idea Set Expiry Date for User Account in ArcGIS Online Ideas

Set Expiry Date for User Account

YvesLeger — Thu, 09 Jun 2016 14:12:58 GMT

We have contractors to whom we want to provide an AGOL account with access to our organization's content for a specific period of time. We now have to manually delete their account after their contract is done. It would be nice to be able to set an expiry date on their account (not just on the password).

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

Wei-HsinFu1 — Wed, 16 Nov 2016 02:25:34 GMT

We have students using our organizational ArcGIS Online account for just a term. It will be great not have to keep track of this type of accounts and manually delete them.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

Anonymous User — Wed, 18 Jan 2017 20:48:06 GMT

Hello Yves Leger,

Would an account becoming disabled after a specified period of time be satisfactory?

"Disabling a member prevents the member from consuming organizational resources. This can be useful while you move their items to a different member. Disabled members cannot sign in to the organization, consume organizational resources, create content, or administer the site. They are still members and count toward the number of users in your organization. Disabled accounts are automatically disabled for Esri access."

Manage members—ArcGIS Online Help | ArcGIS

Is the intent in setting an expiration date on an account to prevent the user from accessing the organization or to automate the removal of the named user and their content from the organization?

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

HilaryCampbell — Wed, 26 Jul 2017 13:43:15 GMT

Hi, Katie. I'm not sure what Yves' intent was here, but we certainly have the same question. The main intent of applying an expiry date to a named user account would be to free up that account for another user, as the total number of named users in our organization is very limited. A key piece of that would be to prevent that user from accessing the organization after their work is complete, as you suggest above. As for the content of expired user accounts, perhaps an automated message to the AGOL organization's account administrators two weeks before the set expiry date would provide enough time to permit any content to be moved to another user account or deleted as required. However, if a user is set to "Viewer Only", this would not be necessary as that user would not have any content.

This would go a long way towards helping AGOL administrators keep their corporate accounts "clean" and to ensure that they are getting maximum benefit from their allocation of named user accounts. Applying an expiry date which would disable a user account is definitely an option, but that could also get messy over time. Administrators still have to go through the corporate account and manually delete disabled user accounts. Perhaps setting a default expiry date of 6 months from the date an account is disabled would do the trick...? As we progress with AGOL, our accounts are going to become more and more complicated. Anything we can "set and forget", so to speak, makes our day-to-day jobs that much easier, and much more predictable for everyone because it would become a standard.

Any suggestions or questions most welcome. Thanks!

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

YvesLeger — Wed, 30 Aug 2017 17:10:39 GMT

Katie,

Yes, the intent would be to automate the removal of the named user and prevent them from accessing organizational data once their contract is up.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

MegHoole — Wed, 30 Aug 2017 23:06:44 GMT

I like this idea... I'd add that I'd like have an option that the accounts to be flagged for review rather than auto disabled or deleted.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

ChrisArneson — Mon, 09 Oct 2017 15:42:33 GMT

I was researching this same functionality. We want to give external entities access to our ArcGIS Online maps but only for a limited time. It would be fantastic if we could just create temporary accounts/passwords which expired after a set time period.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

MōnoSimeone — Thu, 28 Jun 2018 18:37:16 GMT

This idea needs to be implemented, I'm glad to see it being reviewed!

A few additional feature enhancement comments:

1) The expiration date parameters should be tied to a Role, such as "Student" so that all users assigned the role automatically get an expiration date; and admins have the ability to modify a individual manually, if necessary.

2) There should be options for implementation: End date only; Start and End date; or Duration (for next 6 months from Start date)

3) Options for when end date arrives: Disable vs delete (considerations for deletion, all items move to admin or are also deleted)

4) Notifications:

- Provide an email notification template wysiwyg view so admins can include important information about who to contact, methods to migrate content, recharge information, or other messages "after 60 days of account being disabled, this account will be deleted and all items X." And, option for the admin to receive a copy of email.

- The ability to set notification interval, so messages go out on 60, 30 14, 7, 0 days prior to disable/delete. End-users need be made aware several times, the last thing I want are users complaining they didn't get a notification.

5) Ability to search/filter users by active/disabled; or when accounts expire.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

Dr_Carter — Sat, 14 Jul 2018 20:34:43 GMT

Same here. We have an education license and need to add and remove hundreds of students each semester. An option to have their accounts expire at a set date would help a lot.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

HilaryCampbell — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 01:45:38 GMT

This issue has been around for quite a while now. I spoke about this with Kelly Gerrow at the AGOL island at the UC last week. We talked about what types of users could be automatically deleted, as well as what could happen with user accounts which are automatically disabled on a specified date, instead of deleted. I suggested that users who did not create any content in their accounts (our org has a lot of read-only viewers) could be deleted outright. User accounts which do have content could be disabled, which would allow the account administrator(s) the opportunity to move that content to another location before removing the user from the account. Either option should free up the use of that identity. For organizations with a finite number of named user identities in high demand with frequent turnover, the disable option would be very attractive: the quota of named user identities assigned to an account should not be impacted by disabled identities.

Making administrators responsible for checking who is doing what and who is finished when is not optimal. There has to be a better way. Whether for student placements or term contracts, projects or short-term initiatives, AGOL administrators need the ability to set an expiry date on accounts.

I’d also like to suggest that identities are frequently assigned to people who never use them, in anticipation of a perceived need which is never realized. The administrator should have the ability to set warnings for unused identities, with an option to send users system-generated notice that their accounts will be disabled if the account is inactive for a defined period of time (e.g. 90 days). Admins would also need an easy way to find/filter on disabled accounts and accounts nearing expiry. I love Mōno Simeone's idea of tying an expiry date to a role.

bulk administration‌ expiry date‌ ArcGIS-Online‌ #named users‌ #AGOL_identities‌

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

MōnoSimeone — Mon, 16 Jul 2018 18:48:45 GMT

An aspect of this discussion that should be raised is whether or not to use the built-in accounts vs Enterprise Single-Sign On. When implementing SSO there are functions and scripts that can be used to automate how a new user is added into the organization such as their role, credits, groups etc. Esri has made the integration with SSO much easier with more improvements coming (supposedly) by the end of the year.

The reason I raise this is for two parts: 1) with SSO, there is no need to manage new users, an account is automatically created with assigned credits and group access when they sign-in for the first time; 2) Anyone interested in SSO should contact their Esri rep about "functionally unlimited users" which could mean admins not being constantly worried about named user caps -- for some institutions this approach may alleviate the need to delete accounts for students/faculty that have moved on, therefore eliminating the need for an expiry date as well as eliminating the need to deal with content that is connected to maps and apps. That being said, I still believe an expiry date is highly desirable feature that should be implemented whether an org chooses SSO or Built-in accounts.

I think there are still some technical issues and best practices that need to be fleshed out but considering the information I've learned this past week I will strongly work towards implementing SSO to reduce admin workload.

Re: content in a disabled/deleted account > consider an "archive" named user and move content to this account, individual folders can be made labeled with username for easy search.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

JackyHovens — Sun, 16 Dec 2018 21:47:21 GMT

I like the idea of being able to set a deletion date, often I will be told someone is leaving an organisation and I have to make a note and then delete once they have left. It would be great if I could delete and then enter the date to be deleted. We only have viewer users at the moment, but also like the idea of having an email reminder before the deletion for any users that have content.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

MelissaNorthey — Mon, 20 May 2019 19:27:39 GMT

We just set up Enterprise logins, however I'm looking for this to handle temporary, contract workers that we would not set up in our Enterprise system. For example, we have volunteers help us with our Homeless Point-in-time count. If I could give them access for just the month they are needed, it would help.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

DavidSeldner — Mon, 12 Apr 2021 09:47:28 GMT

This would also help us since students get an account for one year and then we have to go through the process of deleting the entries again.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

GJW — Mon, 28 Mar 2022 16:29:35 GMT

We also get many seasonal users, and it would be very useful to set the expiration date during account creation so that their accounts automatically disable and/or delete on that date.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

ChristianComeau1 — Tue, 18 Oct 2022 15:24:30 GMT

As per the previous comments, this is of great interest to my organisation.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

PaulinaGajownik1 — Fri, 24 Nov 2023 08:53:12 GMT

There is no option to set the account validity period.
Universities would like to create an account for a semester or a year, after which it could be extended. The suggestion results from the fact that some students interrupt their studies and when they leave they have an active license.
In the case of the previous system for issuing keys to use ArcMap, verification whether someone was a student entitled to a license was checked by an appropriate script in the student database. Now the University has to do it manually.

@YvesLeger

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

ColeWhite — Wed, 24 Jan 2024 15:28:43 GMT

I definitely support this idea. In higher ed, an ArcGIS Online organization may contain thousands of users. When a user leaves the institution, their ArcGIS Online account and its content will remain in place. With the exception of some cases where we want certain accounts and their data to be preserved (for example, a public story map that's been cited in someone's thesis), this means that our organization's storage capacity will be compromised by these stagnant accounts and data. It also potentially introduces a security risk. Having an expiry date for user accounts (such as the policy used by platforms like Google, etc), would greatly enhance the operational efficiency of organizations with large, transient user bases.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

RyanKelley_NA — Wed, 24 Apr 2024 14:59:28 GMT

Are there any plans to implement a temporary or expiration option for AGOL user accounts? This would definitely be super helpful to consultants or contractors that you want to provide with an account for say 30, 45, or 60 days...something like that.

Re: Set Expiry Date for User Account

MiltonSolano — Fri, 10 May 2024 14:59:45 GMT

Folks,

I support this idea too. In our organization we have temporal students coming and going; sometimes for a few months, others for half a year and we tend to forget about disabling the accounts once their time is over.

A script going through the accounts and finding those not active for the last 6 months works but we need to make sure these accounts belong to a temporary student before disabling it. Setting an expiration date would be great. This expiration should give two options: delete account and their content or just disable it.

If not built into AGOL, we can setup scripts to look for expiration dates on the accounts and report those accounts to the admins for information.

Thanks!