Often software and web app developers require only 1 REST service be referenced in their application which loads anywhere from 1 to infinity datasets from ArcGIS OnLine. Presently, the only way to create that 1 REST service which includes multiple datasets is to load the data into a map in ArcPro and then publish that collection of data as a hosted feature service.
The data management issue is that (1) often the data included in this new bundle already exist in ArcGIS OnLine each as independent REST services (2) so once this bundle of data are pushed to AGOL as a REST service with multiple items, this is now duplicating data in AGOL and (3) whenever there's a data update to any of the datasets within the bundle it now requires twice the effort to push the update to AGOL (since one has to update that initial REST service which references just 1 dataset as well as updating the REST service that contains the bundle of datasets).
It would be most helpful if we could create a Group REST service that references a collection of REST services from their organization. This way whenever a hosted feature dataset within the collection is updated independently, the Group REST service stays in-sync with the source dataset(s).
Presently, one can create a Group Layer (from Map Viewer in AGOL) and this almost does what I'm describing. However, the Group Layer is not a REST service and hence can not be readily used by 3rd party applications.
Thank you!
