topic Can a user migrate ArcDesktop to a new PC by copying AppData>Roaming>ESRI>Desktop10.6? in ArcGIS Desktop Installation Support Questions

Can a user migrate ArcDesktop to a new PC by copying AppData>Roaming>ESRI>Desktop10.6?

PaulHuffman — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 00:09:59 GMT

I am installing ArcGIS Desktop on a user's new PC. I want of course to preserve her network and geodatabase connections from her old machine to the new machine. It seems logical that I could just copy C:\users\name\AppData\Roaming\ESRI\Desktop10.6\ArcCatalog from the old PC to the new PC, because that's where all the connections are kept. Does this work? Is this supported and documented somewhere? Do I also want to go farther up the tree and copy over everything in >AppData>Roaming>ESRI and maybe >AppData>Local>ESRI as well?

Re: Can a user migrate ArcDesktop to a new PC by copying AppData>Roaming>ESRI>Desktop10.6?

NeilAyres — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 08:37:18 GMT

That works, yes. Have copied my custom prjs and transforms like that before.

Just check in AppData / Roaming and Local, I think Pro leaves stuff in different places as well.

Re: Can a user migrate ArcDesktop to a new PC by copying AppData>Roaming>ESRI>Desktop10.6?

PaulHuffman — Mon, 19 Nov 2018 19:24:20 GMT

Well, it worked, but there were unexpected complications. First, Windows tries hard for some reason to keep AppData hidden. Even the copy of AppData>Roaming>ESRI>Desktop10.4 that I made on a thumb drive. Sometimes you can type in AppData in File Explorer to browse down that branch farther, even it doesn't appear in the folder list, but you can also go to File Explorer View>Options>change folder and search options>view>advanced>show hidden files, folders and drives.

On the target machine, the new one, there was no path c:\users\username\AppData\Roaming\Esri\Desktop10.6 to copy ArcCatalog into, even though ArcDesktop was installed and running for Administrator. I had to log in as user and start ArcCatalog for the first time as that user for the tree structure to show up. Then I closed ArcCatalog, and overwrote the two files in the AppData/Roaming folder ArcCatalog.

Re: Can a user migrate ArcDesktop to a new PC by copying AppData>Roaming>ESRI>Desktop10.6?

LaureneKoman — Mon, 19 Nov 2018 21:14:23 GMT

The folder not present is expected behavior. The APPDATA folders are created by the applications at runtime (not by the installation process). Good post, glad the migration was successful for you.