How to implement App update with modified dashboards?

[pkincaid_sa]

I support a Splunk App for our company and we recently made some changes to the dashboards we ship with the app - most specifically, updating the dashboard version and removing a script that was not Python 3 compatible.

However, when customers updated the app, because the user of the App made some small changes to the dashboards, these dashboards did not get updated to the latest dashboards and were showing issues with the old script and the dashboard version - since the changed dashboard would be in the local directory vs. default.

Is there a way for us as the developers of the app to merge or force specific changes to a dashboard for our app even if there were customizations made to the dashboard by the customer? Perhaps a warning that dashboard X is not being updated because a local version exists?

Thanks,
Paul

[FelixLeh]

Forcefully changing the local directory when updating an app would go against the purpose of the folder structure since it is made to guarantee to keep your changes even when updating the app.  

I think the only solution that secures a healthy Splunk Environment would be to manually adjust/remove the local changes that interfere with the new ones. 

Look through the local version of the dashboard the customer created and find any changes they want to keep in the new one. Delete the local version and you'll see the one created in the default directory.
Then make the changes the customer wants to keep in the dashboard thus creating a new local version.

You could also rename the current local dashboard to "dashboard_old.xml". This would result in both dashboards being shown and allows for the transition of the changes while both Dashboards are still intact.

I hope one of those solutions works for you!

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