Not a question, but just wanted to share a script that has been helpful for us. In the past we attempted to use this incredible script created by @jcarlson to scan our organization to figure out where feature layers were being used. The script is amazing and worked for many people, but not for us. It ran, and appeared to be working, but after a few seconds, it would hang and then never complete. It took us a long time to figure out why, but we finally did.
We had some old App Studio applications in our ArcGIS Online organization. These are classified as "Native Applications," which get lumped in with the scripts scan of all applications in the organization. Once we added a debug function to list the layer being scanned, we found that it was getting hung on those native applications every time. We had to add in a segment to skip that application type, but once we did, it worked flawlessly. Here is our full code, which will skip Native Application item types if they are causing issues for you.
"""
Script to find where a specific AGOL layer is used within an ArcGIS Online organization.
This tool connects to your AGOL org, searches specified item types for references
to the layer's URL or item ID, and summarizes the results.
"""
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Import & Warning Suppression
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
import warnings
from urllib3.exceptions import InsecureRequestWarning
# Suppress "Unverified HTTPS request" warnings for cleaner output
warnings.simplefilter("ignore", InsecureRequestWarning)
import os
import json
import pandas as pd
from arcgis.gis import GIS
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
# CONFIGURATION – set these before running
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
ORG_URL = "https://YOUR ORG HERE.arcgis.com/" # Your AGOL organization URL
USERNAME = "AGOL_USERNAME" # Your AGOL username
PASSWORD = "AGOL_PASSWORD" # Your AGOL password
LAYER_ID = "292q8e3ff7b94837a8f373c946bz1c5b" # Item ID of the layer to search for
ITEM_TYPES = ["Web Map", "Application"] # Which item types to scan
MAX_ITEMS = 5000 # Max items per search (-1 for no limit)
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
def find_usage(gis, layer_id):
"""
Search for references to a layer in specified item types.
Parameters:
gis (arcgis.gis.GIS): Authenticated GIS object.
layer_id (str): Item ID of the target layer.
Returns:
dict: Keys are item types; values are lists of items where the layer is found.
"""
# Retrieve the layer item and its service URL
layer_item = gis.content.get(layer_id)
layer_url = layer_item.url
usage = {}
for item_type in ITEM_TYPES:
# Map generic 'Application' to true web mapping apps
actual_type = (
"Web Mapping Application"
if item_type.lower() == "application"
else item_type
)
# Fetch all items of this type
items = gis.content.search(query="", item_type=actual_type, max_items=MAX_ITEMS)
print(f"[DEBUG] {actual_type}: {len(items)} items to scan")
found = []
for it in items:
# Log which item is being checked
print(f"[DEBUG] Scanning {it.id} — {it.title}")
# Skip Native Applications to avoid hangs
if it.type.startswith("Native Application"):
print(f"[DEBUG] Skipping native app {it.id}")
continue
try:
# Pull JSON payload and check for layer URL or ID
payload = json.dumps(it.get_data())
if layer_url in payload or layer_id in payload:
found.append(it)
except Exception as e:
print(f"[WARN] Error fetching {it.id}: {e}")
print(f"[DEBUG] → {len(found)} matches in {actual_type}\n")
usage[item_type] = found
return usage
def summarize(usage):
"""
Print a summary table of items that reference the layer.
Parameters:
usage (dict): Output from find_usage(), mapping item types to item lists.
"""
for itype, items in usage.items():
header = f"\n{itype}s referencing layer:\n" + "-" * (len(itype) + 12)
print(header)
if not items:
print(" None found")
continue
# Build a DataFrame for legibility
df = pd.DataFrame([{
'title': it.title,
'id': it.id,
'owner': it.owner
} for it in items])
print(df.to_string(index=False))
def main():
"""
Main execution flow: validate config, connect to AGOL, run search, and output results.
"""
# Ensure password is provided
if not PASSWORD:
print("ERROR: AGOL_PASSWORD environment variable not found. Exiting.")
return
# Inform user of connection attempt
print(f"→ Connecting to {ORG_URL} as {USERNAME}…")
try:
gis = GIS(ORG_URL, USERNAME, PASSWORD)
print("✔ Connected successfully.\n")
except Exception as e:
print(f"✖ Failed to connect: {e}")
return
# Perform the usage search
print(f"→ Searching for usage of layer '{LAYER_ID}' in item types {ITEM_TYPES}…")
usage = find_usage(gis, LAYER_ID)
# Output a concise summary
summarize(usage)
print("\n→ Done.")
if __name__ == '__main__':
main()
