idea The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices in ArcGIS Pro Ideas

The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 14:16:49 GMT

The "Create Locator" GP tool will output a locator where the "Match with no zones" option is set to "NO". This option is not parameterized and the default value is not influenced by the presence or absence of administrative zones in the source data and GP tool configuration. New locators always have this option set to "NO" by default.

This default value of "NO" is contrary to an esri tech support best practice document and results in poor geocoding success when compared with setting the value to "YES".

We automate the creation of locators with a model or python script. In order to significantly improve geocoding success and to follow esri best practices, someone must interactively update each locator and change the "Match with no zones" option from "NO" to "YES". This must be done for each individual locator as well as repeating the process for any composite locator that they participate in.

We would like esri to make this option accessible as a parameter with the "Create Locator" GP tool and if necessary also with the "Create Composite Address Locator", so that output locators do not need to be interactively re-configured in order to follow esri best practices and achieve usable geocoding success. At minimum, the default should be changed to "YES".

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

DanBauer — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 15:08:39 GMT

In the government sector locator data is often used support critical life safety and emergency response functions. Enabling the Create Locator tool to provide more accurate results will not only align with stated ESRI best practices but more importantly provide better data to first responders which will save time and can ultimately save lives.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

DiegoPortillo_PDX — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 16:58:50 GMT

Limiting re-configuration interactions is beneficial and increases efficiencies on all areas. Finding addresses is a key function of all business areas, and should be readily available and current. This approach will ensure that.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

PaulCone2 — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 20:49:18 GMT

@DanBauer you said it well. Our locators built for emergency response need to be built with default YES here since extra keystrokes (e.g. having to type the city) would slow them down.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

MitchVanderperren1 — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 20:45:46 GMT

Working in an enterprise context and supporting a large and complex environment that has hundreds of users we automate as many processes as possible. Pieces of these processes that we need to interact with manually introduce opportunities for a step to be forgotten or missed when an operator is busy or distracted. The more we can build into the automated tools the less opportunity there is for someone to accidently miss a step.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices - Status changed to: Needs Clarification

BradNiemand — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 23:43:10 GMT

The Create Locator tool will automatically set the "Match with no Zones" property to "Yes" if the locator is built with no administrative zones (city, state, postal, etc...). The Create Locator tool will default the property to "No" if any administrative zone is mapped when building the locator. Also, the tech support best practices link you refer to is for our classic ArcMap based locators that are no longer supported in Pro as of Pro 3.0. This documentation is quite outdated and will be taken down or updated.

It is strongly recommended to map the administrative zones when building a locator and it is also strongly recommended that the "Match with no Zones" property is set to "No". With suggestions support in Pro the need for the "Match with no Zones" property is not as necessary because users have the ability to choose the suggested candidate without needing to enter the entire address or place. Setting "Match with no Zones" to "Yes" should only be done if there is a specific need that requires it.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 23:59:29 GMT

@BradNiemand this idea was suggested by esri tech support as a follow up to enhancement request ENH-000161600. That came out of the support case # 03402446. We found that with an administrative zone set in the locator (we use city as the zone), the findAddressCandidates end point would not return results (or at least all the relevant results). I was told after lots of back and forth with tech support that setting Match with no Zones to "YES" was both a best practice and a requirement to getting relevant results back.

Obviously that was quite contradictory to your post above and a bit dispiriting for me since there doesn't appear to be a consensus within esri on what should be done here. I'm keen to get to the bottom of this issue and it doesn't need to be done here. Suggestions on the best way forward or should I just follow up with our esri rep?

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

BradNiemand — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 00:10:26 GMT

Thanks for the quick response.

Suggestions are the best way to get quick results without entering the entire address and would be the suggestion from the geocoding team as the best move forward.

I did look into your case and it appears that you might be hitting an issue that was already patched. Can you have the following patch applied to your server? https://support.esri.com/en-us/patches-updates/2022/arcgis-server-geocoding-service-quality-patch-8082

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 00:26:35 GMT

I believe we are patched for this. Just pulled from the server.

The reason we aren't necessarily going to suggestions first, then handing that to the findAddressCandidates is that we have some custom apps that aren't set up to use that capability at this point.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

ShanaBritt — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 04:27:56 GMT

@Mike_Quetel Since you are using the findAddressCandidates operation, are you able to use the location parameter that is described here, https://developers.arcgis.com/rest/services-reference/enterprise/find-address-candidates.htm, in your requests? If your custom apps have a map, can it grab the center of the map and use those coordinates for the location parameter?

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 14:15:16 GMT

@ShanaBritt Thank you, I can look into it, but it would require some testing to determine if it actually increases relevant results. I can imagine scenarios where a location hint might be helpful and others where it maybe wouldn't, such as zoomed in quite a bit, but user is attempting to geocode and navigate to an address across town, so location hint is in the wrong place.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

ShanaBritt — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 16:42:27 GMT

@Mike_Quetel When the geocode service is used in a map like in ArcGIS Pro or the MapViewer for example the center of the map is used as the location that is included in the requests to the service. Is you custom app in a browser or mobile device? You could test using the REST endpoint and include coordinates, maybe from the center of the data used to build the locator in the request. When using the REST endpoint to test the service you should include location since there is no map to grab the location from.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 22:54:49 GMT

@ShanaBritt Unfortunately I'm not seeing a benefit from adding the location parameter (with a nearby X/Y coordinate). A result that should be easily returned by my provided inputs still isn't found.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

ShanaBritt — Thu, 09 Nov 2023 07:40:01 GMT

@Mike_Quetel Is creating a multirole locator an option for you rather than using a composite locator for the service? Do you have any differences when using location when not using SingleLine and just using Address or Place?

https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/help/data/geocoding/combine-multiple-layers-into-a-single-locator.htm

https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/help/data/geocoding/tutorial-create-a-multirole-locator.htm

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 15:04:58 GMT

@ShanaBritt It might be in the future, but would require source-level data changes we don't want to tackle quite yet... as long as composite locators are still supported. It's our understanding that in a multi-role locator, only one dataset can occupy a single role at the same time... and it seems like for aliasing purposes this is true also? We have a street name alias table that is used with point addresses and another used with street centerlines (the primary keys used for addresses and centerlines are different). These would need to be combined into a single alias table that could occupy the street name alias role, if my understanding of the documentation is correct. Our initial goal was to change as few things as necessary to be able to retire our classic locators and adopt the new locators.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

Mike_Quetel — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 15:52:38 GMT

@ShanaBritt Answering the 2nd part of your question: In general we don't see any meaningful difference (result wise) between SingleLine and Address/Place. The exception is that SingleLine used to allow the inclusion of the City parameter in classic locators but does not anymore. The City parameter must be paired with the Address parameter or the administrative zone value must be concatenated to the SingleLine value in order to be considered in the new locators. I tried to file a bug for that but it was closed because the behavior was "by design". Fair but it is a partially breaking change to the REST API behavior 🙂

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

ShanaBritt — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 18:41:32 GMT

@Mike_Quetel Regarding multirole locators, you are correct that each primary or alternate name role can only be used once in a multirole locator. So if you had multiple point address sources you would have to merge them together to build the multirole locator with the PointAddress role as described in this tutorial for a POI locator, https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/help/data/geocoding/tutorial-create-a-locator-with-more-than-one-dataset-of-same-role.htm. The same would be true for the alternate street name table, the data for the point address and street address roles would need to have the same join id value to link to the street name from any primary role to the alternate name table role.

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

BradNiemand — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 21:20:46 GMT

@Mike_Quetel

You are correct in your statement above. SingleLine is intended to be the entire input address with all relevant information, including the address, city, state, postal, etc... It was never intended to be used with any of the multiline input fields except for CountryCode. The fact that it worked before was not intentional and really shouldn't be used. If you would like to use multiple fields for input, you should be using Address and City instead.

You can read more about these parameters for the online service (it would function the same with custom locators as well). https://developers.arcgis.com/rest/geocode/api-reference/geocoding-find-address-candidates.htm#ESRI_SECTION1_699C8961EDD845CAB84A46409D9E9105

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices

GIS_Spellblade — Fri, 26 Jan 2024 17:26:34 GMT

I'll just drop this here. Seems like it could solve this issue if these parameters were exposed.

https://community.esri.com/t5/arcgis-pro-ideas/create-locator-additional-options-when-creating/idc-p/1192654#M20349

Re: The Create Locator GP tool should output locators that follow esri tech support best practices - Status changed to: Closed

BradNiemand — Thu, 16 May 2024 20:08:33 GMT

The technical article is outdated and will be removed or updated with current best practices.