Enterprise geodatabases are stored in and add functionality to databases. In ArcGIS Enterprise, you access the data in your enterprise geodatabase through ArcGIS Server web services.
If you have an ArcGIS Enterprise (or ArcGIS Server basic) license, you can create enterprise geodatabases. To interact with enterprise geodatabases in desktop ArcGIS apps such as ArcGIS Pro, you need a Standard or Advanced license for the desktop product.
ArcGIS Server sites and enterprise geodatabases
Register your enterprise geodatabase with ArcGIS Server sites. Add feature classes, tables, mosaic datasets, and raster datasets from these registered databases to maps in ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap, configure the data in the map to look and behave as you require, and publish the data as web layers that reference the data in your enterprise geodatabase as follows:
- Publish map services and feature services (map image layers and feature layers) from feature classes and tables in an enterprise geodatabase to a federated or stand-alone ArcGIS GIS Server site.
- Publish image services from raster datasets in a file geodatabase to a federated or stand-alone ArcGIS GIS Server site.
- Publish an image service from raster datasets or mosaic datasets to a federated or stand-alone ArcGIS Image Server site.
- If you need to share content that meets OGC standards, publish WCS, WFS, WMS, WMTS, and WPS services.
From ArcCatalog, you can also publish a geodata service to use in replication workflows, and publish the geoprocessing tools stored in your enterprise geodatabase as geoprocessing services.
ArcGIS Enterprise portals and enterprise geodatabases
ArcGIS Enterprise portals use web services that consume content from registered enterprise geodatabases. The following list summarizes how you can add these web services to a portal:
- Publish utility network services to your portal's federated ArcGIS GIS Server (with the ArcGIS Utility Network Management extension) to provide access to your networks to viewers and editors.
- Add the services you publish to stand-alone ArcGIS Server sites as layer items in your portal to make them available to portal members.
- Use the services you publish to stand-alone ArcGIS Server sites to maps you create in Map Viewer.
- Add geoprocessing services to your portal to be used as web tools.
Creating, populating, and maintaining enterprise geodatabases
The creation and maintenance of enterprise geodatabases are typically done outside ArcGIS Server. The following sections describe how each person in an organization interacts with enterprise geodatabases depending on his or her role.
Database administrators
Since enterprise geodatabases are stored in databases, you need a database administrator to configure and maintain the database. Most tasks performed by a database administrator are done outside of ArcGIS with the following exceptions, which the database administrator can do using ArcPy functions or geoprocessing tools in ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap and its related apps:
- Create database roles using the Create Role tool or function.
- Create database users to create data using the Create Database User tool or function.
Geodatabase administrators
Geodatabase administrators create and own all the database objects (such as system tables, views, functions, and stored procedures) that compose an enterprise geodatabase. They also perform a small number of geodatabase-specific maintenance tasks, such as rebuilding indexes on system tables, compressing the geodatabase if traditional versioning is used, and upgrading the geodatabase.
Geodatabase administrators do not require as many privileges in the database management system as database administrators. There is one geodatabase administrator per enterprise geodatabase.
The privileges and duties of geodatabase administrators vary by database management system. See the following database-specific sections in the ArcGIS Desktop help for information on geodatabase administrators and the tasks they perform:
- SQL Server
- SAP HANA
- PostgreSQL
- Oracle
- Informix
- Db2 on Linux, UNIX, or Windows
- Db2 on z/OS
Data creators
In most organizations, there are usually a small number of people who create the feature classes, tables, raster datasets, and mosaic datasets that other people in the organization publish, map, and analyze. The people who create the data in an enterprise geodatabase not only add datasets, they are also responsible for managing the datasets. Dataset management tasks performed by the data creator include the following:
- Grant other users access to the data.
- Build and maintain networks.
- Define topological relationships and rules.
- Create domains.
- Define subtypes.
- Enable editor tracking.
- Define attribute rules.
- Enable archiving or versioning.
- Alter the table schema (for example, add or delete a field).
See the ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap help for information on creating and managing data in a geodatabase.
Publishers
To make the data from an enterprise geodatabase available through web services and portal layers, publishers create and configure maps that contain the data.
To ensure the web services can access the data in the enterprise geodatabase, each publisher registers a database connection with one or more federated or stand-alone ArcGIS Server sites. In some cases, registering the enterprise geodatabase as a data store requires you to work with the ArcGIS Server administrator or your IT department to ensure that the ArcGIS Server machines are configured to communicate with the geodatabase.
Once the map is ready and the database is registered with the ArcGIS Server site, publishers can create the web services they and other users need to work with the data.
Editors, analysts, and viewers
When you make the data available through web services, most users can edit, analyze, and view the data through the web services; they never need to interact directly with the enterprise geodatabase. These users can interact with web services in maps using out-of-the box apps or through apps configured by other portal members using app templates or Web AppBuilder for ArcGIS as follows:
- Editors can maintain data through editable feature services and portal feature layer items they add to desktop apps, field apps, custom apps, or the portal Map Viewer.
- Analysts can run geoprocessing tools on feature services and image services in ArcGIS Desktop apps or Python or run feature analysis tools on feature services in the portal Map Viewer.
- Viewers interact with map, feature, or image services in maps created in ArcGIS Pro, ArcMap, and Map Viewer.
For those users who need to work directly with the data in the geodatabase, such as GIS professionals who maintain the data and perform complex analysis, they connect to the geodatabase from desktop apps such as ArcGIS Pro or Python.