Talk:ArcGIS

message: I came here after I looked at the ArcGIS website, where I was astounded that the description seemed to assume that you already knew what the product was for.  I had only the vaguest idea (something to do with maps), but if there was a general description of what I could do with ArcGIS products, it was buried somewhere.  So I came here, hoping for enlightenment--only to find that while there was a wealth of info on different products (although the linked-to pages are pretty bare bones), product history, criticisms, sales, external refs etc. etc., there was virtually nothing to tell me what I could do with this software if I had it!  The closest to what I was looking for was a screen shot, but that doesn't really tell me anything (there are sources, which appear to be data files, but it's unclear what they are--maybe spreadsheets??).  The next closest thing to an explanation was the link to the article on "geographic information system", but that is rather general.  
So my suggestion is to add a section describing some of the typical tasks one can do with this tool, and perhaps what advantages it would have over doing something with google maps or even Microsoft Paint.  I imagine there are *lots* of advantages, but at the moment imagine is all I can do. Mcswell (talk) 14:49, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: The article Geographic Information System is over 7,000 words long and describes what a GIS is quite thoroughly.  This article is not supposed to be a guide or list of capabilities.  If you don't know what ArcGIS does you probably don't need it, but there are plenty of resources on both Wikipedia and elsewhere for learning more.--Simonmetcalf (talk) 10:47, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  What does it do? 

message: I saw that this article was speedily deleted.
All application in the ArcGIS suite deserve an article, because ArcGIS is the standard suite that people use in the professional GIS world. Deleting this is like deleting Microsoft Access in the Microsoft Office Suite.
I don't know much about this stuff myself - I am in the process of learning about the suite, and this will take time, but I know enough to say that this deserves an article.
This is what I started with in writing this article:  NittyG (talk) 02:01, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Article needs to stay

message: I agree that there should perhaps be a section devoted to this on ArcGIS, but I suspect that it needs a separate article to go into more detail. I am not personally qualified to answer this fully, but I think that it is a good educated guess. In general, the articles on GIS applications are pretty poor. They are not comprehensive nor easy to understand. We need to do a complete job with this subject, expanding them and covering them comprehensively, and for someone who does not know anything about them. NittyG (talk) 04:00, 21 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  To merge or not ... 

message: How much does ArcGIS exactly cost? i believe it just states that it is expensive.
:Exact pricing is difficult to quantify as it varies by country, by volume, and sometimes by industry. Jschek (talk) 15:47, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You make good points, that ArcGIS 8.1 isn't backwards compatible; thus, renders ArcView 3.2 scripts and extentions incompatible with ArcGIS 8.1+.  I have updated the article to try to explain these important points. --Aude 23:56, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  12 Years later and I still agree with my statement. I will edit the 8.X section to more clearly state that 8.0 is not really part of the ArcGIS Desktop family --Raymo853 15:49, 19 March 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  ArcGIS as an upgrade for ArcView 3.2? 

message: :Image:ArcMap.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.
Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.
If there is  other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page.  Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.
BetacommandBot 20:36, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Fair use rationale for Image:ArcMap.jpg

message: The article says:
"The ARC Advisory Group estimated in 2010 that ESRI's market share now exceeds 40%"
Is there a reference for this?
It also says that the market share is 36%, but this is just based on an assertion from an ESRI white paper, which gives no details of how they know this (or even what it means i.e. share by number of licenses, or revenue, or what).
Seems pretty dodgy to me.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.27.124.5 (talk) 23:34, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Market Share - is this appropriately referenced? 

message: In the criticism section, high price is mentioned.  "High" is very subjective, so I went to the company's home-page to find out what the prices might be.  After more than five minutes of being circled around: "pricing" leads to products leads to "pricing."  I gave up.  If they're that murky, either they're hiding the prices or they're too obscure/confused for me to use the products (I'm not interested in a free trial, which was findable).  
Anyway, could some concrete figure be given to reduce the subjective nature of the listed complaint?211.225.33.104 (talk) 11:52, 28 May 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: It is easy to find the price: From the home page select "Plans". Then is says "To purchase or if you have any questions, please contact your local Esri office". Select this, phone up your local office and after a discussion of your needs etc you will be told the price.The citations for this are very old, 2005-7. From when Google Maps had only just started, and it was free to use. Google now charges high prices as well, (it is free below a certain threshold). Google Drive also charges for storing data for the maps. It is similarly obscure about the pricing (https://developers.google.com/maps/licensing), "For more information about OEM licensing, contact a Google Maps API for Work Sales Manager." QuentinUK (talk) 11:35, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Price 

message: ArcGIS Engine could easily be merged into ArcGIS--there's nothing in the Engine article that wouldn't fit in the main ArcGIS article  with regards to either content or space. Fisheriesmgmt (talk) 19:47, 31 March 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed merge with [[ArcGIS Engine]] 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on ArcGIS. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/20080515193704/http://esri.com/events/uc/07_workshops/whats_new_geodb_arcsde.pdf to http://esri.com/events/uc/07_workshops/whats_new_geodb_arcsde.pdf
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 02:22, 13 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: The page as it stands is very Desktop-centric. It's more of an ArcView/ArcDesktop entry than an overall ArcGIS entry. I think part of it has to do with the layout of the page. It kind of assumes that the subject is Desktop unless specefied differently. Most everything else is stuffed in 1 paragraph under "Other products"
Here is a quick layout of how I think #3 Components and product levels should look
ArcGIS is a Suite of products made by ESRI which include the following:
    ArcGIS for Desktop
        ArcMap
        ArcGIS Pro
        ArcCatalog
        ArcExplorer Desktop
        ArcReader (No longer updated?)
        ArcGlobe
    ArcGIS for Server
        ArcGIS for Server
        ArcGIS for Portal
        ArcGIS Web Adaptor
        ArcIMS
    ArcGIS for Developers
        ArcGIS Viewer for Silverlight (deprecated)
        ArcGIS Viewer for Flex (open sourced, deprecated)
        ArcGIS API for Javascript
        ArcGIS Engine
        ArcGIS Runtime
        AppStudio for ArcGIS
        Web AppBuilder for ArcGIS
    ArcGIS Online
    ArcGIS for Mobile
        ArcGIS for Windows Mobile
        ArcPad
        Explorer for ArcGIS
        Collector for ArcGIS
There should probably be a heading for "Features" which include Address locator and geodatabase. Currently geodatabase is at the top level. It should be under some category like
Common data formats
  Raster (jpg, tif, etc...)
  Vector
    Shapefile
    Geodatabase
      Personal
      File
      Enterprise
Jason P Tipton (talk) 19:44, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Page Reorganization 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on ArcGIS. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160308072649/http://downloads.esri.com/support/product%20life%20cycle/arcgis_desktop/ArcGIS_PLC.pdf to http://downloads.esri.com/support/product%20life%20cycle/arcgis_desktop/ArcGIS_PLC.pdf
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160308072649/http://downloads.esri.com/support/product%20life%20cycle/arcgis_desktop/ArcGIS_PLC.pdf to http://downloads.esri.com/support/product%20life%20cycle/arcgis_desktop/ArcGIS_PLC.pdf
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 12:22, 8 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: ArcGIS Pro redirects to this article, but it is a separate product from the traditional ArcGIS suite (ArcMap, etc) of products. –Zfish118⋉talk 12:52, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: This was initially a separate article, but incorrectly redirected here. I've re-established it as a separate stub article. I suggest some of the content related to ArcGIS Pro should be moved from this article. +mt 00:07, 9 December 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Disagree. There is not enough for its own page, and the phrase "ArcGIS" is often used to mean "ArcGIS Pro". peterl (talk) 22:54, 9 December 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: The official website for this article (http://www.esri.com/software/arcgis) does not specify any particular software product. A webpage from June 2001 "ArcGIS Overview" says "ArcGIS is a family of software products that form a complete GIS", which is still an accurate definition today. I'm not convinced that "ArcGIS Pro" is synonymous with "ArcGIS", however ArcGIS Pro is the successor software suite to ArcGIS Desktop, which is my rationale that it should be a stub article to expand further. Redirecting it to an article that describes a family of software products is confusing and not helpful to the reader. +mt 02:54, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: There are many places where people say "use ArcGIS", rather than "use ArcGIS Pro", for example  (You "Learn ArcGIS" not "Learn ArcGIS Pro"). But ESRI are very clear with their names. In wikipedia, ArcGIS Desktop doesn't have its own article; it just redirects to ArcGIS. On a similar note ArcEditor has almost nothing in it and could be merged in too. ArcObjects is not well written, but a cleanup would show there's hardly any content there either. I just don't think there's enough useful content to make these viable articles by themselves. As a side note, the ArcInfo article is woefully out of date and a bit of a mess. peterl (talk) 07:00, 10 December 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  ArcGIS Pro 

message: There is no reference or information about how ArcMap 8.1 is a totally new product. Seems to me 8.0 had most of the ArcMap framework in place: WMF-based canvas, ArcObjects built in OLE/COM (at least a primordial version, the geodatabase (.mdb). Suggest delete this. -- curtvprice 15:30, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  ArcMap history 

message: This article is a strange mix of the ArcGIS family and ArcGIS desktop. I might boldly split it off into it's own article. — Berrely • Talk∕Contribs 05:49, 12 August 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Split into ArcGIS Desktop 

message: I added information on the new feature in ArcGIS pro 2.6. I thought this is a software that many people use and knowing more about what some of the features are could help.Joshwalsh36 (talk) 00:06, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  ArcGIS Pro Functionality