topic Re: Blank PDF Exports in ArcGIS Business Analyst Questions

Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Tue, 27 Sep 2022 13:51:37 GMT

Hey Everyone,

From time to time my infographic exports (to PDF) are blank. It seems to happen over a brief period of time and then stop happening. For example, I was creating infographic reports last night and it happened 10 times. This morning it is exporting correctly. I attached an exported, blank file. It should be 10 pages of infographic data. As you can see, there are 10 pages, but they are blank.

Does anyone else have this issue or know how to remedy it?

Re: Blank PDF Exports

HeatherFay — Tue, 27 Sep 2022 20:07:40 GMT

Having the same issue on our team today as well.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Tue, 27 Sep 2022 22:23:48 GMT

I can still export images, but that takes quite a bit more work when I put together the package.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

Anonymous User — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 14:33:13 GMT

@JoshDryer2 @HeatherFay Could you please confirm if this is happening with Business Analyst Web App or are you seeing this behavior in ArcGIS Pro (if Pro, are you using local or online dataset)?

Re: Blank PDF Exports

HeatherFay — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 14:36:27 GMT

BAO, I have not tested in Pro.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

CherylHagevik — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 19:18:08 GMT

Hi @JoshDryer2 and @HeatherFay I'm sorry to hear you're seeing intermittent issues with exporting infographics to PDF from BA Web App. Since the issue only occurs at times and then seems to resolve itself, it's possible there could be some network connectivity or performance issues occurring. If/when the issue occurs again, we can try to learn more through some additional troubleshooting:

Are you exporting the infographic from the Run Reports tab or from the Infographics player that displays over the Maps tab? Does the issue occur in both areas?
Are you working with a custom infographic template? If so, does the issue also occur with other templates like the Standard infographics templates?
Is the issue occurring from multiple browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Safari)?

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 20:35:27 GMT

Here are my answers:

I export from the infographics player that displays over the maps tab. I've not tested the other way.
I am exporting a custom infographic. I've not tested the other way.
I use Edge.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 20:41:44 GMT

I tested the infographic export using the map tab and the other one. Both produced blank PDF's today at 4:41pm.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

CherylHagevik — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 20:59:45 GMT

@JoshDryer2 Thank you for providing these details. Can you help us understand if the issue occurs with all infographics templates or just this particular one? Are you able to share the custom template for testing?

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 21:18:49 GMT

I tried exporting through Chrome. It comes out blank in that program too.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

HeatherFay — Thu, 29 Sep 2022 14:53:08 GMT

1.) Running the infographics from Run Reports tab

2.) I tried with a custom report and the standard Demographic Profile report, both were blank when exporting as PDF.

3.) This was in chrome browser.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

CherylHagevik — Thu, 29 Sep 2022 15:13:33 GMT

Thank you for these details @JoshDryer2 and @HeatherFay. We are working on looking into this issue further and appreciate your patience.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Wed, 07 Dec 2022 12:45:24 GMT

Hey everyone. I am getting blank reports again today. They were exporting fine for the last couple of months and then today they started coming out blank again. Did we ever find a solution to this issue?

Re: Blank PDF Exports

CherylHagevik — Wed, 07 Dec 2022 17:49:17 GMT

Hi @JoshDryer2 Thank you for letting us know that you are seeing this issue today. We have followed up on our side and the blank exports should be resolved at this point. Can you please let us know how your exports are looking now? We appreciate your patience on this issue.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Tue, 20 Dec 2022 16:11:29 GMT

Hey @CherylHagevik ! Thank you for resolving this issue. The exports are working well now. I always appreciate your timely responses and solutions. Do you know if the arcGis business analyst exporting process adds "tags" to the PDF's by default? When I export to a PDF, it contains tags and they are causing incompatibility issues with my process. When I go in and delete the tags, everything works fine. So I thought that I would ask if you all can eliminate those tags on your end. Just a thought. I included a screen shot for reference.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

CherylHagevik — Tue, 20 Dec 2022 18:34:54 GMT

Hi @JoshDryer2 Happy to hear your exports are looking good now and again, thanks so much for your patience while resolved this issue.

For the PDF tags, these seem related to Accessibility settings for the PDF reader. They appear to be set automatically by the PDF Reader and then can be edited if needed. Maybe hiding the tags would help with your workflow? You can hide the tags by going to the View menu in Adobe Acrobat, then Show/Hide > Navigation panes > Reset panes.

Re: Blank PDF Exports

JoshDryer2 — Thu, 16 Feb 2023 16:30:04 GMT

Thank you, Cheryl! I appreciate your guidance on this issue. I've got my workflow going really well now, thanks to you.