The beta 2 version of the ArcGIS API for Python was released in September 2016. Since then, there have been several more releases leading up to the 1.2.4 version that is available at the time of this writing. Esri describes the API as "a powerful, modern, and easy to use Pythonic library to perform GIS visualization and analysis, spatial data management and GIS system administration tasks that can run both in an interactive fashion, as well as using scripts". The API was designed with analysts, developers, power users, content publishers, administrators, and data scientists in mind and allows full access to your web GIS. In this chapter, we will cover how to install, configure, and use the ArcGIS API for Python. We will look at how to use the API to do the following:
- Changing web map service URLs
- Creating a web map inventory
- Replicating content
- Managing users and groups
- Working with features