Quitting Desktop Cold Turkey

[JasonBritton1]

I've been a Desktop user for about 14 years. I have seen a lot of reasons that users are saying avoid ArcGIS Pro. Just thought I'd share my experience since I've quit ArcGIS for Desktop. I had played with Pro after going to the SE UC a few years back but didn't commit. I decided to change because my attribute updates to services hosted on ArcGIS Online decided not to save when editing in ArcMap. Tech support couldn't duplicate the issue on their end and couldn't figure out why it wouldn't work. On a whim I wanted to see if the same issue would happen in Pro. When I moved everything into a Pro project the edits to my online services worked as they should. Just as a point of info I don't develop or write scripts so I can't speak to how that works.

The biggest hurdle in migrating to pro is relearning where everything is. The interface has changed a lot, but thanks to google its pretty easy to find what you are looking for. Editing is a bit clunkier in my opinion than it is in Desktop. One suggestion I have would be to bring the snapping options back to the right click menu. Another issue is that so far there is still no fix for creating hyperlinks in the identify window. I brought this up about two years ago and  as far as I can see, it seems like it still hasn't been addressed. The last negative I have is that labeling is a bit slower but its really a minor inconvenience.

Pro does make it much easier to work with those items that are hosted on portal and ArcGIS Online. My organization has made a heavy commitment to Online and it has definitely made my maintenance for the hosted services much more convenient. The ability to create multiple layouts in a single project is also a big plus. I've seen some worry about the lack of ArcCatalog. You use the Project Pane in Pro. It works essentially the same as the catalog window in an mxd but with some added functionality. So it's pretty much ArcCatalog its just not available as a standalone program.

ESRI can deny it all they want, but the bottom line is this is going to replace Desktop. Maybe not this year, but eventually it will. Overall I'd say I'm happy with the switch. Once I become more familiar with the interface I don't expect it will feel much different than Desktop did. I'd recommend that users start becoming familiar with this program.

[ThomasColson]

Most GIS'ers, like AutoCAD'ers, have multiple monitors for the explicit purpose of managing tools and data on one screen, and the ability to drag them over to a workspace. I'm struggling to understand why Pro Developers aren't understanding how most GIS users efficiently work, and keep trying to justify the lack of dual workspaces with responses like "...but it did it within the single application rather than through a separate, stand-alone app." . And I'll ask again, if the functionality is present in ArcMap, and it works, and the customers like/want/depend on it, why remove it, then tell the customers to provide a written justification for it's return, which, in most cases, will be a futile exercise, as others in this thread have confirmed? 

[KoryKramer]

Thomas,

Since you've been asking this question consistently across GeoNet

And I'll ask again, if the functionality is present in ArcMap, and it works, and the customers like/want/depend on it, why remove it, then tell the customers to provide a written justification for it's return, which, in most cases, will be a futile exercise

I wanted to take this opportunity to clarify why feedback from the user community is important to the development of ArcGIS Pro.  The initial release of ArcGIS Pro was not billed as an ArcMap equivalent. We released the first version with features that users had been asking for, which we couldn’t provide with the architecture of ArcMap - this included things like performance improvements (64-­bit processing), 2D and 3D views, multi­threaded geoprocessing, and support for multiple layouts. With subsequent (and future) releases of ArcGIS Pro, we have delivered, and will continue to deliver more of the functionality that is in ArcMap and new innovations that are only possible with the architecture of ArcGIS Pro.  When we ask the user community what they would like to see in Pro, we are asking you to help us prioritize what functionality gets built into the upcoming version, not whether ArcMap functionality will be built into ArcGIS Pro.  

The migration to ArcGIS Pro represents a major enhancement in capabilities for our users because it is fully integrated into the Web GIS pattern of working on and with web layers, web maps, and web scenes. This means that in common workflows where a user generates a high-­quality map or 3D visualization, he or she can author a map or 3D representation and share it to ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise to make it immediately available as web maps for other users in their organization.

While Esri is working hard on providing most of the capabilities of ArcMap in ArcGIS Pro, we are also implementing new innovations that are only possible in the “connected desktop” and services architecture, including many apps that compliment and extend the desktop environment and capabilities of our users.

Over the last several years we have been working aggressively to build capabilities of ArcMap into the ArcGIS Pro application.  These capabilities weren't “taken away” – we are working as fast as we can to build them into ArcGIS Pro; and it is simply a matter of time.  Again, input from the Desktop community helps us to prioritize the order in which capabilities are added.

With the release of 2.0 (Summer 2017) many of the capabilities commonly used by ArcMap users will have been implemented into ArcGIS Pro, including:

• Project Favorites and a Catalog user experience
• New analysis geoprocessing tools
• Support for WFS as a native layer and support for service version from OGC web services
• Support for migrating existing and creating new annotations
• Layout with Grids and support for Charts
• Traverse tool for COGO feature creation
• Ability to run multiple instances of ArcGIS Pro on the same machine
• Improvements to the .NET SDK for developers
• Additional functionality for the Task framework
• Improved cartography

Over the next year, we expect ArcGIS Pro to provide virtually all of the commonly used capabilities found in ArcMap, as well as new functionality that will support the evolving role of GIS and the GIS professional.

We very much appreciate our users being patient while we systematically build out the capabilities of ArcGIS Pro, and we will continue to encourage the community to participate in the process.

[DanPatterson_Retired]

Nice summary Kory.  

Unfortunately for esri, they chose the name appendage 'Pro' .  

Perhaps this has created a herd mentality of users wanting the latest and greatest.  The differentiation could have be made more explicit from the beginning.

There is very little discussion on GeoNet of the new capabilities that Pro brings.  Little things, like using Python 3.6 ...a mere 8 years after the birth of 3.x .

Maybe  renaming ArcMap to ArcMap Gold ... and Pro to ArcGIS Bronze ... would have been a better move strategically.

[MattWilkie3]

Kory Kramer wrote:

When we ask the user community what they would like to see in Pro, we are asking you to help us prioritize what functionality gets built into the upcoming version, not whether ArcMap functionality will be built into ArcGIS Pro.

Thank you for this. If Esri had led with this years ago much teapot tempesting could have been avoided. Is this a view that is consistent and shared across the development team?

Over the last several years we have been working aggressively to build capabilities of ArcMap into the ArcGIS Pro application.  These capabilities weren't “taken away” – we are working as fast as we can to build them into ArcGIS Pro; and it is simply a matter of time.  

2 years and version 2.0 to rename shapefiles. How much time are talking about for approximate equivalency? How long before steam runs out on adding the "whethers" and ArcMap joins ArcInfo and ArcView3 on the shelf of "most stuff works if you really need it but you're swimming upstream against the current"?

Make no mistake, there will be useful things left out. It can't be helped. I don't blame Esri for not completely recreating all the features of the old in the new. It's too hard to make a new thing and an old thing in a new way at the same time. I do level a finger at them for pretending that it won't happen.

[MattWilkie3]

Thanks for taking the time to engage and provide feedback Kory. That action is precisely what I see missing from the Ideas space. My complaint is less that my personal pet peeves are not acted on, though some of that is certainly present, and more that Esri Inc. is so opaque on what doesn't get acted on and why. Substantive responses, dealing with specifics, not hand wavy "oh there are so many things to consider, such as x, and y, and z" -- all of which are true, but don't serve to illuminate.

[MattWilkie3]

...is the "stand alone" part of that idea an integral piece in your mind?  What if Pro did everything that you needed in terms of data management, but it did it within the single application rather than through a separate, stand-alone app?  Would that meet your needs?

I use Catalog in situations where I'm only manipulating data, with no map involved. I want/need as much screen real estate as possible to expand folders and databases, drag things from one place to another, and so on.  I also use catalog when geoprocessing, working on code and models*.

I don't care if the experience is controlled by a single .exe file or 5**. What I'm after is being able to maximize my time and efficiency. One of the ways I do that is to use one command sequence for working on map project (Start >> ArcMap) and another one for working on gp/data project (Start >> ArcCatalog). If I can start Pro (Start >> Pro as Catalog) and have the opening view zap all ribbons and controls dealing with Table of Contents, Page Layout, Symbology etc. and expose all the tools for data management I'd be happy. (This presupposes the ability to have multiple sessions running at once, with the ability to drag and drop from one session to the other.)

* The only benefit I can see at the moment of having Catalog completely embedded in the mother app is being able to save GP Results for future sessions.

** I do care if the launch time is 5 times longer to load the mother of all applications, when my job of the moment only needs 1 aspect. So many of my scripts and models take handfuls of seconds and less to run, but half a minute to start because `import arcpy` is a sloth.

[IainStuart]

Fundamentally if ESRI pushes everything to on-line/cloud platforms then there will be a problem for those of us whose clients absolutely do not want their data anywhere near on-line and cloud for data security reasons.

[JasonBritton1]

I don't think it will be everything. My guess would be ESRI would maintain some version of ArcServer so users would have the option of configuring content for internal sources.

[KoryKramer]

ArcGIS Pro doesn't force a user to expose data online (to the cloud).  If you already use ArcGIS Server (now called ArcGIS Enterprise What is ArcGIS Enterprise?—Portal for ArcGIS (10.5) | ArcGIS Enterprise ) you have access to Portal for ArcGIS What is Portal for ArcGIS?—Portal for ArcGIS (10.5) | ArcGIS Enterprise Portal is an on-premises solution that is analogous to ArcGIS Online, but entirely on your own servers, behind your firewall.  If these are concerns for you, as they certainly are for many organizations, I would highly recommend reading up on Portal.

[DanPatterson_Retired]

Nice summary Jason...  Good points from all above

But I age myself when I say...

I found the transition easier than the transition from the ArcView to the ArcGIS world ... everything changed...(won't even go to the ArcInfo stuff)

The big change for me was the programming languages.  ArcObjects certainly didn't offer the ease of Avenue, but it is nice to see that open source languages and applications have been embraced (python, r, numpy, scipy, pandas, matplotlib etc.

Perhaps over time, more can or will be added