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10038: Data Frame uses the Maplex Label Engine

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You are using the Maplex Label Engine for computing labels on the fly. The Maplex Label Engine does an excellent job placing labels on the fly but will decrease performance due to the calculations involved. For this reason, the Maplex Label Engine is recommended only for cached map services when publishing map services. When working with a basemap layer, the Maplex Label Engine may decrease performance of map display between pan and zoom operations.

Solutions

Check the drawing performance for your layer or basemap layer in ArcMap. If you are publishing, check the drawing performance for your service in the Preview window.

Learn more about working with basemap layers or previewing your service

  • If you need to make changes you can change on-the-fly map labeling to use the Standard Label Engine, which is faster. However, this can lower the quality of your label placement.
  • Alternatively, you can precompute your map labels using the Maplex Label Engine, then save these as annotation features. Using this alternative, you would replace on-the-fly Maplex Label Engine labeling with annotation layers in your document.
Note:

The use of the Maplex Label Engine can cause the cache generation process to give slow throughput. Though caching is mostly a one-time effort that can help clients get fast access to beautiful high-quality cartographic maps, the cache-building process is also memory and CPU-intensive. Ensure that the sufficient RAM is available while generating the cache for the service. If more RAM cannot be acquired, then use the Standard Label Engine to generate the cache, or you can use the Maplex Label Engine to create annotation and then use the annotation in the cache.

More information

There are three options for generating map text:

  • Use the Standard Label Engine, which performs simple map labeling and places fewer map labels but has faster performance.
  • Use the Maplex Label Engine, which does highly intelligent, advanced map labeling, saving significant editing time and placing more labels. However, advanced Maplex Label Engine capabilities can lead to poor performance and are only recommended for cached map services.
  • Use annotation to save text labels that have been precomputed.

See An overview of working with text for more information.