Esri ArcGIS Image Server Reader

Licensing options for this format begin with FME Professional Edition.

Note: This format is currently only available with 32-bit FME for versions of ArcGIS Image Server up to version 10.0.

Overview

FME can read data from the Esri® ArcGIS Image Server.

The Esri ArcGIS Image Server provides fast access to large quantities of file-based imagery. It is processed on-the-fly and on-demand. It makes imagery quickly accessible without reloading.

The Image Server is particularly useful when imagery is deployed enterprise-wide to a variety of clients, without preprocessing the data and loading it into a DBMS. It is also useful for performing dynamic imagery processing, providing better image visualization, and reducing storage costs, data processing and data maintenance.

Reader Overview

FME considers an ArcGIS Image Server name to be a dataset, such as 127.0.0.1.

The setting box provides more options such as a host name, a port number and the image service list. A host name is equivalent to a dataset. Typing the server name in the Source Dataset text box or the Host text box has the same effect. The default port number is 3982. This number can be changed in <fme_install_folder>/install/metafile/arcgis_image_server.fmf so that new workspace generation will have a new default port number. The image service list constraint provides a list of available services from the server. Workbench will only generate Feature Types for the selected services. However, if none of the services are selected, a feature type will be generated for each available service from the server.

The reader allows two shortcuts in the Source Dataset field:

  • an Image Service URL path, such as ImageService://127.0.0.1:10000/Landsat_321, or
  • a server/host name and a port number separated by a colon, such as 127.0.0.1:10000.

If the input is an Image Service URL path, only one feature type will be generated. In the example above, the feature type will be Landsat_321. If the input is <host>:<port>, a feature type will be generated for each available service from the server if no service is specified in the image service list constraint in the setting box. In either case, the Port value in the setting box will be ignored.

Note: At the time this reader was developed, the ArcGIS Image Server 9.3 was still in the beta phase. Although some reader tests had been done with a 9.3 beta server, there is no guarantee that this reader will continue to work in a 9.3 server in all cases. This reader will be tested and updated again once the ArcGIS Image Server 9.3 is released.

To run FME ArcGIS Image Server reader, ISClientC.dll must be in the search path. This dll file will be installed by ClientCore.msi, which can be found in the ArcGIS Image Server disc or on Esri's website.

FME Raster Features

FME raster features represent raster data and use several concepts that are unlike those used in the handling of vector data. See About FME Rasters.