Animated GIFs as symbols in Map Viewer - functionality not working properly

BrendanConway2

GIFs as symbols in Map Viewer: The functionality for using animated GIFs as symbols in ArcGIS Online is not working properly. This can still be done in Classic Map Viewer, so why is it not possible in Map Viewer, which is supposed to be the more up to date app?

An error message often appears 'Uploaded image is too large, resize or use a smaller image', but there is no information at that point to provide advice about an acceptable image size.

Elsewhere there is an obscure tip: Use style options (Map Viewer)—ArcGIS Online Help | Documentation which states ‘For best results, use a square image no greater than 36 pixels wide by 36 pixels high. Other sizes will be adjusted to fit.’, but this adjustment does not happen.

Also 36x36px is ridiculously small. Quality is so compromised that the quality of the animated GIF is very low.

Even when an animated GIF is uploadable, the animation works in the Legend, but not in the symbol on the map, which appears as a static image and the definition is very poor.

RussRoberts

I am no able to reproduce this with some of the gif icons I have available. Are you able to share the gif you are using? In Map Viewer we store the uploaded images in the browser cache and then store the image in the web. The symbols in the map are then no longer dependent on the image always being available hosted elsewhere or having the hosting server correctly configured where we would see a number of CORS errors when trying to retrieve the hosted image. You can also use this gifs in pro and publish them as picture marker symbols in a web style and Map Viewer can use them from those symbol galleries and will also do a similar storage model where the final symbol is not dependent on the source web style always being available.

BrendanConway2

Thanks Russ. I have already raised this with Technical Support (04050135) so the suggestion you made has already happened and we know that there are issues with the functionality which need attention so it was suggested that the issue be raised here. The Pro workaround sounds good, but I don't use Pro and need to be able to work with other teachers and students who only use AGOL. So we need a solution that works in Map Viewer (MV). MV has many great qualities, but surprisingly, 5-6 years into its lifespan, it still cannot offer some things that can be done in Classic Map Viewer (CMV), which is why the deprecation of CMV is premature. Consequently CMV's lifespan should be extended unti MV issues are fixed e.g. MV cannot save 'Sketch' for use in other apps; the choice of symbols is very limited; URLs cannot be used to create customised symbols.

RussRoberts

Saving sketch as an item is on our roadmap for 2026 similar to the MVC and map notes saving. For symbol galleries we have a number of galleries available that can be added to Map Viewer directly through symbol styler in the layer styling experience and in the sketch panel. These can also be added to your own org symbol gallery if you wanted to customize the default gallery option similar to building a custom basemap gallery for your organization. There are currently 35 symbol galleries available which you can check out here:

https://www.arcgis.com/home/group.html?sortField=modified&sortOrder=desc&id=3ff4a2ef0d3f41c986025e63...

If there is a gallery missing that you would like us to review feel free to let us know.

Thanks!

BrendanConway2

I appreciate your support on this! It's hard to understand why the Sketch upgrade is taking so long when it was notified several years ago and there will be no overlap with CMV capabilities e.g. in MV how can a line such as a river course be drawn, then saved and used in Scene? I know there is a workaround using FL but this is too much for most users, so this valuable functionality is impossible.

Thanks for the link to the symbol galleries - I wasn't aware of these. Unfortunately, as above, this seems to be a very convoluted route and too much for most users. It's very difficult to see what's in each gallery because all of them use the same 'palette' icon. It is much better to have them available directly in the symbol dialogue, as in CMV.

It would be excellent to review the missing galleries and put them into MV. For example, I can't find any of of these useful collections that are in CMV: 'A-Z', 'Disasters' 'Shapes' (42 symbols), 'Cartographic', 'General Infrastructure', ' Numbers', 'Outdoor Recreation', People Places'

I can see that some of the CMV collections are probably in the galleries, but it would be good to have direct access to them via the MV 'Symbology> Edit layer style>Style options>Symbol style' workflow: 'Government', National Park Service', 'Points of Interest' (55 symbols), Public Safety, Shapes' (42 symbols), Transporation, Utilities (three collections).

The 'Use an Image' to link to a URL was really useful, but that's gone and it would be very good to have that back!

If these things could be fixed it would be most welcome!

RussRoberts

We are currently working on filling out the summary description for these symbol galleries to give an easier higher level understanding as we bring them into living atlas. For some of those galleries that are picture markers coming from ArcMap based styles we currently do not have plans to migrate those over at this time but that can be converted to a Pro desktop style and published to your org if you do want to use that workflow.

For using the image by URL workflow we currently do not have plans to support this. One of the primary issues we saw with that workflow was many servers hosting the images were not correctly configured and would not work with our newer SDK based apps like Map Viewer, Scene Viewer and other newer web apps where we use WebGL to render these images and the hosting servers would not allow the retrieval of these images and cause nothing to draw on the map.

https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/cors/