While collection is perfectly handled by Collector sometimes users require some extra information which allows them to have a full GIS collection. This is the case as an example when external sensors are used, you have all the attributes defined in your feature class however you still need to fill these manually since Collector will not read this data. Take as an example an external GNSS receiver which wants to pass height, accuracy, Datum or other data to the GIS collection feature class. User wants to use collector and at the moment of the measurement this data needs to be passed to the feature class. If there would be a simple way to fill the collection form with data from the external sensort then no need to manually enter that information by the user. As such Collector could have an API (or a communication app to app link) which allows the filling of other data into the feature class defined by the GIS specialist.
What is the flow:
-User runs 2 apps (one in the background which is doing extraction/parsing from the sensor)
-Collector in normal use
-Feature class has certain naming convention defined by sensor manufacturer but defined as attributes by the ArcGIS Online feature class specialist
-The sensor app will make a connection (example to a TCP port or a process to process mechanism) which allows the sensor app to fill the attributes defined in the collector app
-Sensor app sends constant updates to Collector for this data
-Collector at the moment of collection uses this data so it can be added to the collected feature form
-So customer simply has sensor app running in the back and then collector takes care of filling any other data
What are the possibilities:
-Imagine temp sensor pushing temperature data
-Imagine humidity sensor
-Imagine distance sensor (using laser)
etc
