Migrating DLO 7.5 to new server + upgrade to 7.6: questions

[brastedd]

Hello,

I've been asked to put together a plan to move our DLO 7.5 to new hardware, plus upgrade to 7.6. As this is my first job dealing with DLO, I have some questions.

I noticed there are several components to DLO. I believe we have the Administration Server, Maintenance Server, and DLO Database, but how can I tell for sure? We don't have the dedupe server set up.

What is the recommended path to migrate + upgrade? Should we migrate first, or upgrade first?

I've seen a few documents regarding upgrading to 7.6, installing 7.6, and migrating 7.5 to another server.

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH223552

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH223671

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH217373

Are there any others I should be aware of? Will these instructions (presumably just the upgrade and migrate ones) be sufficient for the migration and upgrade to 7.6?

We currently have a large NAS attached for DLO storage, which we'll be migrating in place when we migrate the DLO server. However we are interested in getting new storage hardware. Where can I get recommended specs?

Thanks for your help.

[VJware]

The Admin Server, Maintenance Server & the DLO DB are all required components of DLO. Every DLO setup will have these. It may be possible, that one sets it up in such a manner that they are distributed across servers, however if opts with the default, the DLO server will have all these 3 components.

If moving to new hardware, I would say to migrate first and then run the upgrade on the new server.

Those 3 KBs should be sufificent enough for both migration & upgrade.

There aren't any published specs by DLO for the storage location, though if you are planing to use a NAS, then the DLO requirements are that the NAS should be accessible via Windows shares & preferably has a drive letter assigned.

[brastedd]

Thanks for the reply. I've looked at those tech articles and now I'm a little confused.

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH223552

What is the upgrade process? Do I upgrade the database schema and then just run the 7.6 setup over the top of the current install?

What are recommended best practices for the upgrade and migration?

Roughly how long does an upgrade take? Can you give me a ballpark figure? We have a few thousand users in the database.

Are there any recommendations at all on storage? e.g. minimum size, access speed, etc.

Thanks.

[VJware]

Yes, the DB schema is upgraded first followed by running the 7.6 setup.

Upgrade time depends upon lot of factors. In one my test environments, the Admin Server took less than 30 mins for the upgrade and approx 5 mins for the agent upgrade (Of course, my test environment did not contain the number of users which you have. Best would to be upgrade batches of agents instead of upgrading them all at the same time).

No specific recommendation for the storage, though you can use this storage estimate tool (attached) for calculating approx size.

[brastedd]

Thanks again. Are there any instructions on how to upgrade the clients (i.e. in batches/not in batches)? Do you have a calculator that doesn't consider the dedupe database?
 

[VJware]

Considering the number of clients deployed at your end, I would personally opt for upgrading in batches. (I would import a .csv containing selective number of clients and then push install them from the UI)

No, I do not have a separate calculator which doesn't consider the DeDupe DB. However, as DeDupe essentially reduces storage space, you could consider the output from this calculator as the minimum size required for the storage.

[brastedd]

Do you know of any step by step instructions on how to upgrade the clients in batches? How do I generate the list of clients to import? I'm very unfamiliar with the interface. How long does each step take (ballpark figure)?

Thanks.

[VJware]

The Admin Guide contains information on how to upgrade the DLO clients. In one of my test environment, a typical client upgrade took less than 5 mins.

Have a look @ the section titled "Procedure to Push Install Desktop Agent and DLO Maintenance Server" in the SDLO 7.6 Admin Guide. It contains information on how to generate a list of clients and how to push install them.

And there aren't any separate instructions on how to update the clients in batches. It's the same as upgrading all the clients in one go or upgrading a specific number in one go. If you would like to upgrade a specific number of clients, then you just add that number of clients to the push deployment wizard.

[brastedd]

Thanks very much for the help. Some more questions, if I may:

How long (ballpark) does it take to do a database backup? Does doing a manual backup take DLO offline?

The guide refers to push installing the DLO maintenance server after the upgrade. What is this referring to? I believe our maintenance server is on the same machine as the Administration server, so is this step necessary for me?

When push-updating the agents, I noticed in the guide that you only import the IP address/computer name from the list but still need to add the username, password, and domain name. Is there any way to add this to the import so I don't have to type it for thousands of users? Or can I type it once and have DLO use the same credentials for all the others?

[VJware]

In my test environ, the DB backup took less than 10 mins. DLO isn't taken offline when a DB backup is made.

Push-installing the Maintenance server isn't necessary if you use the Maintenance server on the same machine as that of the DLO Admin server.

When you import a file containing multiple users, you would have to add the credentials just once provided you enable this option in the install wizard - "Use this user name and password when attempting to connect to additional computers during the installation"