Offline utility network

[DasheEbra]

Hello ESRI Community,

Our GIS consultation company is currently engaged in a project for an electric generation company, let's call it 'X,' aiming to establish a centralized Geodatabase with a Utility Network (UN). This UN will cater to generation, transmission, and distribution sectors, with X managing the build, design, configuration, and administration on its server.

Here's the challenge: X is working with 10 distribution companies and a transmission company, each needing access only to their specific geographical area within the UN. The added complexity is that these companies will be conducting offline editing in the field, synchronizing edits back to X's server at predefined times.

After extensive research, I haven't found a clear-cut workflow for offline utility network editing in such a multi-company, offline environment. I'm reaching out to the ESRI community to seek insights and recommendations for the best workflow in this scenario.

Specifically:

• What strategies have you successfully employed for configuring a centralized UN for multi-company use?
• Are there best practices for enabling offline editing in designated geographical areas within a UN?
• How can we efficiently synchronize edits from multiple companies back to the central UN maintained by X?

I've already explored options such as replica creation (not supported in branch version) and offline editing tools (missing UN concepts) no rules, terminals or any UN benefits such all UN features classes without the UN dataset, even after Sync to UN service the edits were made in offline version that violence the UN rules weren't detected as errors. Your experiences and suggestions would be immensely valuable in navigating this unique project.

[JohnAlsup]

This capability is not yet available for the Utility Network.  Also, this is something that has to be addressed across the entire software stack, not just the Utility Network.  I'm not sure what releases all the changes will be completed in.  I would recommending contacting support.

[LarryYoung]

Hi, 

It is true the utility network is not yet fully support in offline workflows for editing purposes, but we do plan on having that in place by the end of 2024.

That said, there are many different levels to your workflow and i strongly suggest you begin with your Esri partner coordinator or sales manager for a more in depth discussion.  

Once you go offline, what do you plan to edit with?  Are you going to try and use FIeld Maps, a custom Maps SDK application, or a partner solution?  Field maps has editing capabilities, of course, but not at the level you are talking about for utility networks.  Some of that will also come in the future, but may not be enough for your requirements.

Sync and taking data offline in general can support taking subsets of the data offline, but again you have to wait for full support of the utility network in that capacity.  If you leave out the offline part, we've seen organizations implement restricting work in certain areas through SOE/SOIs and/or attribute rules.

One good source for utility network info is here:  https://www.esri.com/en-us/arcgis/products/arcgis-utility-network/resources.  Click on the blogs link to find blogs on offline, etc.

thanks.