Needs assessment for Web Mapping

[MattTenold1]

Hello everyone,

I work for a local government organization and we have had ArcGIS Server installed for over two years but we haven't really been utilizing it more than a few specialized map and geoprocessing services.  However more departments and applications are finally ready to use ArcGIS Server.   Does anyone else have experience with discussions among multiple departments and would be willing to share their notes and any comments or issues that had to be addressed when creating an organization wide ArcGIS Server implementation?

[ChadKopplin]

Matt, I work for a State Agency with seven different divisions.  Yes there are differences among agency's, but I can see some similarities especially since it sounds like many agency's may be utilizing a shared ArcGIS Server.  A few things to think about will the central GIS Server be shared for the the production/authoritative data for agency's?  If yes, then you may want to think about replication of the agency data, so, that only the data that the agency's want to be shared will be on the central server.  Along with this is security, will you use Windows based security, ArcGIS and server based security, or map service based security or a combination.  What data will be utilized by multiply agency's and what data will only be used by certain agency's.  Does each agency's computers and does the server hardware meet the minimum requirements for the ArcGIS software.  What will be the server load?  Will the data only be used by the agency's internally or will the agency's be opening the data to the web?  If to the web then a web adaptor will need to be set up and the following thread lists the firewall ports that need to be open in order to use the server internally and externallyFirewall ports needed to connect to SDE 10.2 + .  If you will be opening up services to the web will one server meet the load on the server, by default server will open 2 SOC accounts for each map service, each one holds ~64mb/SOC (of RAM).  So, based on the number of map services that you are serving multiply those by 128 mbs this will tell you the amount of available RAM that your server will have available to process and open the services, this will increase with the amount of users you have hitting those services at any given time.  This will let you know if the server is able to server the load or expected load.  I have more information from our planning over the past 8 yrs, I will try to find it and send it to you.

[MattTenold1]

Thank you for responding Chad.  We currently have the web adapter installed and working however I am also curious about the meetings you had when you first brought everyone to the table and started talking about organizing the data and performing a needs assessment.   Could you elaborate a bit more on this part of the topic as well?

[ChadKopplin]

Within each division we have multiple programs, so we had to work with those programs to see what attributes and layers they work with and would need to produce because they are the authority for that data.  Then we took that information and applied it to the geodatabase to include all of their data.  As examples Groundwater Vulnerability was produced by our groundwater section of the Water Quality Division, and the Coal Mine Permit boundary's were produced by the coal section of our Land Quality Division.  We had to work with those programs to find out what attributes were important to show in the map services that we were opening to the public.  Anything that would assist the public with looking through the permit to access the information that they need.  In some cases that permit is electronic in others it is a large volume on shelf or in a filing cabinet.

[ChadKopplin]

Matt,

Here is an example of a document that I created for our Land Quality Division (LQD).  I first reviewed the permit applications for each permit type, then made a listing of the potential feature classes and their attributes, then I also included all layers needed on the maps to go along with the permit. Then is was sent out to the GIS working group that I created for the LQD working group that I created in order to get their feedback on what should be there since the permit applications were created (this is the red attributes in the document).  Then I moved forward creating the feature classes in our SDE geodatabase as well as file geodatabase that is used by the data editors before updating the SDE layers.

[ChadKopplin]

The big challenge that we faced was getting a unique facility where DEQ does business, because any given permit location may have to get multiple permits that may cross multiple divisions.  Each program has a different definition of what a facility is, so, this became challenge on getting the programs to agree on what will be the name of the all encompassing facility for any given permit location.

[MichaelGinzburg]

One of the important issues which influence multi-department ArcGIS Server design is information security model. For example: will all services be available to all users or there will be a certain level of isolation? Issues with sensitive or classified information should be addressed. 

After you have defined your security model - there're a lot of ESRI technical information about  implementation of your model.