Publishing error...looking for thoughts/suggestions

StevenJohnson

We recently installed 10.1 for Server.  I was able to publish a service containing simple points (in SHP format) to the server.  I later tried to publish another, slightly more complicated service containing basemap layers (administrative boundaries, water, etc.) but got an error that stated:

"Packing succeeded, but publishing failed.
Expected to find comma, colon or start of array; state: Empty; buffer:
Please consult the GP Results Window for enhanced error description"

I did some comparisons between the MXDs to determine what the error may have been caused by.  I tried changing the label engine, the scale/label dependencies, the layer format (from GDB fcs to SHPs), etc. all resulting in the same error. 

Would appreciate any suggestions/feedback from anyone who may have experienced the same error.

thanks in advance!

StevenJohnson

Another update! 

I recently had the same problem I originally posted about but this time, when attempting to publish a MXD that contained many complex layers that could not be removed and needed to be represented in the map service.  This meant my previous work-around would not apply for this situation. 

I found that when I published directly from ArcMap (Share As > Service > Publish a service) I would get the mentioned errors (discussed before).  However, when I split the process into two different stages - Share As > Service > Save a service definition file, THEN published the saved service definition file (*.sd) using the server manager application - it worked without any errors!  I'm not sure why this work-around worked, but it may have something to do with the single packaging/publishing process used within ArcMap.

Hope this helps others as well!