Curate data for ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma
Curating your GIS data is a key step before integrating geospatial information into Autodesk Forma. Configuring geospatial information allows users to search, collate, and visualize this data in Forma Site Design to enhance planning, design, and analysis workflows.
In this topic, you will learn how to effectively prepare your data for ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma.
Add supported items
Items are the contents made available through ArcGIS Online and ArcGIS Enterprise portals. You can add supported files from your computer, a shared network location, or a cloud location. When you add a file, an item is created in My content that you can share with others.
Note:
The ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma extension currently supports hosted feature layers, web maps, web scenes, and some imagery layers.
Publish layers
You can publish your maps and data as hosted layers to ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise. When you do this, the portal hosts your layers and the data that populates them. The ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma extension can access your hosted feature and imagery layer content.
As a publisher in your organization, you can host feature data in your ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise portals by publishing hosted feature layers. Both platforms support multiple sources to allow you to accomplish this.
To create hosted imagery layers, you must have a user type of Creator, Professional, or Professional Plus, and privileges to publish hosted imagery layers and create content.
Dive in:
See Publish hosted feature layers in ArcGIS Online or Publish hosted feature layers in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
See Publish hosted imagery layers in ArcGIS Online or Publish hosted imagery layers in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
Manage items
When you add or create an item, configure the item's details and settings to help users find it and understand what the item contains. This will also help to ensure that they use the correct item when adding ArcGIS data to the Forma site. The item owner, organization administrators, and data curators can configure the details and settings for items in an organization.
Dive in:
See Configure item details and settings in ArcGIS Online or Configure item details and settings in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
Publishers and administrators in the organization can manage the settings and details of hosted layers published to ArcGIS Online and ArcGIS Enterprise.
Dive in:
See Hosted layer management in ArcGIS Online or Layer item management in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
As the layer owner, or an administrator, you can alter certain settings on a hosted feature layer, while others are set on individual layers in the hosted feature layer.
Dive in:
See Manage hosted feature layers in ArcGIS Online or Manage hosted feature layers in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
As the layer owner, or an administrator, you can alter certain settings on a hosted imagery layer and the data it contains.
Dive in:
See Manage hosted imagery layer settings in ArcGIS Online or Manage hosted imagery layers in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
Discover items
The Content page in your portal is organized by tabs that allow you to access, organize, browse, search, and work with your own content (My content), items you have marked as favorites (My favorites), content shared with you through groups (My groups), content from your organization (My organization), and ArcGIS Living Atlas content (Living Atlas).
Dive in:
See Browse and search content in ArcGIS Online or Browse and search content in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
See Use advanced search in ArcGIS Online or Use advanced search in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
See Content categories in ArcGIS Online or Content categories ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
ArcGIS Living Atlas is a collection of global geographic information—such as feature layers, maps, scenes, and imagery layers—curated by Esri with contributions from partners and user communities. You can access ArcGIS Living Atlas content within ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma to provide greater spatial context to your design.
Important:
In ArcGIS Enterprise 11.4 and later, the portal does not come preconfigured with ArcGIS Living Atlas content. See Deploy ArcGIS Living Atlas content to learn more about configuring ArcGIS Living Atlas for your Enterprise organization.
When users search for content based on a location, the search uses the extent (the geographic boundary) that is specified for the item. The Only show content within the site filter in ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma allows you to refine search results based on these defined extents.
Dive in:
See Define content extent in ArcGIS Online or Define content extent in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
Note:
If the extent of an item is set at a global scale, it will always appear in ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma when the Only show content within site filter is enabled.
Share items
When you finish configuring the item, you can share it with other members of your organization or the public, use groups to organize and share your items, or use collaborations to share content with other organizations. This ensures your GIS data is consumable by other teams that you want to share content with.
Dive in:
See Groups in ArcGIS Online or Groups in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
See Share items in ArcGIS Online or Share items in ArcGIS Enterprise to learn more.
Use and edit data
How and where you use a web layer depends on the type of layer and what you need to do with it. The following are examples of how to use and edit data for analysis in Forma Site Design:
Use layers in maps and scenes to visually convey spatial information. You can add layers you published, layers shared with you by others, and layers available through ArcGIS Living Atlas to improve context.
Add editable feature layers to Map Viewer or Scene Viewer to update feature and attribute data which can ensure you are working with the latest geospatial information.
You can control who can access and edit your feature layer through a combination of hosted feature layer views, editing settings, and sharing properties.
Dive in:
To determine whether you need to create feature layer views, share, or set editing properties for your hosted feature layers, see Data access and editing in ArcGIS Online or Controlling access to hosted feature layer data in ArcGIS Enterprise.
Editing levels determine whether you can add features, delete features, update feature attributes only, or update feature geometry.
Dive in:
To learn more about editing web maps, see Edit features in Map Viewer in ArcGIS Online or Edit features in Map Viewer in ArcGIS Enterprise.
To learn more about editing web scenes, see Edit features in scenes in ArcGIS Online or Edit features in scenes in ArcGIS Enterprise.
Layer styles
Applying unique styles to GIS layers can improve the clarity and visual impact of the data in Forma Site Design. You can transform raw data into visually compelling maps to communicate geospatial information.
Important:
See the Existing and historical limitations post in the ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma Esri Community to learn more about style limitations in Forma Site Design.
With Map Viewer, you can explore various layer styling options such as color ramps and line weights.
Dive in:
To learn more, see Apply styles in ArcGIS Online or Apply styles in ArcGIS Enterprise.
Note:
Feature layer styles can be configured on the Visualization tab as an alternative to opening the layer in Map Viewer.
Similarly, with Scene Viewer, you can change styles for your layers.
Dive in:
To learn more, see Style layers in a scene in ArcGIS Online or Style layers in a scene in ArcGIS Enterprise.
Once data has been curated appropriately, ArcGIS for Autodesk Forma users start to Add layers to Forma Site Design to support project planning and design analysis.