Communicating with a WCS service in a web browser
A web browser is the simplest client of a WCS service. WCS requests can be issued through HTTP, and the responses or exceptions are returned through the browser. WCS services support three operations: GetCapabilities, DescribeCoverage, and GetCoverage. Through URL parameters, a client can use these operations to obtain service metadata, coverage information, and coverages from the WCS service. These operations and parameters are detailed in the OGC WCS specification.
ArcGIS for Desktop can act as a client for WCS services. A WCS coverage can be displayed in ArcMap (similar to a raster layer), exported to a raster dataset using the Export Data dialog box, and consumed by geoprocessing tools that take a raster layer as input. To learn more, see Adding a WCS service to ArcMap.
Additionally, many third-party applications are available for working with WCS and other OGC services.
Below are examples of requests to ArcGIS Server WCS services using a web browser.
GetCapabilities
This request will return all service-level metadata and a brief description of the data in GML format. To use the GetCapabilities operation, copy and paste the WCS service URL into the address bar and add ?SERVICE=WCS&VERSION=1.0.0&REQUEST=GETCAPABILITIES to the end of the URL.
DescribeCoverage
This request will return a full description of one or more coverages within the service in GML format. To use the DescribeCoverage operation, copy and paste the WCS service URL into the address bar and add ?SERVICE=WCS&VERSION=1.0.0&REQUEST=DescribeCoverage&COVERAGE=1 to the end of the URL.
GetCoverage
This request will return a coverage in one of the supported formats: GeoTIFF, NITF, HDF, JPEG, JPEG2000, and PNG. To use the GetCoverage operation, copy and paste the WCS service URL into the address bar.
For WCS services originating from mosaic datasets, TIME and IMAGES parameters can be added:
Time
TIME—Supports time queries by specifying a time instance or time range. The format can be YYYYMMDDHHMMSS, YYYYMMDD, YYYYMM, or YYYY.
TIME=1999 (time at year 1999)
URL example: http://gisserver.domain.com:6080/arcgis/services/folder/service/ImageServer/WCSServer?SERVICE=WCS&VERSION=1.0.0&REQUEST=GetCoverage&COVERAGE=1&FORMAT=GeoTIFF&BBOX=-180,-55.5,180,83.5&WIDTH=720&HEIGHT=278&CRS=EPSG:4326&INTERPOLATION=nearest%20neighbor&Band=1,2,3&TIME=1999
TIME=1980/2010 (time from year 1980 to 2010)
URL example: http://gisserver.domain.com:6080/arcgis/services/folder/service/ImageServer/WCSServer?SERVICE=WCS&VERSION=1.0.0&REQUEST=GetCoverage&COVERAGE=1&FORMAT=GeoTIFF&BBOX=-180,-55.5,180,83.5&WIDTH=720&HEIGHT=278&CRS=EPSG:4326&INTERPOLATION=nearest%20neighbor&Band=1,2,3&TIME=1980/2010
TIME=1999-12-31T14:30:30/2000-01-01T14:30:30
URL example: http://gisserver.domain.com:6080/arcgis/services/folder/service/ImageServer/WCSServer?SERVICE=WCS&VERSION=1.0.0&REQUEST=GetCoverage&COVERAGE=1&FORMAT=GeoTIFF&BBOX=-180,-55.5,180,83.5&WIDTH=720&HEIGHT=278&CRS=EPSG:4326&INTERPOLATION=nearest%20neighbor&Band=1,2,3&TIME=1999-12-31T14:30:30/2000-01-01T14:30:30
Images
IMAGES—Supports query of individual rasters
IMAGES=1,2 (where the numbers are the object IDs of the image service catalog table)