Latest Contributions by MarcoBoeringa

A comprehensive overview of current limitations / requirements of Spatial Data Server is also in this Help topic: A quick tour of authoring feature services for ArcGIS Spatial Data Server ... View more

I just found that there is a product called ArcGIS spatial data server. And reading about it, found it is very similar to ArcGIS for server (just subset of it). So, what is the difference between the two? is it just a subset of the full server, so maybe it is cheaper? If ArcGIS Server and ArcGIS Spatial Data Server (SDS) actually share any programming code is something only ESRI can tell, so your question of "whether it is a subset of the full server" is unanswerable... ESRI presents them as two separate products. From a functionality point of view, SDS does not support any of the advanced geodatabase functionality like topologies, network datasets, parcel fabrics etc. So if your goal is to build a geodatabase incorporating any of this, and create a webapplication having some of this advanced functionality, than SDS is NOT the way to go, you will need ArcGIS for Server. In addition, Spatial Database Server was primarily designed to access and serve editable Feature Service layers from non-Geodatabase repository containing Spatial databases with native spatial types, although you can access and serve Geodatabase layers in a read-only mode - and as Simple Features only - too. Please note it also is primarily targeted at serving web Feature Services, not Image Services, which it can't even create according to the documentation I saw. IDK, but performance is likely not to be on par with fast cached Image Services of the same data. ... View more

Is there any way to trace the source that causes HANG ? Log Files etc ? -AS Since the -9 error indicates possible issues with database login, maybe taking a look at RDBMS error logs may give some idea of what is going on: View the SQL Server Error Log (SQL Server Management Studio) Using Trace and Error Logs (Oracle) Vince can probably give you better instruction or insight if this is useful in this specific case... EDIT: I now see -9 actually just says "login", so maybe having a look at the server OS (Windows?) error logs could be of some use too, primarilly for SQL Server, where database authentication is usually derived from Windows. Additional possibly useful link in this SQL Server contect: SQL SERVER �?? A Quick Look at Logging and Ideas around Logging. ... View more

Googling for "Error (-9):Couldn't Start Server Task." yielded the following old ESRI links that may be of some use. Especially see Danny Krouk's remarks in the discussion thread: http://forums.esri.com/Thread.asp?c=2&f=59&t=81786 http://support.esri.com/es/knowledgebase/techarticles/detail/19035 Also, these two links might be of some use: http://oracledbatips.com/arcsde/ArcSDE-error-codes-0-20.html http://edndoc.esri.com/arcsde/9.1/capi_functions/returncodes_incl.htm From the second link: SE_INVALID_USER     (-9) The user attempting to access the ArcSDE server does not have a valid login account on the ArcSDE host machine. Returned by the SE_connection_create call only. SE_DB_IO_ERROR     (-51) A database-level I/O error occurred. You can call the extended error code immediately after this code is returned to inquire about the specific database error code. ... View more

Thank you for the contribution Marco. I couldn�??t do this check on the sql server database. Jamal, Could you be a little bit more specific as to why you "... couldn't do this check ..."?? Were you unable to check the "Binary-code point" option in the dialog you made a screenshot of and that I attached below again? If so, this might be due to the fact that you also checked/selected "Case insensitive" and "Accent insensitive" or any of the other available options. If I understand it well, "Binary-code point" collations more or less use a predefined table with the sorting order fully determined (this is the code point/page, see this page and this page about character encoding and code pages on Wikipedia). This means you can't add options like "Case insensitive". Also see the following small remark below from this MSDN page, which confirms this incompatibility. So you will probably need to uncheck all other collation options before checking the "Binary-code point" collation option: "If BIN or Binary-code point is selected, the Case-sensitive, Accent-sensitive, Kana-sensitive, and Width-sensitive options are not available." Please, have a look on the screenshot below, am I in the right place to stick (as an example) �??ALTER TABLE myTable ALTER COLUMN mycol NVARCHAR(10) COLLATE Greek_CS_AI�?� [ATTACH=CONFIG]22117[/ATTACH] I guess you are in the right place, but in your case the statement is probably going to look a bit more like: "ALTER TABLE dbo.Communities_24 ALTER COLUMN CommunityName_Points_Arabic COLLATE Arabic_BIN2" In case you wish to try to set a "Binary-code point" (BIN2) collation on this specific column. ... View more

Thank you Marco for the input. That�??s exactly what I did! You should be able to find this on my previous screenshot (enterprise geodatabase with that feature class) 1. I added the �??Arabic�?� as Collation designator (adding feature to an existing instance) 2. Then I created an enterprise geodatabase 3. I copied the feature class to it 4. I tried the sql search! But no luck! It didn�??t work without the �??N�?� Best Jamal Jamal, did you also try to set a "Binary-code point" collation? This should force Unicode comparison in SQL Server. See this text from the MSDN page: "Binary-code point (_BIN2) Sorts and compares data in SQL Server tables based on Unicode code points for Unicode data. For non-Unicode data, Binary-code point will use comparisons identical to binary sorts. The advantage of using a Binary-code point sort order is that no data resorting is required in applications that compare sorted SQL Server data. As a result, a Binary-code point sort order provides simpler application development and possible performance increases. For more information, see Guidelines for Using BIN and BIN2 Collations." ... View more

Using the �??N�?� is sufficient without the need to install the collation designator. What do you think Marco? However, installing the �??Arabic�?� collation might be still needed referring to the fact that my database includes Arabic fonts. It should be necessary to avoid other types of error and weird behaviour. Best Jamal Jamal, I still think it would be worthwhile to set the collation to Arabic and try to re-load the data in your geodatabase (re-loading to force setting of Arabic collation on the Arabic unicode column). If I understand it well, your queries should than not need the "N" prefix, which is more consistent with the normal ArcGIS usage and less confusing to you or your geodatabase users. As the ArcGIS troubleshooting page also states: "No results are returned by ArcMap unless the SQL Server instance being queried is using a (Thai) locale or collation." Alternatively, you might still try to change the collation of specifically the Arabic character column in SQL Server Managent Studio by using the ALTER statement against the column, as explained on this page (scroll down to see it under "Column-level collations"): Collation and International Terminology Example from the page: ALTER TABLE myTable ALTER COLUMN mycol NVARCHAR(10) COLLATE Greek_CS_AI And as you also say, it should potentially give a more consistent behaviour with the sorting of the data in different applications and SQL Server. There also seem to be some new things with SQL Server 2008 and collations and a recommendation and push by Microsoft to use "BIN2" binary collations by checking the "Binary-code point" checkbox in the dialog you made a screenshot of. See this Microsoft MSDN page under "Binary collations": Windows Collation Sorting Styles But anyway, as I wrote before this is all a bit outside my knowledge base. I think Vince or Shannon might be able to give better informed answers on this specific subject. ... View more

Hi Hardolph, When generalizing the ellipses I just get triangles, no matter what maximum allowable offset is given. Is that what You meant by playing with the parameters? Hi Jeroen, Although Hardolph points in the right direction regarding his remarks about how the geodatabase stores true ellipses (mathematically instead of a dense line of vertices), I think you will need to use the Densify tool instead of the Generalize tool. Generalize removes access vertices based on tolerances, Densify adds them, and this last thing is what you want when converting to a Shapefile. See the Help topic: Densify (Editing) ... View more

In addition, if you have older datasets (originally created prior to ArcGIS 9.2) in "basic precision", take notice of the following warning ESRI makes in the Help link Vince posted, it is probably also wise to take this into account when doing a simple "manual" transition as I suggested by creating a new Feature Class with different storage type: "If you are converting the spatial column type, the data must be stored in high precision. If your data is currently stored with basic precision, you must first migrate it to high precision before you migrate the storage type. This can be done with either the Upgrade Spatial Reference geoprocessing tool or the sdelayer command with the alter operation. See Migrating to high precision for information on migrating the precision of a dataset." ... View more

ArcGIS supports so called "Configuration Keywords" that determine the spatial storage type in an ArcSDE geodatabase. You set the configuration keyword when creating a new Feature Class. If you create a new Feature Class, and set the spatial type to SDO by using the "SDO_GEOMETRY" configuration keyword, and than import the existing Feature Class's geometries / features to the new one, you will have converted the data to SDO_GEOMETRY. ... View more

This is my understanding of what is present: sde: oracle10g <-> Oracle 11g client <-> Oracle 11g Server My understanding too. The "sde: oracle10g" invokes Oracle's 10g libraries (oci.dll), for which Oracle provides reverse compatibility in the 11g client.  This is not an Esri-tested and certified configuration.  It may work, but it cannot take advantage of any 11g capabilities present in the sdeora11gsrvr101 DLL. Do I understand it well that the 10g libraries are separately included with the 11g Client install?, or is the oci.dll just "equipped" with the capability to handle 10g type connection requests ("sde: oracle10g"), invoking a different path in the code? Any known 11g specific capabilities in the sdeora11gsrvr101 DLL? Do I need to think in terms of support for newly introduced native Oracle data types via ArcSDE configuration keywords, and not so much in terms of actual geodatabase functionality, as that is more depended on the geodatabase level (9.x, 10.x etc.), and not so much the database? ... View more

Esri supports Oracle 10g with the 10g client and Oracle 11g with the 11g client, using Oracle's client drivers.  While 10g clients may be able to connect to 11g servers, I doubt you'll always have a fault-free path. Vince, the OP isn't using Oracle Client 10g against an 11g Oracle server. Just read the first post again: I have an environment where the Oracle SDE database has been upgraded to 11g from 10g, but the desktop clients remained at 10g due to the huge number of mxd layers that would need to be converted to 11g in the connection parameters.  I have started writing python code to convert these layers in a batch mode.  While performing this testing I noticed that even though a test computer has no 10g Oracle Client software but it does have 11g Oracle Client software installed, the connections to SDE still work. As such, it would appear from the surface that this big conversion job is not necessary.  My question would then be what functionality would I be missing if I leave the Oracle 10g client connections (--> EDIT: Probably the ArcGIS connection files) in place, even though the desktop computers would have the 11g Oracle Client software installed on them? If I understand it well, it is just the ArcGIS connection files that have originally been created while the Oracle Client 10g was still installed, and that the OP thought needed reconfiguration. ... View more

Derek, A couple of quick remarks. One thing I think ESRI is slightly forgetting in the new design of the last couple of years, is that one of the most frequent ESRI website user groups are the developers and advanced (geodatabase) GIS managers, not just the ordinary ArcGIS or GIS webapplication users, the last group may not even know they are using ESRI software at all, nor have ever heard of the company or know what the ESRI acronym means! Developers and data managers may visit the site on a daily basis to find important data and information to help them get along with their latest project. They aren't so much interested in "Communities", as each project they do may actually be in an entirely different "Community"... such is developer work... they simply want the quickest access to API, Help, whitepapers, technical papers there is to solve urgent issues they have and find out how to do things. And in terms of "Communities", the only thing they are probably really interested in, is the Forum pages, to get direct help of peers... One example that could use improvement, is the link to the API (Help) references that is "hidden" under the "Help" menu option in the ArcGIS Resources section (http://resources.arcgis.com/en/home/), while I think many developers would prefer a separate direct API's menu option in the same main menu. This would also cut back on the great amount of links under the "Help" section. The same link to the API's list could be under the important: http://support.esri.com/en/ page, which already gives direct access to many important things for developers and GIS geodatabase administrators. I think separating out the "Developer Help" from the other help sections ("ArcGIS Help", "Application Help" etc.), and giving a more prominent position to the API references with all the object models, interfaces etc, via a direct link in the main menu's of the Support and Resources pages would at least be one change of use to many. I also think "API (References)" is a better name for this than "Developer Help", as most developers are more used to that first term when searching for details on object models, classes, methods and interfaces. ... View more

The role of the Oracle Client in ArcGIS Geodatabase behaviour and functionality is actually quite minimal to nil to my knowledge. Oracle Client is just necessary to make an ODBC connection to your database and send back and forth SQL transaction data, it acts as a kind of "bridge" between the ArcGIS client and your RDBMS, just like any normal ODBC driver. It is the Geodatabase level (ArcGIS 9.x, 10.0, 10.1 etc.) that mainly determines what you can or can't do on a Geodatabase and in ArcGIS. ... View more