Will adding a field to a service break Field Maps offline areas?

DeniseVachon

If I add a field to an existing service that is used in field maps and has offline areas taken offline by staff, will this prevent staff from syncing their existing offline areas back?

This blog post says that replicas will fail to sync if the feature service schema changes while edits were being made offline. ArcGIS Field Maps: Offline Edits Fail to Sync - Le... - Esri Community  So I guess what I'm asking is: Does adding a field to a service qualify as a "schema change"?

GlenShepherd

Basically, do I need to have all of my field staff sync their edits in existing offline areas before adding a new field to a feature service in order to prevent orphaned replicas?

- Yes, if you want to play it safe.

 

This is the advised workflow. Any time we make schema updates, offline map areas need to be re-created (regardless of whether they were pre-packaged in ArcGIS Field Maps Designer, or packaged on demand in the field app).

You could try it, and it may work on some occasions. But more often than not, it's better to make sure the schema of the replica matches the online parent.