Hi Carina,
We upgraded our "Custom-Only" 7.1/10g/Slolaris server recently to
7.6.4/11g/RedHat.
I always suggest NOT to skip a major version when doing an upgrade, due to the
fact that BMC only supports the last 3 versions, and therefore, might not test
their software during development for upgrades from unsupported versions at the
time. (I seriously doubt that BMC would have tested a straight upgrade from 7.1
to 7.6.04 or much less 8.0 or 8.1, due to their version support policies).
Before I started my current stint at the company where I am working now, they
attempted an upgrade from 7.1 to 7.6.4 and failed several times.
Even with the assistance of a local support partner, the upgrade failed and
they eventually gave up.
The solution to the problem later turned out to be that you should not skip any
major versions and go through the installer logs to find out what went wrong if
the installer fails.
We found a caveat with some of the AR System forms and tables which had to be
addressed manually before the upgrade in order to get the upgrade to work.
I suggest the following steps which worked for us to do a successful upgrade
(please test it first on a development/test environment before doing this on
prod):
1. Back up the current DB (full DB export dump).
2. Export and delete all records from the AR System User Central File form.
3. Export and delete all records from the AR System User Preference form.
4. Temporary Disable Automatic Processes (performance tuning to make
upgrade complete faster):
Escalations
Alerts
Archive
Log Files
Server Events
5. Temporary Decrease Threads count (max 2 each) to enable faster
re-caching during upgrade.
6. Shut Down AR System.
7. Verify that the Oracle 11g 64 bit client has been installed on the
server and update the tnsnames file for this client.
8. Verify that at least java 1.6 32 and 64 bit has been installed.
9. Comment out Db-Character-Set: UTF-8 parameter in ar.conf file if using
UTF-8.
10. Run the following script on Oracle (fix for SW00327170):
CREATE TABLE SCHEMA_ARCHIVE_BACKUP
AS
SELECT SCHEMAID, ARCHIVEFROMFORM FROM SCHEMA_ARCHIVE;
COMMIT;
UPDATE SCHEMA_ARCHIVE
SET ARCHIVEFROMFORM = NULL;
COMMIT;
ALTER TABLE SCHEMA_ARCHIVE
MODIFY (ARCHIVEFROMFORM NUMBER (15));
COMMIT;
UPDATE SCHEMA_ARCHIVE
SET ARCHIVEFROMFORM =
(SELECT ARCHIVEFROMFORM
FROM SCHEMA_ARCHIVE_BACKUP
WHERE SCHEMA_ARCHIVE_BACKUP.SCHEMAID = SCHEMA_ARCHIVE.SCHEMAID);
COMMIT;
ALTER TABLE SCHEMA_ARCHIVE
MODIFY (ARCHIVEFROMFORM NOT NULL);
11. Upgrade to ARS 7.5.0
12. Upgrade to ARS 7.6.04 SP5
13. Upgrade to ARS 8.0
14. Upgrade to ARS 8.1
15. Restore original config for
Escalations
Alerts
Archive
Log Files
Server Events
Threads count
16. Import backed up records for the AR System User Central File form.
17. Import backed up records for the AR System User Preference form.
HTH,
Best Regards,
Theo
-----Original Message-----
From: Action Request System discussion list(ARSList)
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Grooms, Frederick W
Sent: 12 December 2014 22:44
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Help with upgrade path
My suggestion
Take a backup of the Oracle 10g data and copy/restore it to the Oracle 12c
(Your DBA could also do this with oracle DataPump).
Install 8.1 on the new server against the copy/restored data. When installing
it should ask you if you want to upgrade or start new in the database. Choose
upgrade.
(You do NOT need to have an existing set of ARS binaries on the new server
to choose upgrade as this only refers to the database data)
Fred
-----Original Message-----
From: Action Request System discussion list(ARSList)
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Carina Burns
Sent: Friday, December 12, 2014 11:38 AM
To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
Subject: Help with upgrade path
Greetings!!!
I am turning to you all for suggestions for an upgrade path for our ARS system.
I've contacted BMC for advice, however our support contract level is Basic...
which is also the adjective I would use to describe my current level of
customer satisfaction.
Has anyone gone from ARS 7.1 to 8.1? How did you do it?
If you don't want to wade thru my specifics, kindly preface your reply with
TLDR before you explain your upgrade method.
The specifics:
Our production set up is
ARS 7.1 patch 11 / Midtier7.0.01 patch 5/ Apache Tomcat 5.027 / Crystal Reports
XI running on WinSvr 2003 SP2 against an Oracle 10g last patch database on
RedHat Enterprise 4.0
I had thought to step thru and upgrade to 7.6 and then to 8.1 but was advised
after opening a support ticket that since we have custom forms only and are not
using ITSM or any other BMC app, we could go straight to 8.1 from 7.1.
The compatibility matrix lists the minimums but states that any newer versions
are supported for OS and database. Since hardware only gets upgraded when bond
money exists about every 5-7 years at our school district, I asked for the
latest/greatest. I cleared my choices/plan with support but since it was going
to take a while to get the servers, I closed the ticket saying I would open
another once I had my gear.
My new servers are virtual; a WinSvr2012 R2 and a Oracle Linux 6 box. I put
Oracle 12c on as the database.
I had thought to install ARS 7.1 as a "new install", delete the data, copy the
production 10g AR schema over to the 12c user, then run 8.1 as an upgrade.
That's essentially how I did it the last time and support confirmed that a
number of people run their upgrades that way. But Oh-Oh! 7.1 is 32bit and
doesn't want to install on my Win 64bit OS...Maybe both support and I missed
that little hitch or perhaps I misunderstood. Anyhow, I opened a new ticket
and asked if I could do the same thing but with 8.1 instead. In other words,
install ARS 8.1 as a new install, delete the data, copy over the 10g AR schema
to the 12c user, then run 8.1 again as an upgrade.
Here are the answers I got back on my ticket (paraphrased):
A) 7.1 isn't supported,
B) I was free to experiment using the new install/delete data/move schema/run
upgrade method but it may not work
C) I can try to install 8.1 as new and use the Migrator to move over all my
custom forms
D) Contract professional services and pay BMC to help with my upgrade
Option D isn't going to happen. So I am left with options B and C. The
analyst on the first support ticket didn't think Migrator would be necessary
since we aren't using ITSM. Thoughts on that (While I go read the migrator
documentation)? Comments on option B?
Thanks in advance!
Carina
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