What are the options for searching imagery represented by Image Server image service definitions? In other words, how can clients find the imagery they need? I have a large set of imagery from our Photogrammetry Unit, presently served out by Intergraph's Terrashare, that I am trying to serve via Image Server. Not really sure how to proceed; there are hundreds of missions covering many different areas. Presumably I'd need to create one .ISDef per mission. What then? What are the metadata search options available to clients consuming Image Server imagery from:
* ArcMap
* ArcGIS Explorer
* Microstation
The Terrashare solution currently in place, and which shall remain in place, uses some sort of an Oracle database backend to store metadata. What is the equivalent set-up for Image Server? A metadata search "lite" capability may be all we need. But I'd like to know what all my options are.
I'm at a bit of a loss on how to even organize this imagery in Image Server. I'm more accustomed to managing a few statewide datasets rather than hundreds of individual pre-mosaicked Photogrammetry raster datasets.
Finally, just to confirm, creating, say, 300 .ISDef / Image Server services, served out through ArcGIS Server, shouldn't require the same amount of resources that serving 300 ArcGIS Server map services, should it? Each map service requires resources out of the gate, e.g. map server instances / ArcSOC.exe processes. What about Image Server? How does an Image Server service correlate to pre-allocated system resources like memory and CPU? This is all on Windows 2008 Server by the way.
Thanks very much.