idea ArcGIS Pro indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed in ArcGIS Pro Ideas

ArcGIS Pro indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed

JamesBotterill4 — Fri, 23 Jul 2021 17:12:39 GMT

Are you experiencing slowness initially opening a project in ArcGIS Pro?

Do you have a large amount of Enterprise SDE content in your map views / layouts?

Then consider unticking the "Skip enterprise database connections" under ArcGIS Pro > Options

My suggestion to ESRI is:

Change: update the hover text or add a popup when users add a SDE databases connection to consider indexing options

Why: as above, the "skip" enterprise connections is ticked on by default, so the user needs a reminder to consider indexing SDE content should they have more of it say compared to just file geodatabase

ArcCatalog

Re: ArcPRO indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed

AlisonMynsberge — Fri, 19 Mar 2021 13:00:16 GMT

Interesting... Does this really speed things up? @KoryKramer

Re: ArcPRO indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed

KoryKramer — Fri, 19 Mar 2021 13:06:05 GMT

Indexing is a consideration when troubleshooting performance issues as described in

Switch to the Indexing tab (learn more about indexing options).

If you know where your data is, or you rarely have reason to search projects, you can turn indexing off. Try turning off indexing, or otherwise reschedule it to occur during times when you’re not using your machine.

Re: ArcPRO indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed

KoryKramer — Fri, 19 Mar 2021 13:25:01 GMT

To add to the response above https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/help/projects/index-project-items.htm#GUID-07D6A013-47CB-435C-B595-DD7DB616A098 indicates that by default the contents of enterprise geodatabases are not indexed.

Re: ArcGIS Pro indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed

NaicongLi — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 20:59:01 GMT

Hello JamesBotterill4,

Performance when opening a project where a map is open and active and includes visible enterprise geodatabase data is not impacted by the presence or absence of a search index. Search indexes only allow you to find items in the same enterprise geodatabase using the Search control in the Catalog pane and Catalog view.

Significant changes have been made to browsing, searching, and indexing since this idea was submitted. Beginning in Pro 2.7, which came out just a couple months after this idea was submitted, browsing in the Catalog does not leverage search indexes that exist. Also, indexing options and capabilities have changed significantly. We continue to not index enterprise geodatabase connections by default, as documented in the "How projects are indexed" help topic: https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/help/projects/index-project-items.htm#ESRI_SECTION1_954C7177739F497CA501E7992F64CF30.

Indexing enterprise geodatabases that are added to the project must be carefully considered and scheduled with an eye to how and when the database is responding to the most requests. For this reason we will not modify the ScreenTip associated with the New Database Connection context menu option.

Administrators may be interested in creating search indexes that can be shared with others so searching is available for enterprise geodatabases and network locations that contain shared GIS data, without each user having to build their own index: https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/help/projects/index-project-items.htm#ESRI_SECTION1_EB6BC43B38DB4ACFA38FCCE33C655DD6 Administrators can provide prebuilt indexes to users through the administrator settings framework with a Pro.settingsConfig file: https://pro.arcgis.com/en/pro-app/latest/get-started/catalog-settings.htm#ESRI_SECTION1_7259C68432CE488CBD981B5579766F98. This capability has been available since Pro 3.2.

Given the changes above, we are closing this idea. Thank you for your feedback.

Re: ArcGIS Pro indexing Enterprise SDE content to improve project speed - Status changed to: Closed

NaicongLi — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 20:59:22 GMT