Is it possible to migrate users from one ArcGIS Server instance to different one

Question

We are planning to consolidate 2 ArcGIS Server instances, by migrating all services and users from one into the other.

So users are stored in json files:

{
  "username": "foo",
  "password": "7SxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxKEfw==",
  "description": "dummy",
  "email": "[email protected]",
  "fullname": "bar, fo",
  "secretQuestion": "default",
  "secretAnswer": "IxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxG577Q=",
  "disabled": false
}

Apprently the secret answer and the password is hashed. I can't find any information on how this is hashed and if the hash is based on some machine key, certificate or other.

So the question is: Can those user configurations be migrated, without further ado or do we need to create new passwords for each user and email them out after we've copied the files.

Answer 1

You don't have to create new accounts or passwords.

1. Copy the roles from the config-store\security\roles
2. Copy the .json files for the users (not the lock files) from config-store\security\users
3. Copy users and roles to the same directories on the new server.
4. Make sure that on the new server the same roles exist. I had trouble with the roles remaining associated to the users. So there might be a bit of administration work on your end.
5. Once you copied the roles and the users, log in as administrator and double check the accounts.
6. If they are associated to the a role, then ArcGIS server recognizes the encrypted password and it doesn't need to be changed.
7. If they are not, then you'll need to re-associate them, then ArcGIS server recognizes the encrypted password and it doesn't need to be changed.