Latest Contributions by JohnathanHasthorpe

Sharing QuickCapture Projects Publically There may be situations where you want to share a QuickCapture project publicly, meaning users won’t need to enter a username and password to download the project and submit data. This is useful for applications such as crowdsourcing, where you want members of the public to submit data. In these cases, you won’t know who your users are and won’t be able to assign individual licenses to them. Sharing QuickCapture projects publicly can be done using the QuickCapture Web Designer, but the implementation differs depending on whether you are using ArcGIS Online (AGOL) or ArcGIS Enterprise. ArcGIS Online (AGOL) If you are using AGOL, you can share QuickCapture projects publicly, as long as your organization has a Hub Premium license. Once this is applied, the designer will allow you to share the project with Everyone (Public). How to Share: Click the 'Share' button, then select the option to Share with everyone. This will make the project public, along with any associated project layers and web maps, if necessary. Once shared, you can distribute the QR code (created by the designer) to users via email or embed it in a document. Users can scan the QR code using their mobile phone camera. If QuickCapture is not already installed, they will be directed to the appropriate app store to download it. After installation, scanning the QR code will automatically download the project to the app’s public workspace, ready for use. Note: The designer also allows you to create project links as an alternative to QR codes. These links can be embedded in emails or documents as another way to distribute your public projects. ArcGIS Enterprise If you are using ArcGIS Enterprise, no additional license is required to share QuickCapture projects publicly. The option to share your project is always available, and the QuickCapture Designer will allow you to create project QR codes and links, just like you can do in ArcGIS Online. However, there are some important considerations: External Access: If you want your project to be accessible outside of your internal network, ensure that your portal is accessible externally. In some cases, a VPN can be used if only certain members of your organization need access. In other cases, you may need to adjust your firewall settings to allow external access to the portal, the project, and associated items. Web Maps: A bug in QuickCapture prevented web maps from loading in public projects (BUG-000166936). The fix is available in version 1.21 of the Web Designer and will be available in the Enterprise-hosted version of the designer in ArcGIS Enterprise version 11.5. Additionally, it will require the map to be updated in existing projects and the project resaved. If you are using an older version of ArcGIS Enterprise, you will need to use the online version of the Web Designer with your Enterprise. See the following steps to fix your existing projects. Use the online Web Designer with your Enterprise: Go to the online version of the designer: ArcGIS QuickCapture Designer. Select Sign in with ArcGIS Enterprise. Enter your portal URL and sign in with your ArcGIS Enterprise credentials. Open the project you want to share publically and go to Configure Project Map. Select Change and choose the map you want to use. Even if the correct map is already selected, reselect it to ensure the correct property is set. Save the project and share it publicly, if needed. ... View more

The supportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIDs warning The QuickCapture designer shows a warning if your project contains feature layers that have the supportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIDs property is set to false. Many feature layers (including those created from the ArcGIS Online templates) by default will have this property set to false, so if you create a QuickCapture project from them, you will see the following warning in the QuickCapture Designer analyser UI: (The following layers are configured in a way that may cause photo loss) Currently, this is just a warning, meaning that you can still save the project without applying the fix. However it is strongly recommended that you don’t ignore it. In the future we will make this an error, which will prevent you from saving the project, until the issue is resolved. See this deprecation notice. The reason that supportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIDs is important is that the setting that supports reliable transactions when uploading attachments (particularly when working in low bandwidth conditions) and helps the QuickCapture mobile app to prevent the upload of duplicate features. I'm seeing the warning in the QuickCapture Designer, what do I do? If you are using a hosted feature service in ArcGIS Online, setting supportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIDs is really simple. You just need to enable the Sync capability on your layer. It does not matter if there are existing features and attachments in the layer, the steps will still work. You can follow the steps outlined in this blog. If you are using non hosted feature layers or ArcGIS enterprise then the steps shared in this Survey123 blog, also apply to QuickCapture.     ... View more

We have seen cases where duplicate features were submitted by the QuickCapture mobile application. This issue typically was experienced in areas with poor network connectivity. In some cases, the users saw timeout errors, while in other cases, they may not be aware of the duplicate submissions. Cause of the issue The problem occurs due to the app's logic, which aims to prevent data loss. When the app attempts to upload a feature (or batch of features), it waits for a success response from the server. If no response is received, the app assumes the upload has failed and will attempt to retry the upload twice more. If there is still no response, the app will show an error to the user. The user can then manually attempt the submission as many times as they like. The issue arises when a feature is actually successfully uploaded, but the app does not receive a response in time. In such cases, the app may mistakenly retry the upload, resulting in duplicate feature submissions. In the past, we accepted this as a trade-off to avoid data loss. However, the latest version of the application introduces a new mechanism to prevent this issue. Solution In the latest version of the QuickCapture app (1.21), a unique GlobalID is created for each submitted feature. If a feature with the same GlobalID is submitted again, the server will return an error. When the app detects this specific error, it will treat the feature as successfully submitted and will not attempt to resubmit it. Enabling the supportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIds capability in hosted feature services All you need to do is update to the latest version of the mobile application (1.21 or higher) and ensure that all your feature layers have the supportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIds capability enabled. This capability allows the app to create and assign a GlobalID to each feature before sending it, instead of relying on the server to generate the GlobalID on submission. Check if your feature service supports the capability: In the QuickCapture web designer, select a project button and navigate to the DATA tab. Click the (i) icon to open the item page for the feature layer the button is sending features to. Scroll down to the URL section for the feature layer and click the View button.   This will open the ArcGIS REST Services Directory page for the feature service. Look for the SupportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIds property and ensure it is set to True.   Enable the capability in a hosted feature service: If the property is not set to true, go back to the feature layer’s item page and click the Settings tab.   Scroll to the Editing section, check the Enable Sync option, and save the change. This will create the required fields and indexes, and set SupportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIds = true.   Note: This is a one-way process; you can uncheck Enable Sync later if it is not necessary for your workflows. Finally: in the QuickCapture web designer, re-save the project. Users in field will then be able to download the project update. That is it, you are done. No more duplicate features in your feature service! Bonus: More reliable sending of attachments When a target feature service is configured with SupportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIds = true, QuickCapture mobile users will also experience the more robust sending of attachemnents (photos or videos). Esentially, the mobile application will upload attachents first, and only when all attachments have been successfully uploaded, will it send the feature. This means that you should not get a feature that has been submitted with missing attachments, which is still possible for layers that have SupportsApplyEditsWithGlobalIds = false. That is it for now. Happy QuickCapturing!     ... View more