Best Practices for creating a DX UIM Upgrade Plan

Products

• DX Unified Infrastructure Management (Nimsoft / UIM)

Issue/Introduction

As part of the pre-upgrade review process, Support has asked us to submit an Upgrade Plan.

How do we go about this?  Are there any examples we can refer to?  What should the Upgrade Plan contain and what should it cover?

Environment

DX UIM - Any Version 
Preparing for Upgrade to any other version

Resolution

The specifics of your upgrade plan will vary depending on your business needs and the environment itself, but the general idea is to create a "guide" that someone performing the upgrade can follow in order to ensure the upgrade is successful.

Attached to this KB you will find a referemce example; this should not be considered comprehensive but serve as a guideline for what such a plan may contain.

Generally speaking, the document should cover the following points - again this is not comprehensive but serves as a general guide:

• Enumerate a list of machines that are involved in the upgrade and how to access them (Primary Hub, OC, CABI, Database, HA Hub if present, etc.)
• List the current version of the software and the intended upgrade target version
• Describe the locations on your network/servers where the installers can be found or the locations from which they should be downloaded
• Make note of the installation path for the current version and whether this differs from the out-of-the-box default path (e.g. /opt/nimsoft or C:\Program Files (x86)\Nimsoft)
• Make note of which antivirus software is present and whether appropriate exclusions are in place for the Nimsoft Folders, and/or outline the process for disabling the antivirus or creating exceptions if needed
• Describe the expected workflow - which installer files will be needed? How will they be executed, and on which servers? Will any of the default installation options need to be changed specific to this environment?
• List any additional steps which will be taken during the upgrade - creation of queues, deployment of updated probe versions, etc (refer to the installation documentation for specifics.)
• Describe a process for verification of a successful installation and healthy post-upgrade environment
• Describe any post-install tasks that need to be accomplished (e.g. re-enable antivirus, delete installers from /tmp, etc)
• Outline the process which will be followed in the event of an unsuccessful upgrade for rolling back to the previous version

 

Additional Information

Many customers use the official Installation Documentation as a starting point for their upgrade planning guides.

Additional Examples can be found in the PDF/Docx attached to this KB.