Tips for a New ArcGIS Enterprise Administrator

[JEMOO-01]

Hello Community,

I am about to start working as an ArcGIS Enterprise Administrator. While I have a theoretical understanding of the installation and configuration process from instructor-led courses (Sharing Content to ArcGIS Enterprise, Configuring a Base Deployment, and Administration Workflows), I haven't had the opportunity to perform these tasks hands-on. The current ArcGIS Enterprise setup was installed and configured by someone else.

As a fresh graduate, I'm confident in my theoretical knowledge of the components and workflows, but I lack practical experience and am unsure of the real-world challenges I might face in this role.

Could you please share:

1. What common challenges might I face as an Enterprise Administrator?
2. Recommendations for setting up a virtual environment where I can practice and make mistakes without affecting live systems (preferably free resources).
3. Any advice or tips on approaching troubleshooting and problem-solving in this role?

Your insights will be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

[Brian_McLeer]

I have watched several technical session videos Esri posted from Developer Summit and UC from the most recent year. The two below I have watched in the past few months and found very beneficial. 

https://mediaspace.esri.com/media/t/1_h7hoj676

https://mediaspace.esri.com/playlist/dedicated/337930682/1_0lzt3vh4/1_nfl0n2n5

[BillFox]

the short story in a half dozen bullets,

if you have an open slate option,

• supply your network, server, security and database teams with unlimited hot pockets, cookies, donuts, etc.
• get frequent eye checkups, you will be reading thousands of installation, setup and support documents
• check in on this community site every single day to immerse yourself with real world GIS
• visit and get to know your users worlds too, that will give you an understanding of their current and future business needs, help make sure you are all on the same page for critical workflows, system maintenance windows, environment upgrades/migrations and try to be able to do what they do - enough to help them the best you can
• definitely setup (from scratch) a highly available enterprise (all components, portals, servers, web adaptors, network adaptors, load balancers, SSL certificates, reverse proxies, data stores, enterprise geodatabases, printing, etc.), that will allow you to really understand how all the pieces fit together for secure internal and public access
• use the most recent long term support esri enterprise software

[RyanUthoff]

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What common challenges might I face as an Enterprise Administrator?

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• People asking for more permissions then should have. Not everyone needs to have admin permissions, and if they push back when you say no, ask them to justify why they need to be admins.
• Random questions and issues you do not know the answer to. Google and geonet is your friend. Don't be afraid to say that you don't know the answer, but that you'll research and get back to them.
• Not knowing if something that you want to do will negatively impact the server. This is when you NEED a dev server for testing. Always test anything that will potentially negatively impact the server in a dev environment first. Don't be that person that causes a server outage because you didn't test it first.

Recommendations for setting up a virtual environment where I can practice and make mistakes without affecting live systems (preferably free resources)

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AWS has a free tier, but in my opinion, you really need to be asking your internal IT group for resources regarding this. This is their responsibility, not yours.

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Any advice or tips on approaching troubleshooting and problem-solving in this role?

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• Server logs are your friend.
• I've solved countless issues watching the internet traffic either using my browser's dev tools or using a program like Fiddler.

Above all, just be prepared to learn as you go. School and instructor-led courses will only teach you a fraction of the amount of information you need to know. No one knows everything, but that's why Esri's documentation exists.