An overview of the Distributed Geodatabase toolset

Distributing geodatabases allows organizations to disperse their data as necessary from central servers to regional or local offices, which may be in a connected or disconnected environment. This is achieved through replication of the geodatabase in whole or in part and dispensing these replicas as necessary throughout an organization. As the replicas are updated, changes can be coordinated between the offices through a synchronization process.

Legacy:

The Distributed Geodatabase toolset was introduced at 9.2. The Distributed Geodatabase toolset covers the same functionality as the Disconnected Editing toolset, along with many new tools that support geodatabase replication and also a tool to import WFS feature types. The Disconnected Editing tools are still available to support backward compatibility; however, if you are developing new models or scripts, it is recommended to use the tools in the Distributed Geodatabase toolset.

Tools in the Distributed Geodatabase toolset

Tool	Description
Add Global IDs	Adds global IDs to a list of geodatabase feature classes, tables, and/or feature datasets.
Compare Replica Schema	Generates an XML that describes schema differences between a replica geodatabase and the relative replica geodatabase.
Create Replica	Creates a replica to a geodatabase from a specified list of feature classes, layers, datasets, and/or tables in an enterprise geodatabase.
Create Replica Footprints	Creates a feature class that contains the geometries for all the replicas in a geodatabase. Attributes in the feature class store the information from the replica manager.
Create Replica From Server	Creates a replica using a specified list of feature classes, layers, feature datasets, and/or tables from a remote geodatabase using a geodata service published on ArcGIS Server.
Export Acknowledgement Message	Creates an output acknowledgement file to acknowledge the reception of previously received data change messages.
Export Data Change Message	Creates an output delta file containing updates from an input replica.
Export Replica Schema	Creates a replica schema file with the schema of an input one- or two-way replica.
Export XML Workspace Document	Creates a readable XML document of the geodatabase contents.
Import Message	Imports changes from a delta file into a replica geodatabase, or imports an acknowledgment message into a replica geodatabase.
Import Replica Schema	Applies replica schema differences using an input replica geodatabase and XML schema file.
Import XML Workspace Document	Imports the contents of an XML workspace document into an existing geodatabase.
Re-export Unacknowledged Data Change Messages	Creates an output delta file containing unacknowledged replica updates from a one-way or two-way replica geodatabase.
Synchronize Changes	Synchronizes updates between two replica geodatabases in a direction specified by the user.