Configuring your environment

By default, packages in the arcgis meta-package are configured to work with ArcGIS Online. arcgis utilizes environment variables to determine how requests are crafted and where requests are made. These environment variables are:

• ARCGIS_HOST
• ARCGIS_USER
• ARCGIS_CLIENT
• ARCGIS_SECRET
• ARCGIS_TOKEN

Environment variable usage

• ARCGIS_HOST is used to to determine where authorization takes place. By default, this is "https://www.arcgis.com". This is because the packages, by default, interact with ArcGIS Online. To use a different portal, you will need to modify the ARCGIS_HOST path to url of that portal.

• ARCGIS_USER variable is used to determine who actions are performed on behalf of. Notably, it is used in functions that modify or create resource such as functions from arcgislayers: create_service(), add_item(), and publish_item().

• ARCGIS_CLIENT and ARCGIS_SECRET environment variables are used only in the auth_client() OAuth2 client flow authorization. See the article on authorization for more.

• ARCGIS_TOKEN is used to fetch a users access token. These are retrieved using the various auth_ functions of arcgisutils and set using set_auth_token(). Alternatively, the ARCGIS_TOKEN can be set to an API key.

Modifying your environment variables

Environment variables should never be included in your code. Instead, they should be stored in an external environment file such as an .Renvrion file. See usethis::edit_r_environ() on how you can set these variables. Generally, it is recommended that you have a project level .Renviron file that stores only the requisite environment variables.