OGC WFS Layers on a Dashboard

[MichaelHamsa]

Hello,

We are trying to utilize layers from an OGC compliant Web Feature Service on a dashboard and we are running into some problems. The map obviously shows up fine but when we try to add another element, like in Indicator that sums up features from one of the WFS layers, we are getting a message that says "the map doesn't have any layers that can be used."

The WFS we are using supports query and filter capabilities (Basic Level Compatibility), what capabilities is it missing that is prevent it from being used with elements like an Indicator?

Thanks,

Mike...

[DerekLaw · Accepted solution]

Hi Mike,

> We are trying to utilize layers from an OGC compliant Web Feature Service on a dashboard ...  but when we try to add another element, like in Indicator that sums up features from one of the WFS layers, we are getting a message that says "the map doesn't have any layers that can be used."

This is expected behavior. All dashboard elements only support map and feature services from the ArcGIS platform. Only the Map element supports other data source types, please see the help topic:

Understand data sources—Operations Dashboard for ArcGIS | Documentation 

Hope this helps,

[MichaelHamsa]

Thank you very much for the response, I did find that reference in the documentation. I'm wondering, do we have any options to use data from the WFS to populate other data elements on a Dashboard? Is it possible to expose that data through a native feature or map service? We would like to consolidate the data from different systems for specific processes - like storm damage assessment - in a single Operations Dashboard. Using data published through a WFS from another system is a fairly straightforward way to do that.

Thanks again,

Mike...

[MichaelHamsa]

As an example, could we develop an ArcGIS Server Object Extension (SOE) that consumes the data from the another system and exposes it in a way that the Operations Dashboard would be able to use?

Thanks,

Mike...

[DerekLaw]

Hi Mike,

> ... do we have any options to use data from the WFS to populate other data elements on a Dashboard? Is it possible to expose that data through a native feature or map service? ... could we develop an ArcGIS Server Object Extension (SOE) that consumes the data from the another system and exposes it in a way that the Operations Dashboard would be able to use?

Possibly. I suppose as long as the output from the SOE is a map or feature service (that follows the ArcGIS Platform web services schema) it might work. Not sure as this now a custom solution.

Hope this helps,

[MichaelHamsa]

Thank you very much - is there anyone we can confirm this with? Maybe on the ArcGIS Server team? We've already spent quite a bit of time making sure our Web Feature Services support queries and filtering (thinking that would allow it to be used in the Dashboard), so before we spend anymore time, I'd like to confirm that this would work.

Also, what about the custom widget path - if we developed a custom widget for the Dashboard, would that be an option to display certain types of data outside of Esri on an Operations Dashboard?

Thanks again for the help,

Mike...

[DerekLaw]

Hi Mike,

> ... is there anyone we can confirm this with? Maybe on the ArcGIS Server team?

I've checked with the ArcGIS Enterprise Dev team and they've confirmed that an SOE won't be able to meet your needs.

> ... what about the custom widget path - if we developed a custom widget for the Dashboard

Operations Dashboard does not currently support any custom development. Sorry.

There's no workaround at this time. Perhaps you could generate some map and feature services directly from the data source(s) of your WFS service(s).

Hope this helps,

[MichaelHamsa]

I really appreciate all the assistance on this - maybe not what we were hoping for, but it certainly does help. Hopefully we can find a solution to make this work. I'm going look into publishing a service directly from our data source (SQL Server) to see if that may solve our problems.

Thanks again,

Mike...