Why do vector tile services require Portal / AGOL?

[berniejconnors]

Hello Community,

        We have been publishing raster tile map services with ArcGIS Server since version 9.3.1.  That was 2009 - long before ArcGIS Portal was a product.  Portal was not necessary for the publishing of raster tile map services.  Why is Portal / ArcGIS Online required for publishing vector tile map services?  Why can't my vector tiles live beside their raster tile brothers on a file server?  Is there a really good reason for making my map server infrastructure more complex?

Thanks,

Bernie.

[AmandaDeMedeiros]

Hi @berniejconnors,

I remember when we used to work together before the days of Vector Tile Services. The Community Map of Canada was a fledgling, the same with my GIS career. I would process large datasets from your community into our Topographic Raster Tile Service. It took a REALLY long time as you can imagine processing an entire province. I don’t know if you remember how long you waited on us to cache new updates. Anytime a mistake was made, the reprocessing of an area had to be cached all over. I recall the day I was at an Esri UC and they introduced Vector Tile Services, it blew my mind. The processing time was so much faster!

Now let’s skip forward from memory lane to what’s needed behind all that power.

Let’s start with what are Vector Tiles?

Vector tiles are exactly that: clipped tiles, or grid squares, composed of layers of vector features. They are served in a similar way to raster tiles. A client application requests tiles based on a zoom level and extent, and the server responds with binary data representing the vector tiles containing the layers to be visualized on that map.

Rendering is done in the client. As personal computers and mobile phones have become more powerful, vector tiles create interactive web maps.

What is making the rendering possible?

It needs a JavaScript API Integration to be consumed within the built applications. This is where the Portal/AGOL interface does the heavy lifting. Any big changes in the JavaScript API will need to be addressed in Portal/AGOL for browser to interpret the services.

Storage

Vector Tile’s are not static and has access to attribute information. So it can’t live on a file server like a Raster Tile Service can.

Benefits

Vector tiles offer a number of advantages over raster map tiles for web mappers. These were our biggest advantages at the Community Map of Canada.

Firstly, they can be customised extensively by the user. Styles can be customised and adapted as a default or based on user interaction – for example, to highlight a particular layer or feature. Because they are rendered in the client, custom styles can be defined and applied when the map is created. Designers can adapt the style of their maps so they match organisational colour schemes.

Secondly, maps made with vector tiles are fast. A vector tile service will send much less data than a raster service would send for the same map, meaning lower bandwidth use and lower disk space requirements. Features are represented in a very lightweight manner and styles are only defined once before being applied to a layer no matter how many features. This makes vector tile maps great for mobile and low-bandwidth uses.

There are a lot more.

Why are our systems so complex?

Technology is forever changing and improving!

Something that we found to be complex long ago will be considered simple in a few year’s time. Use my Community Map of Canada example, since we’ve changed to Vector Tile Services we are able to process a lot more Canadian communities in a quicker turn around time. When the Community Map of Canada was first created we thought it was very complex, and now we have a different view of them. 

I hope this spin and explanation gave you a different view on this topic. 

[berniejconnors]

Amanda,

        That is a great explanation of Esri vector tiles.  But wouldn't it be better if customers had a choice?  You can have "basic" vector tiles without Portal/AGOL.  Or, you can combine vectore tiles with Portal/AGOL and you can also have restyling and .... etc.

Bernie.

[AmandaDeMedeiros · Accepted solution]

Hi @berniejconnors,

You're still thinking dimensionally in the terms of the original design of a Raster Tiles and their storage requirements. Raster Tiles are static images that are pre-rendered, eliminating the need for complex data processing or simplification. They lack the ability to dynamically style or interact with individual features.

Bringing it back to your question, “Can you use Vector Tiles without Portal/AGOL?” The answer is no, and the reason is due to the Portal/AGOL's JavaScript API working in the backend to leverage all the capabilities of Vector Tiles mentioned in the previous post (and more). It utilizes JavaScript API, WebGL, and other rendering technologies to provide an interactive mapping experience.

The Main Difference Between Vector Tiles and Raster Tiles:

• Raster Tile basemaps have certain limitations in performance and size.
• Raster tiles struggle to provide high performance without compromising on image resolution.
• In contrast, Vector tiles offer higher resolution, faster basemap services, and customization capabilities.

Another significant difference is the storage for the two types because Raster Tiles are static, while Vector Tiles are dynamic.

• Raster tiles are stored as pre-rendered images (PNG, JPEG, WebP) representing map data at specific zoom levels.
• Raster tiles are stored as image files, whereas vector tiles are stored as compact tile files containing vector data.

Why are Vector Tiles Faster, Interactive, and Customizable?

• Geometry, attribute, and style data in vector tiles are stored separately.
• This separation allows vector basemaps to be interactive and provide actual information on features without constant server requests.
• You can customize the symbology style file used to render vector tiles extensively.

Since Vector Tiles are generated on the fly and cached only on a session-to-session basis on the client side, you no longer have to wait hours for caching to complete. This eliminates struggles with storage space on your hosting server.

You can still use Raster Tiles for specific workflows, they are not becoming obsolete.