tutorials/display-a-map-api/

Just reference the locally stored file instead of the service when creating each Layer. See these links for more info:

• https://developers.arcgis.com/unreal-engine/layers/#set-a-basemap
• https://developers.arcgis.com/unreal-engine/maps/elevation/#set-elevation

4. Does it matter whether maps are online or offline for routing? 

At this time, routing in the ArcGIS Maps SDKs for Game Engines requires a connection to a routing service. However, the map layers themselves on which you overlay the route results can be any combination of online or offline layers. The two things (routing and layers) are distinct.

5. Do individual users need ArcGIS subscriptions to do routing, or can I use my API key?

They do not need ArcGIS Subscriptions, no. You can use your API Key to deliver solutions that do routing (you get 20,000 routes for free per month).

Depending on the nature of the app, and the target users, some developers choose to require/let their users use their ArcGIS Subscription, and you can certainly do that, but it's not a consumer-oriented approach. If your target users are not already ArcGIS subscribers, then an API Key is the appropriate approach.

Hope that helps!

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