Can I use basemaps I sideloaded for Collector in Explorer on the same iOS device?

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02-11-2020 05:06 PM
JakeJacobs
Occasional Contributor III

I have sideloaded tpks of imagery (up to 100GB) on iOS devices to use as offline Collector basemaps.  Can I reference the same basemaps in Explorer when I take a map cache offline?  I certainly don't want to load the data twice.

4 Replies
SaranyaKesavan
New Contributor II

Erika,

This capability is currently not possible in our apps and we totally understand why it might be needed. This is something we have been discussing internally and certainly something we can look into adding for a future release.

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WilliamRice
Occasional Contributor II

My organization really needs a complete replacement for the 10.2 era Esri Windows Mobile Map and Utility Mobile Map application.  In the big bad world of disasters, the Internet is not going to always be around and it truly is imperative that we have as an option to physicaly store large aerial imagery base maps and other data  on the device.

by Anonymous User
Not applicable

Hey William Rice‌,

We definitely understand the reality of working in the field often means unreliable connectivity. We're always looking for ways too improve offline capabilities in our apps. The current versions of Explorer and Collector support sideloading large aerial imagery basemaps for use Web Maps (or even Mobile Map Packages in Explorer). Have you tried this functionality yet?

With that said, unfortunately there are some limitations for sharing this data between applications. This requires the data to be copied to separate locations if you're using both applications on the same device. We are actively investigating ways to improve this for future releases.

Joel

JakeJacobs
Occasional Contributor III

We are just completing a similar project to move all our ArcGIS Mobile for Windows inspection programs to Collector/Survey123/Tracker for ArcGIS.  You are probably smart to have waited a little longer. I think the functionality has finally almost achieved parity, if you are able to move to iOS devices. We did that and the users like them a lot plus they are cheaper than the rugged tablets we were using. Not as much integration with other big enterprise systems, though.  It works best for our contract inspection programs.

We are using iTunes to sideload about 100GB of imagery that has been packaged as tpks on the devices, broken up by State. It's only built at the close in zoom scales to save on space. We use an Esri vector gray basemap and vector hybrid reference layer in the map.  Users create their own offline caches from their devices for a subarea they are working in at the time and that gets them the nice streets layer and some reference for large scales. Then they manually switch to the sideloaded offline basemap to see the imagery when they are zoomed in close. It's working well although having to use iTunes is a nuisance and because the imagery is stored in a place Collector requires it, if for some reason the app needs to be reinstalled we also lose the imagery.