topic Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer in ArcGIS REST APIs and Services Questions

How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

KarenRobine1 — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 20:07:44 GMT

According to the documentation here:

https://developers.arcgis.com/rest/services-reference/query-feature-service-layer-.htm

There's a parameter, returnCentroid. According to the documentation Notes:

Note:

The layer metadata returns supportsReturningGeometryCentroid in the advancedQueryCapabilities metadata object. The absence of the supportsReturningGeometryCentroid property means that the server does not support the returnCentroid parameter. Line and point data will return supportReturningGeometryCentroid as false.

Question: I'm trying to figure out how to make the server support the returnCentroid parameter, because in our case, the supportsReturningGeometryCentroid property does not exist. FYI: We're on 10.8 so I know this is supposed to be supported in our version.

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

pfoppe — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 20:30:03 GMT

The underlying service in question was published from the ArcMap engine, not ArcGIS PRO (if that matters).

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

jcarlson — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 21:41:53 GMT

That property would be contained within the larger advancedQueryCapabilities:

"advancedQueryCapabilities": { "supportsPagination": true, "supportsQueryWithDistance": true, "supportsReturningQueryExtent": true, "supportsStatistics": true, "supportsOrderBy": true, "supportsDistinct": true, "supportsQueryWithResultType": true, "supportsSqlExpression": true, "supportsReturningGeometryCentroid": true }

Do you see anything in that object?

What is the data source you're querying? Is it hosted, or a registered service on a server?

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

pfoppe — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 22:09:33 GMT

Thanks for the response. Data is hosted in a File Geodatabase on a back-end File system that is registered with a stand-alone (not federated) ArcGIS Server v10.8.1

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

jcarlson — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 13:19:01 GMT

Hm. I wonder if that's somehow related. I don't have experience with using file-based resources through a server, so I don't even have any layers to test this with.

Can you use the returnCentroid capability with other layers that are either Hosted Feature Layers or published from an Enterprise Geodatabase?

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

KarenRobine1 — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 13:54:08 GMT

Thanks for the response Josh. I think I may have figured it out. I think(???) it ONLY works on Feature Services. Not on Map Services. I didn't even think of that as I just assumed all queries work on Map Services. I'm not sure if this would be a bug in the REST-based functionality, or it's as intended? I'm testing my theory today. Thanks.

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

jcarlson — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 14:00:15 GMT

Oh, that sounds like it would be the issue. There are a number of things that just don't see, to work the same against a map service vs a feature service. Post back how your test goes, I'm curious to hear!

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

KarenRobine1 — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 00:07:25 GMT

OK, that was it. You have to setup the service as a "FeatureService" with Query capabilities turned on. Then, it looks like you can return the centroids. is it a Bug or a Feature??

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

jcarlson — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 14:17:10 GMT

A feature, I believe.

Though I'm of the mindset that anyone who wants my data should be able to get at it as easily as possible, I know there are situations in which tighter control over data access would be desirable.

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

KarenRobine1 — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 21:35:52 GMT

so re-reading the documentation on this. Turns out it's not possible on my linear data... ugh..

Used to return the geometry centroid associated with each feature returned. If true, the result includes the geometry centroid. The default is false. Currently, this parameter is not supported for polygon data and is ignored for count and objectID queries. This parameter is only supported on layer-level queries.

Note:

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

jcarlson — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 21:49:08 GMT

There is still a way to get the centroids, if you don't mind doing some Python.

Once you query the layer out to a spatially enabled dataframe, you can call the centroid property on a GeoSeries Accessor of the dataframe's SHAPE column.

sdf = lines_service.layers[0].query(as_df=True) gsa = arcgis.features.GeoSeriesAccessor(sdf['SHAPE']) gsa.centroid

Which returns:

0     (986305.7876933983, 1833079.8610554787)
1     (960080.7627723165, 1827236.9255665324)
2     (943782.9728523004, 1822116.2102860417)
3      (920423.2422279464, 1823134.951778373)
4     (991925.4577918178, 1758800.7325564628)
5     (916942.1624821002, 1776554.3496633286)
6     (927332.5836300697, 1748540.1104202385)
7     (952494.8496332371, 1765384.4943458117)
...

And just to confirm, the layer I'm running it on has the return centroid property set to False. The difference here is that I'm asking the dataframe for the centroid, not the REST endpoint.

I don't know if that's applicable to what you're trying to do with the data, but wanted to make sure you knew about it.

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

KarenRobine1 — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 15:21:52 GMT

Thanks Josh. I'm actually doing this using the JavaScript API. I could possibly do a request using the geometry service to get the center for each geometry passed in, but trying to keep this thing fast as I may have to do it for tens of thousands of lines at a time on a public-facing app, so speed is key. Thanks again for your help.

Karen

Re: How to get returnCentroid to work when querying Feature Service layer

hoogw — Thu, 01 May 2025 17:19:04 GMT

In 2025, I confirmed that only FeatureServer( feature service ) have returnCentroid.

Any arcgis online ( esri hosted ) have this, because esri hosted only provide featureServer(feature service), esri don't provide hosted map-server(or map-service).

You have to host yourself for a map-server(map-service)

here is sample

https://services.arcgis.com/aA3snZwJfFkVyDuP/ArcGIS/rest/services/BDC_Cities_and_Communities/FeatureServer/0?f=pjson

While MapServer ( map service ) don't have returnCentroid.

here is sample

https://public.gis.lacounty.gov/public/rest/services/LACounty_Cache/LACounty_StreetMap/MapServer/0?f=pjson