Custom Symbology Disappears

Question

Hi ESRI community!

I have a map that is used by a large amount of people in my company and probably sees about 30-70 users per day. We recently added a layer to this map that is symbolized by unique values and is all the same image with different colors (symbolizing existing, proposed, and disconnected statuses). We added these images to our Portal 10.9.1 and added the image URL to get these custom images populated in the map (see screenshot below).

The issue we're having is that every few days, these custom images will disappear from our map, and we have to go back into Portal to resymbolize them. It's not a huge issue, but I was wondering why this may be the case or if anyone else has experienced this problem. I had this issue with another layer as well, but after the 3rd time adding the custom image symbology back I haven't had the problem with it disappearing. Does anyone know why this may be the case? Any help is appreciated, thank you!

Eugene_Adkins · Answer

I have experienced issues with services published to Portal with a definition query. If the feature is created without the necessary information to suffice the query it could cause some issues with the way the data behaves with features that do not meet the query even though the information is entered after the fact. That’s why I was asking if you had symbology that allowed for “all other values” to exist until the proper T subtype can be applied.

One the troubleshooting side for reconciling the versions I’m not familiar with any “quick” method for testing. Maybe something in data reviewer? But I’m not terribly familiar with that extension. Maybe a log on the server manager side could be check for that specific service? Aside from that, based on the number of users you have, you could get a specified number of users (10 to 15) to reconcile and post and check for the issue. If no conflict then the next set numbers of users until all users have reconciled and posted. This process may identify a specific user. At the end of the day, maybe logs on the server manager side would be the best place to start once the issue is noticed.

emoreno · Answer

Hi Eugene, thanks for the response!

This layer was published to Portal with a definition query as we only wanted to show where subtype = 'T'. Data is entered daily to this layer that does not fit this query, but we haven't added any more 'T' subtypes since the initial publishing of the feature service to Portal. Additionally, the images are shared publicly so there shouldn't be a problem there. Lastly, our data is versioned and but I'm not sure what we have configured that may be causing the symbology to revert. Like I said, this data gets updated daily but this issue only happens sporadically, maybe once a week. This seems like the most likely of the three ideas that may be happening, however, and would be an avenue worth exploring. If you have any ideas as to what I can check on the back end to check this theory that would be appreciated! Thanks again for the insight.

Eugene_Adkins · Answer

These are only ideas.

* I’m guessing the layer was published to Portal so you’re using a feature service in the map. If so, was the layer published with a definition query? Perhaps somehow data is getting entered that does fit the query. But maybe you have a “all other values” symbology that would remedy this?
* Here is something I found on ESRI’s site that talks about permissions for the image itself that could cause issues. Perhaps all users do not have access rights to the url image causing something “break” in the process?
* Is your data versioned? It doesn’t sound like it is, but if so, perhaps something in the reconcile process is reverting back to the old symbology before the custom symbology was applied?

Good luck! Maybe something I said will cause you to think of something.