Can't set Portal Content Directory to a Share

[BillHarvey1]

When I set the content directory of ArcGIS Portal to be highly available I get a message that the portal's content directory must be a drive letter path location this is local to the host machine.    See attached doc.

.

Everything is shared

I can see the directory

I have access to it.

Tried to map a drive letter on the machine to the share with same results.

What is going on?

Thanks.

[RandallWilliams · Accepted solution]

By default, you'll need to create the content directory locally, but you can change it after the install process. Some directories MUST remain local, but others can be moved. See:

Changing the portal content directory—Portal for ArcGIS (10.5.x) | ArcGIS Enterprise 

[BillHarvey1]

Thanks.   I had seen that but had read you should be able to set it during the install in a few places.   Seem to find some contradicting documentation regarding setting up a high availability portal.

Thank you.

[JonathanQuinn]

Are you able to provide links to the documentation that were confusing?  We'd like to review the information to see if we can make things more clear.

[DeepakKaul]

I've also encountered this issue and the misleading documentation is in the configuring HA Portal. Can you please specify the correct way of setting the Content store for a HA deployment that uses shared file server? 

Configure a highly available portal—Installation Guides (10.5) | ArcGIS Enterprise 

While installing the first portal server, the installer won't let me move forward until you select a local drive. Even if you use the local drive initially, the "create site" web page again asks for content folder location and will not accept the file share location. The documentation is also missing how to connect the second portal to the file share & at what stage it should be connected. 

Jonathan Quinn

[JonathanQuinn]

When initially installing Portal, you'll set the default content directory to the local machine.  This is where the template content, index, and other files will be stored.  Once Portal is installed and you reach the Portal home page, you can define where you want the content to be stored at.  It's at this point you'll set the content directory to a shared location.  I'll look at the doc to see if we can make that more clear.

[MattMcLees]

Did any of you ever figure out the exact procedure to make this happen? I'm currently trying to do the same thing with a Portal 10.7.1 implementation. I follow the piece about pointing to a local directory first and then changing it. What do you do with the second server? It makes you specify a local drive letter as well and then there is nowhere to change it before you get to the option to join an existing Portal. It then errors out joining because the content directories are different. That's the part that I wish was a little more clear.

Thanks,

[JonathanQuinn]

When setting up a highly available Portal, the high level process is:

1) Install the software on the first portal machine

• During the installation process, you have the option of specifying a local drive for the default content directory. This is where internal files and data lives, (aside from content). This can also be where you define the content directory when creating the portal, but adds an extra step

2) Create the portal site on the first machine

• You can choose to create the portal site and specify the content directory to be set to the share you've defined previously, or a local path. If you choose to create the portal with content on a local drive, you'll need to move it:

               Changing the portal content directory—Portal for ArcGIS (10.7 and 10.7.1) | ArcGIS Enterprise 

               If this is a new deployment, it's easier to create the portal with content on the share 

3) Install the software on the second portal machine

• During the installation process, define the same drive and path that you used to install the first portal
• Ensure that the account used to install the software on the second machine can access the share storing the content.

4) Join the second machine to the first

I think we can update the documentation for installing/configuring the first portal to not link to the documentation about creating a standalone portal and just indicate to use the share on your file server.