idea Option to request permission (or join a group) for access to a secured resource in ArcGIS Online Ideas

Option to request permission (or join a group) for access to a secured resource

Jay_Gregory — Mon, 08 Sep 2025 14:31:06 GMT

If someone is sent a link to an internal AGO resource (dashboard, layer, app, etc.) and the user doesn't have permission they just get a page that says "you do not have permission to access the resource." Most BI tools (Tableau, PowerBi, etc.) also give the option to the user to request permission to the asset. As it stands, the user doesn't even know who owns the ArcGIS resource to even ask how to get permission - they have to ask the person who sent them the link, so might not even know the resource owner.

Is there any reason a capability has not been built in - I can't imagine we're the first one to bring this up, though I couldn't find a similar idea anyway.

Re: Option to request permission (or join a group) for access to a secured resource

JonathanMcD — Mon, 08 Sep 2025 14:44:04 GMT

@Jay_Gregory

Ultimately your GIS admin would step in, as I do, 'cos there could be a number of reasons why the person has no access. So I suppose the easiest thing is for all your users being aware of this.

Also, won't it be the responsibility of the person sending the link to ensure access or help support getting access?

Re: Option to request permission (or join a group) for access to a secured resource

Jay_Gregory — Mon, 08 Sep 2025 14:52:57 GMT

I can see that working in some cases, but having an admin be the central point for permission requests for a large organization is not really scalable in our case. And unfortunately here links get passed too much - especially far down the line, the person who received it might not even know how they got access if their name was added to the group pre-emptively.

Even just a "here is the owner of the resource" or something like that. I'm mostly just comparing it to other popular BI tools as well.

Re: Option to request permission (or join a group) for access to a secured resource

JonathanMcD — Mon, 08 Sep 2025 15:09:10 GMT

Why not pre-empt things and create a gallery of commonly used applications/maps/data that's available to the org. The creator just needs to ensure admin sets right perms, then admin manages user access.

We've currently got 220+ named GIS users in an org of 4000+, every user is a member of an org group and content is managed as such by default.

Meant to add, is it perhaps not a worry (and a bit out of control) where links are just being passed around?

I do get the premise behind your idea, but ultimately it'll surely land with the admin anyway...so...

Re: Option to request permission (or join a group) for access to a secured resource

Jay_Gregory — Mon, 08 Sep 2025 15:09:16 GMT

This is more for resources that users don't have access to. User X has access to a dashboard and sends it to a colleague who doesn't have access (maybe its a good example of dashboard design, maybe it's relevant, etc.). Is there a self-service way that second user can easily request access to the dashboard? Even most of our users are not familiar with the concept of "ownership" within the system. I work for a large federal agency (50k emp) unfortunately, so communication gets hard - we also have a lot of viewers.