Creating special custom sites whose name begins with FileOnlyCustomSite

You might delete special custom sites whose name begins with FileOnlyCustomSite that are generated to propagate files to agents accidentally or purposely, for example, when performing a gather reset. You can recreate them by using the PropagateFiles.exe tool.

Before you begin

To log in by using PropagateFile.exe, you must enable the Can use Console permission.

About this task

This procedure describes how to recreate special custom sites whose name begins with FileOnlyCustomSite. By following these steps, you can avoid errors such as Unable to find site id for URL.

Procedure

Create a dummy directory containing an empty file, for example: C:\dummy with foo_file.txt.
Navigate to the BigFix server directory. For example, C:\Program Files (x86)\BigFix Enterprise\BES Server.
To authorize a user to write in to the special custom site, run the PropagateFiles.exe tool as follows:
```
PropagateFiles.exe CreateFileOnlyCustomSiteUserAuthorization <site admin pvk> <site admin password> <serverURL> <operator name> <operator password> <site name>
```
where:
- site admin pvk: The full path to the BigFix license file (license.pvk).
- site admin password: The password for the license file.
- serverURL: The server URL that is copied from the masthead file.
- operator name: The name of an existing user.
- operator password: The user password for the user.
- site name: The name of the special custom site. The site must contain only files and the name must begin with FileOnlyCustomSite.
For example, PropagateFiles.exe CreateFileOnlyCustomSiteUserAuthorization C:\licenses\licence.pvk lcs_password http://bigfixserver:52311 bigfixuser bfu_password FileOnlyCustomSite_FOO.
Alternatively, you can use your Windows credentials to authenticate:
```
PropagateFiles.exe CreateFileOnlyCustomSiteUserAuthorization Windowsauthentication <site admin pvk> <site admin password> <serverURL> <site name>
```
To propagate the dummy directory contents to the custom site, run the following command:
```
PropagateFiles.exe UpdateFileOnlyCustomSite <serverURL> <operator name> <operator password> <pvk file location> <directory to propagate> <site name>
```
For example, PropagateFiles.exe UpdatefileOnlyCustomSite http://bigfixserver:52311 bigfixuser bfu_password C:\licenses\licence.pvk C:\dummy FileOnlyCustomSite_FOO.
Alternatively, you can use your Windows credentials to authenticate:
```
PropagateFiles.exe UpdateFileOnlyCustomSite Windowsauthentication <serverURL> <directory to propagate> <site name>
```
Attention: This operation replaces the custom site contents with your directory contents.

To distribute the custom site with its file content to the targets, run a custom action with an action script.

custom site subscribe CustomSite_<site name> as "<site name>" on "{parameter "action issue date" of action}"

For example:

custom site subscribe CustomSite_FileOnlyCustomSite_FOO as "FileOnlyCustomSite_FOO" on "{now}"

Results

A special custom site called CustomSite_FileOnlyCustomSite_FOO is created.

Special custom sites are not visible on the BigFix console. To verify that the site has been correctly created, check the following files:

C:\Program Files (x86)\BigFix Enterprise\BES Server\Mirror Server\Inbox\bfemapfile.xml
C:\Program Files (x86)\BigFix Enterprise\BES Server\Mirror Server\Inbox\GatherState.xml