Printing cached map results in blank output

Description

Creating a cached map improves the performance of the map where the server draws the entire map at different scales and stores copies of the map images. The cached map can be shared using PrintingTools in ArcGIS Server. In some instances, when printing a cached map, the print output generated is blank even though the cached map displays correctly in viewing clients.

Cause

By default, a map service is published with dynamic layers enabled. When the dynamic layers are enabled, the print operation Export Web Map Task makes a dynamic request to create an output where the cached tiles are not fetched but instead, an export operation is made to the source data. If for any reason the source data is not available, the export operation results in a blank output.

Solution or Workaround

To solve this issue, disable the dynamic layer capabilities on the map service. The dynamic layers can be disabled from the ArcGIS Server Manager site and in ArcGIS Desktop.

To disable the dynamic layers in the ArcGIS Server Manager site, refer to ArcGIS Server: Enabling dynamic layers on a map service in Manager. To disable the dynamic layers on ArcGIS Desktop, refer to ArcMap Help: Enabling dynamic layers on a map service in ArcGIS Desktop.

Note:
When the dynamic layers are disabled, the capabilities of the layers to be updated on the fly are also disabled.