Attachment updates

[ModernElectric]

Currently - I have almost 6000 attachments linked to my Water GIS system. Most of them are composed of .PDF construction as-builts and .JPEG field phtotos. However - these .PDFs are constantly being updated. The problem I have is when one of the "Native" external files are modified and saved - the editor has to go into ArcMap - remove that attachment and reattach the same file. This makes it really frustrating when there are alot of attachments being updated on a regular basis. it would be nice that when the external native file is modified and saved - nothing has to be done to the attachment in ArcMap.

[PhilHolleran]

When using geodatabase attachments the file itself is loaded into the relational database as a blob.  For your workflow this, in effect, creates two copies: one stored on the file system and one in the relational database.  It sounds like you only want one copy of the file to exist.  For this, you can consider making the file folder(s) available as a web share and creating a field to hyperlink to the file's location (e.g. http:\\myFileShare\ww\12101.pdf).  This way, you will always be acecssing the version of the file that is shared on the file system.

[CoryWilliams]

It would be nice if we could set the datasource to be either within the GDB or on a network share...
I know that my DBA's aren't keen on storing data within the database like this...

[DuncanHornby]

I agree it would be good if the attachment is managed or unmanaged just like a raster catalog. I would find it very helpful the ability to link an attachment to an external file rather than something that gets sucked into the geodatabase.

[RobertMateja]

We are in the same position.  Our record mapping is constantly being updated.  It would be better to have the option for attachements to only store the path to the file on a file server.  There would only be one copy of a record map and the attachement would always point to the newest version.  It would also keep the geodatabase from growing exponentially.

[MichaelVolz]

I agree with the below comments.  In addition to attachment changes, I do not want to store the attachments in 2 locations if I already have a robust document management system.