This topic lists questions or issues that you may encounter when working with ArcGIS Server and suggests possible solutions. If you don't find the issue you're looking for, you can also search for articles on the Esri Support Center website.
Installation
- Is an installation log or summary stored somewhere for me to review later?
- I was unable to install ArcGIS Server because my machine name contains an underscore character.
- Why are some folders left behind after uninstalling?
- I get an error message about my license being expired.
- After installing ArcGIS Server, I see An error occurred while searching for [users\roles]: [IP Address]:3268.
- I am experiencing publishing failures, sync failures, geoprocessing failures, and other technical issues.
Administration
- How do I change the ArcGIS Server account?
- I am concerned about the security implications of the primary site administrator password reset (PasswordReset.bat) script. What can I do about this?
- Will ArcGIS Server work when disconnected from the network?
- I'm attempting to connect to the server in ArcGIS Pro through ArcGIS Web Adaptor, and my connection fails.
- Can I safely rename a GIS server machine in my ArcGIS Server site?
- I disabled HTTP-based communication in my ArcGIS Server site and now I can't access the help using the installed shortcuts.
- How can I view the current hardware specifications of a machine in my ArcGIS Server site?
- I see an Invalid database connection or The data item is inaccessible error when I try to register a database with ArcGIS Server.
- ArcGIS Web Adaptor does not recognize unavailable machines or new machines I've added to my site.
- Can I configure the same ArcGIS Web Adaptor to work with both ArcGIS Server and Portal for ArcGIS?
ArcGIS Server Manager
- I attempted to create or join an ArcGIS Server site and something failed. How do I troubleshoot the issue?
- I can't sign in to ArcGIS Server Manager.
- Which browsers are supported by ArcGIS Server Manager?
- How do I retrieve my Bing Maps key from ArcGIS Server Manager?
- When attempting to publish a service definition file in ArcGIS Server Manager, I can only browse my local file system. Why can I not see the server's file system?
Services
- I have an asynchronous job running on my geoprocessing service that I want to cancel.
- Why can't I publish map documents, address locators, and other GIS resources to the ArcGIS Server site using ArcGIS Server Manager?
- After creating an ArcGIS Server site, I notice services appearing in the services list in ArcGIS Server Manager. What are these? Why can't I delete some of them?
- I added a service to a web app, but the service seems to be unavailable.
- I updated my map document then stopped and started my service, but I don't see the updates in my map service.
- I try to publish a service definition in ArcGIS Server Manager and my browser crashes.
- I encounter an error in ArcGIS Pro when attempting to publish a GIS resource that references data in a Microsoft Windows file share.
- What Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)-compliant services can I publish with ArcGIS Server?
- I can't publish a service to an ArcGIS Server site that uses a certificate issued by a certifying authority (CA).
- I'm having trouble creating a service that contains layers from a database or geodatabase.
- I started creating a map cache, and it's taking a long time. When will it finish?
- I recently updated my map caches. Are client applications automatically aware that the updated tiles are available?
- I get an error message that says publishing of geoprocessing services is restricted. How can I resolve this?
Installation
The installation is not automatically logged, but if you run the installation from the command line, you can include parameters that create a log file. See the ArcGIS Server (Windows) Installation Guide to learn about creating a log of the installation.
You can view which features of ArcGIS Server are installed through the Programs and Features dialog box in Windows. Choose ArcGIS Server > Uninstall/Change > Modify to view or change the list of installed components.
Several widely used internet host name specifications have designated the underscore character as nonstandard. Although Windows allows you to use the underscore in a machine name, it can still cause problems when you interact with other servers and platforms. For this reason, ArcGIS Server will not proceed with installation on servers that have an underscore in the host name.
When you uninstall ArcGIS Server, some folders and files are left on disk. These are left for your convenience if you reinstall or upgrade the product. If you don't plan to reinstall, you can delete these files.
You may notice persisting files located at <ArcGIS Server installation directory>\arcgisserver that include the following:
- server directories
- config-store
- log files
Leaving these folders preserves map caches, your installation configuration, and other server resources that you may want to keep if you reinstall. Server directories that you created and registered on your own are also not affected by uninstalling.
If you receive a message about your license being expired, contact Esri Customer Service to obtain a new license and reauthorize ArcGIS Server using the ArcGIS Software Authorization Wizard.
After installing ArcGIS Server, I see An error occurred while searching for [users\roles]: [IP Address]:3268.
When ArcGIS Server is configured to enforce security with users and roles managed in Microsoft Active Directory, it uses the Active Directory Global Catalog to obtain user and role information. However, ArcGIS Server will be unable to enforce security if it binds to a domain controller that does not also serve as a global catalog. In this case, you'll need to manually specify the domain controller used by ArcGIS Server after performing the installation. For full instructions, see Configure the domain controller used by ArcGIS Server.
I am experiencing publishing failures, sync failures, geoprocessing failures, and other technical issues.
If you are experiencing issues with publishing, syncing, and geoprocessing services failing, ensure that your ArcGIS Server configuration store or directory path lengths do not exceed 260 characters.
Note:
With the Microsoft release of the Windows 10 Anniversary Update, version 1607, it is possible to extend the 260-character limit for New Technology File System (NTFS) paths. While this is an opt-in behavior of the Windows 10 Anniversary Update, doing so can result in unexpected behavior in ArcGIS Server and is not supported or recommended.
Administration
After you install ArcGIS Server, you can change the account by using the Configure ArcGIS Server Account utility. This utility is bundled with the ArcGIS Server installation and can be launched by clicking Start > ArcGIS > ArcGIS Server > Configure ArcGIS Server Account.
You should not use your operating system's tools to manually change the ArcGIS Server account. The utility has been designed to apply permissions to various directories across all the machines in your deployment. Changing the account manually could result in server failure leading to system downtime.
For full instructions on how to change the ArcGIS Server account using the utility, see The ArcGIS Server account.
I am concerned about the security implications of the primary site administrator password reset (PasswordReset.bat) script. What can I do about this?
If you are in a highly secure environment, you should restrict file permissions to the configuration store, and disable the primary site administrator account. Performing these two tasks ensures that the primary site administrator account password reset script will have no effect on the security of your site.
To learn more, see Best practices for configuring a secure environment.
If you have multiple machines participating in your ArcGIS Server site, the site requires the network to function.
If you have a one-machine deployment—that is, one machine participating in an ArcGIS Server site—ArcGIS Server will operate correctly when disconnected from the network as long as all the data referenced by your GIS services are stored locally on that machine. Additionally, if the machine is part of a domain and you have disconnected the computer from the domain, you must specify a local account as the ArcGIS Server account.
I'm attempting to connect to the server in ArcGIS Pro through ArcGIS Web Adaptor, and my connection fails.
If your server administrator has configured the ArcGIS Web Adaptor to block administrative access to the server, you will not be able to connect to the server in ArcGIS Pro through the ArcGIS Web Adaptor URL using an administrative or publisher connection. Alternatively, you can connect directly to the GIS server in ArcGIS Pro by using the URL format https://gisserver.domain.com:6443/arcgis. For more information, see Connect to ArcGIS Server from ArcGIS Pro.
Yes. ArcGIS Server automatically detects a machine name change and reconfigures your site to use the new name. After you use your operating system's tools to rename the machine, you may see the following message in the server logs:
ArcGIS Server has detected that the server machine [old machine name] has been changed to [new machine name]. ArcGIS Server will be updated automatically to use the new host name.
Depending on your site deployment, you may need to perform some additional steps to ensure that your site is configured properly to use the new machine name:
- If you enabled HTTPS for your site and your certificate was using the previous machine name, you must generate a new certificate and configure your site to use it. For full instructions, see Secure ArcGIS Server communication..
- If you configured ArcGIS Web Adaptor to use your previous machine name, you must configure it with a new URL that uses the updated machine name. For full instructions, see Configure ArcGIS Web Adaptor after installation.
I disabled HTTP-based communication in my ArcGIS Server site and now I can't access the help using the installed shortcuts.
After disabling HTTP-based communication, you will be unable to access local help documentation from the installed shortcuts since they are configured to use HTTP in their URLs. As a workaround, you can manually modify the shortcuts to use HTTPS. Keep in mind that this only applies to local help resources, not content hosted on the web by Esri.
The Hardware Configuration resource in the ArcGIS Server Administrator Directory displays hardware information for the specified machine in your ArcGIS Server site, giving the specifications of the CPU and operating system, amount of system memory, and number of physical and logical processors. It updates the information when it detects any changes to the configuration of your machine, as well as each time the machine is restarted.
I see an Invalid database connection or The data item is inaccessible error when I try to register a database with ArcGIS Server.
These errors can appear if the database client software or libraries are not found on the server machine. Each machine in your ArcGIS Server site must have the 64-bit version of the database client software installed to allow ArcGIS Server to access the database. You must install these clients before you can register your database with ArcGIS Server. See Database clients for more information.
Restart the ArcGIS Server service after you install the database client software.
By default, ArcGIS Web Adaptor checks the site for new or unavailable machines every minute. If you've waited over one minute since a machine was added, removed, or disabled, and the Web Adaptor still doesn't recognize the changes, it could be because you changed the properties of the user who originally registered the Web Adaptor with the site.
For example, if the account used to register ArcGIS Web Adaptor with the site was disabled, the password changed, or the role type was demoted to a role that does not have administrative privileges, the Web Adaptor will be unable to check the status of your site for new or unavailable machines. To fix this issue, you'll need to reconfigure the Web Adaptor. For full instructions, see Configure ArcGIS Web Adaptor after installation.
ArcGIS Server Manager
I attempted to create or join an ArcGIS Server site and something failed. How do I troubleshoot the issue?
If you encounter a failure when creating or joining an ArcGIS Server site, you can troubleshoot the issue by addressing the error messages reported in the create site or join site summary panel. Additionally, a log of the event is recorded on disk, located at <ArcGIS Server installation directory>\ArcGIS\Server\usr\logs\<machine name>\server. The messages in the log can provide additional insight into what caused the issue. To view the log, browse to the logs directory and open the log in a text editor.
To sign in to Server Manager, you must provide a username and password that has been granted administrator or publisher privileges to the ArcGIS Server site. Usernames and passwords are case sensitive. You must provide the proper case to sign in to Server Manager. Contact your server administrator to find out which username and password you should use. If you are the administrator, provide the username and password that you specified when creating the site. For more information, see Log in to Manager.
It is recommended that you use ArcGIS Server Manager with a supported web browser.
The ability to retrieve your Bing Maps key using Server Manager was removed beginning at 10.1. Visit the My Esri website or contact your Esri customer service representative to find out about your key.
Services
A suite of resources and operations allow server administrators to locate, monitor, and intervene in asynchronous jobs being run by a geoprocessing service. Each of these are available by accessing the service's page in the ArcGIS Server Administrator Directory (URL format https://server:port/arcgis/admin/services/[<folder>]/<serviceName.serviceType>).
From the Jobs page, you can query for jobs that meet specific conditions, purge the queue of all jobs with a current status of NEW, SUBMITTED, or WAITING, and view statistics about the current jobs for the service.
From the page of a specific job, you can cancel the job if it currently carries a status of SUBMITTED or EXECUTING (keeping the job information in the system), or delete the job regardless of current status, which will remove all trace of it from the service and cancel the job if applicable.
Why can't I publish map documents, address locators, and other GIS resources to the ArcGIS Server site using ArcGIS Server Manager?
GIS resources that you attempt to publish to ArcGIS Server are put through a rigorous analysis process to make sure they are ready to be exposed on the web. To analyze your GIS resources before publishing, use ArcGIS Pro to publish services to ArcGIS Server.
However, if you are in a cloud or highly secure environment, you can create service definition files that can be published to ArcGIS Server using ArcGIS Server Manager. Service definition files offer you a way to take a snapshot of your GIS resources and data and publish them to ArcGIS Server as services at a later time. Any GIS resource can be analyzed and encapsulated as a service definition file. Once the service definition file is created, you can browse to it in ArcGIS Server Manager and publish it as a service.
After creating an ArcGIS Server site, I notice services appearing in the services list in ArcGIS Server Manager. What are these? Why can't I delete some of them?
The ArcGIS Server installation comes with a variety of preconfigured services that help you do common tasks such as the following:
- Caching maps and image services (CachingTools, ReportingTools)
- Publishing services (PublishingTools)
- Printing web maps (PrintingTools)
- Performing geometric calculations (Geometry)
- Previewing the functionality of ArcGIS Server (SampleWorldCities)
- Synchronizing data between clients and ArcGIS Server (SyncTools)
Essential services, such as CachingTools, PublishingTools, and ReportingTools are started by default and cannot be deleted. Stopping these services would be detrimental to the performance and functionality of ArcGIS Server.
Nonessential services, such as Geometry and PrintingTools are stopped by default. If you need to use these services, you can explicitly start them in ArcGIS Server Manager. The SampleWorldCities map service is started by default and can be deleted at any time.
Keep in mind that server resources are consumed only when a service is started and requested to perform a task. For more information, see the preconfigured services section of What's included with ArcGIS Server.
If your web app references a service from a remote server (a different server from the one where your web app is hosted), the server hosting your web app needs to have permission from the remote server to access the service. Often, the server hosting your web app is the one installed with ArcGIS Web Adaptor, and the server hosting your services is a GIS server. If these two servers reside on different domains, the web browser plug-in running the web app is not allowed to access the service for security reasons. To access services across web domains, a client access policy file must be present in the root directory of the web server hosting the service.
If your server administrator has enabled security on your ArcGIS Server site, this file may need to be modified to include the domain of the server hosting your web app. For more information, see Restrict cross-domain requests to ArcGIS Server.
I updated my map document then stopped and started my service, but I don't see the updates in my map service.
When any changes are made to the GIS resource referenced by a service, you'll need to overwrite the service so clients see changes to your GIS resource and its source data.
For instructions on how to overwrite your service, see Overwrite a web layer.
Service definitions that contain source GIS datasets can take a long time to publish because the data must be transferred to the server. However, it is a known limitation that service definitions over 2 GB in size cannot be published when running Server Manager in the Mozilla Firefox web browsers. Service definitions over 2 GB can be published when you run Server Manager in Google Chrome.
If you're unsure whether your service definition is over 2 GB, examine the file's properties immediately after you create it. If you didn't change the default staging location, the service definition will be in C:\Users\<user name>\AppData\Local\ESRI\ArcGISPro\Staging\SharingProcesses.
I encounter an error in ArcGIS Pro when attempting to publish a GIS resource that references data in a Microsoft Windows file share.
If the data referenced by your GIS resource resides in a Windows file share, you may encounter the following error in ArcGIS Pro when publishing:
Packaging succeeded, but publishing failed. ERROR 001369: Failed to create the service.
This failure may result from opportunistic locking, or oplocks, which is a Windows file-locking feature. When oplocks are enabled for your designated file share, the Windows machine is allowed to cache files locally. Usually, this is the machine that is being used to publish the service. If a second machine needs access to the data, it must receive an oplocks break from the Windows machine before the file is synchronized back to the second machine. Usually, this is the machine to which the service is being published. If a break is received by the Windows machine during publishing, the subsequent data synchronization may cause publishing to fail.
Other common issues related to opportunistic locking:
- A machine or machines in your multi-machine site enables locks on the config-store and directories, preventing other machines from accessing them.
- Publishing failures due to the reasons described above
- Issues accessing registered data in shared locations
- Issues accessing cached tiles stored in locations with oplocks
To work around these issues, disable oplocks for each file share you have configured.
For more information about oplocks, see Opportunistic Locks in the Microsoft documentation.
Using ArcGIS Server Manager or ArcGIS Pro, you can publish Web Coverage Services (WCS), Web Feature Services (WFS), Web Map Services (WMS), Web Map Tile Services (WMTS), and Web Processing Services (WPS). Additionally, you can configure map services to return Keyhole Markup Language (KML) if requested.
I can't publish a service to an ArcGIS Server site that uses a certificate issued by a certifying authority (CA).
If HTTPS is enabled using a CA-issued certificate, the CRL Distribution Points (CDP) defined in the certificate must be valid and accessible from the machine or machines hosting ArcGIS Server. If the CDP defined in the certificate is invalid or inaccessible due to network and/or firewall settings, publishing will fail in ArcGIS Pro and the following severe error message will display in the ArcGIS Server log:
Error while using HTTPS security, URL = https://gisserver.domain.com:6443/arcgis/services, HTTP Status Code = 0 and Status Text = (WinInet error code = 12057)
To work around this issue, you can disable the validation of the CDP by following the steps below:
- On each machine hosting ArcGIS Server, log in as the ArcGIS Server account. This is the account running the ArcGIS Server service.
- Click Start > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services and stop the ArcGIS Server service.
- Click Start > Control Panel > Internet Options.
- Click the Advanced tab and scroll down to the Security section.
- Uncheck the option Check for server certificate revocation and click OK.
- Click Start > Log off to log off the current user.
- Log back in to the computer and start the ArcGIS Server service.
- Repeat these steps on all other machines in your ArcGIS Server site.
To understand how to configure the correct permissions and client files required to access database and geodatabase data, see Make your data accessible to ArcGIS Server.
I recently updated my map caches. Are client applications automatically aware that the updated tiles are available?
If you update an area of a map cache, users of ArcGIS Pro who have already visited that area and extent must clear their local image caches before they can see the updates. As a server administrator, you must alert your users when updated data is available so that they know to clear their caches. Consult the help system for your client application for instructions on how to clear the local cache.
I get an error message that says publishing of geoprocessing services is restricted. How can I resolve this?
The error message is for error code 001862: Publishing of geoprocessing services is restricted to administrators only. Only administrators can publish geoprocessing services and deploy service extensions (SOEs or SOIs). This restriction can be changed by an administrator. See Change geoprocessing service and service extension publishing privileges for details.