DNS Name Change for La Plata County
An aerial view of Durango, Colorado’s downtown area. Durango is the county seat of La Plata County.
Transitioning to a shorter, more user-friendly URL within the GIS environment
La Plata County is located in southwestern Colorado and has a population of approximately 56,000. The County’s GIS department sought to improve accessibility by transitioning from a lengthy domain name to a shorter, more user-friendly URL. However, within a GIS environment, updating a domain name is a complex process that requires careful planning and execution to avoid service disruptions.
“A big concern for our organization is that we have numerous web apps and GIS web pages that most county departments use for their daily workflows and thousands of public users. We wanted to avoid having our apps, website, and server down for any significant period of time,” said David Kirk, GIS Analyst for La Plata County.
Thoughtful planning and flexibility
To ensure a smooth and secure transition, the County partnered with Argis Solutions for expert support. The project began with a thorough review and documentation of the County’s existing GIS architecture, with special attention to the ArcGIS Web Adaptor associated with the GIS web server.
A new SSL certificate was installed, and all domain redirections were confirmed to function correctly. The federation settings between Portal for ArcGIS and the ArcGIS Server were verified and adjusted to ensure proper communication between the two systems. ArcGIS Web Adaptor was uninstalled and then reinstalled to reflect the new domain settings, and all necessary configurations were updated across both the portal and the server.
Minimal service disruptions
Following the DNS update, testing was performed to identify and resolve any remaining issues, ensuring a smooth transition to the new domain. As a result, the County successfully transitioned to the new domain with minimal disruption to services, ultimately improving accessibility for users and streamlining internal operations.
“The Argis team was really flexible with our staff’s schedule, as the work needed to be done after hours or on weekends. It was a smooth process, and the value for the services provided was excellent,” said Kirk.
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