Domino Upgrade – different methods to consider

Desired Outcome:
Decide on a Domino Upgrade method, after reviewing various options (copy method; replication preserving server identity)

System Overview
-Two clustered Domino 8.5.3FP6 Enterprise Servers on old bare-metal hardware
-One Domino 9.0.1. Enterprise Server for Traveler
-VMWare with two new VM’s of Windows Server 2016
Note: Plan is to migrate one of the Enterprise Servers and the Traveler server to VM’s
Note: For now, the other Enterprise Server will remain with an in-place upgrade to 10.0.1
-Downloads of IBM Domino 10.0.1 software to both VM’s

Copy Method
-This is a common method and is typically endorsed. The basic idea is to: create the directories on new server the same as on old server; make a copy of the /data folder to the new server; install the same version of Domino on new server; confirm for a couple days all is working; complete by doing an in-place upgrade to the version of Domino you actually want.

Daniel Nashed gave me some additional input on the copy method. Copy the data, but not the binaries – meaning you do a fresh Domino install. An idea is to create a new server; copy the data over; test everything; delete the data; bring data over again. He REALLY likes this method.

Replication Method (inherit server identity)

-Input from Daniel Nashed was: That bring more issues than it solves. The concept works, and he has done many times before, but you have to be careful if you have DAOS and especially when the data is encrypted if you forgot to disable that. The replication method works, but it means you have to check in detail if all came over and you have to create replicas, etc.

-Input from John Paganetti (HCL):
-Good that I’m clustered, as it will have minimal impact on users
-Supports creating a test environment. I’ll be copying data over to a VM; installing Domino 8.5.3.; in-place upgrade to Domino 10.0.1.; test all applications
-Refresh Design on Administration Server only (checked) – this would be DA-OJAI
-Instead of creating two VM’s (Windows Server 2016), create three
-Create a VM with Domino 10.0.1.; add it to the cluster with the two Domino 8.5.3. servers; create replicas over to confirm applications work in a production environment.
-Bring down one of the Domino 8.5.3 servers; copy over the Program Directory, Data Directory, etc to a VM; rename notes.ini on the source server (so it can’t load again).
-Update various FQDN to new server
-Update the ODS for databases
-???? In-Place upgrade to Domino 10.0.1. — pending input from JP
-Wait a couple weeks
-Repeat on other server (cluster mate)

-Traveler server (various notes)

Chosen Method
-I’m going to go down path of adding a new server and doing the inherit identity
-In the administration server of current server, I added a new server and captured the server.id file
-Installed Domino 10 on a new server (VM)
-Used the server.id file
-Goal is to build up the new server; copy over various applications to test
-Then, create a one-way replication from current server to new server

About Paul

CERT Coordinator, Ham Radio Operator, GTD Fan; Photographer; Domino/Notes Administrator
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