SharePoint 2013 to SharePoint 2013 Migration - sharepoint

I am working with a customer which have SharePoint 2013 dev, test and prod environments sitting in a datacentre. We are moving the datacentre which means their SharePoint 2013 needs to be moved as is. They have 1 heavly custom build application on top of SharePoint which needs to be moved. I need confirmation, process suggestion on the migration part.
I install SharePoint 2013 like for like in new environment.
Option 1
I take backup for their databases and restore them on new SQL Server. Use Mount-SPContentDatabase to mount database and test if everything is working as expected
Option 2
Recreate web application, site collections, activate custom features, timer job and migrate content.
I personally think that option 1 is more applicable but need input and suggestions. Any road blockers or gotcha are also encouraged.
Thanks for sharing your experience

As its a same version migration it wont be much of an issue but go with option 1.
Re Creating the whole farm is so hard specially if you decide to deploy each and every component.
I've migrations to same version and these are the steps that i follow.
Create a checklist of all solutions and features (WSP etc).
The check list should have the same services that are running in the farm as well.
Install SharePoint in the new farm and update to the same version as the existing farm , having same version will reduce a lot of
problems.
Create the service applications just like the existing farm.
Restore the service application databases (MetaData, UserProfile etc)
Create the web application and restore the content database
Deploy the custom solutions
Confirm that everything in your checklist is deployed and working fine
Fix errors if there are any
This is the flow that i follow and so far i've been successful.
Good Luck

Related

Creating test application by restoring database in SharePoint 2010

We have planned to migrate our SharePoint server 2010 to SharePoint Online (Office 365). Before we migrate our production site, we have tried to create a test environment in SharePoint server 2010 using the backup data of our production sites. We have tried the below steps to create a Staging environment as like our Production environment. Can anyone suggest the steps for migration or the steps we have followed is good.
Steps :
I have backup the content database.
Created a new web application and restored the backup database to this web application.
As the site is not loading and hence we created a new site
collection.
Once the new site collection is created, the site is able to load but the site and content of production site is not restored as like in our testing site.
Will restoring the database is enough to restore the site collection in the application in SharePoint or need to restore the site separately to the web application. Any suggested solution will be grateful for me to proceed.
Thank you and Best Regards,
Ragunaathan M P
If you are creating a test environment to use for SharePoint online your best bet is to use the 2016 bits. When you move your content over you need to do make sure you have upgraded the content.
So you would do some flavor of the following:
1) Backup the existing database
2) Restore the DB to the new farm
3) Mount the DB (Mount-SPContentDatabase xxx)
At this point (this is very overly simplified you should be able to render the sites.
Lots of other factors will be involved (InfoPath, Full Trust Code, Workflows, etc). However if your content is pretty vanilla this is what I would do. Dp not use the nob2bsiteupgrade option on mount or you will have an upgraded database schema, but your sites won't work.
To validate your upgrade check the logs and look at the versions table in the database. You should see a 16.x.x.x version. The other numbers are the upgrader actions and won't tell you much.
Here are some references:
Upgrade Content
Upgrade-SPContentDatabase
Mount-SPContentDatabase

What is the best way to create SharePoint 2010 copy?

I'm looking for a way to duplicate the content of a SharePoint 2010 server in order to work against it without taxing the main (production) server. I would need the backup server to update as needed, but I'm not looking for a failover solution. It looks like 2010 includes replication features for failover, but I can't tell if this is appropriate for my solution as well (simply not configuring the switchover feature). Can someone with SP 2010 experience tell me if this feature would work for my needs?
You could attach a restored backup of your production content database. See this MSDN documentation for more info: Attach or detach content databases (Sharepoint Server 2010).
There is also a GUI tool http://sushi.codeplex.com/ which should help you. You could backup production and restore to dev site whenever you needed to.
You could also use either stsadm.exe and the backup/restore option OR the powershell cmd backup/restore.
In addition, there is a built in interface in Central Admin to backup/restore sites. I've generally found either the command line or the SUSHI tool to be quicker and easier.
In most cases, the taxing work is on the sharepoint side, not the SQL side. You could attach another front end to the farm but reserve it for only your traffic. Otherwise you're looking at some form of backup/restore to copy everything to a 2nd duplicate farm.

Setting up Sharepoint Dev environment from exsisting site

We have a company SharePoint site that we paid a company to configure and setup for us. We are slowly taking over more and more of the administration of this site. We would like to setup a test environment so we can make changes with out affecting daily business.
How can we take what they have already installed, deployed, and configured and make a copy of it?
I know we can backup the database, but what about the stuff the downloaded and deployed into the system?
None of what they installed are paid applications from what i can tell. They look like the base applications from the Microsoft SharePoint site like Case Management, Knowledge Base, and a few others.
Thanks
You should take an inventory of the installed solutions, you can see that in the list of solutions under central administration. Then try to identity 3rd party solutions and get the WSP files (I bet they are stored in a folder on your server :))
Set up a new environment, make sure to install exactly the same version, including any service packs and/or hotfixes. You can get that list when you search for the version number in Google (the version number is usually seen in the Site Administration page).
After that, install your custom solutions and attach the content database, this should be it.

How do I get started developing a simple workflow application in SharePoint?

I would like to start developing a simple Workflow application in Sharepoint. What files should I download?
SharePoint Server 2007 SDK?
SharePoint Server?
SQL Server?
Visual Studio?
other?
Are they all required for workflow development?
I do not have SharePoint anywhere, please include its components in your answer.
If you don't have SharePoint installed, the free WSS 3.0 version is available for download from Microsoft. Follow these steps to install in a single server environment. It will install a basic version of SQL Server. Note this is suitable for prototyping only, not a production deployment, due to restrictions in the basic install.
Then use SharePoint Designer to create the workflows, free from Microsoft. There is no need for any other software. This allows you to configure workflow against a particular list in your SharePoint site with a wizard-like interface. See this topic on Office Online for more information.
If you need to develop a reusable workflow that can be deployed to many different sites or a production SharePoint instance then this is a much larger time investment. Start by reading one of the many other questions on this site for "getting started with SharePoint" that will give resources to how the product works. Be warned: there's a reasonable learning curve. Once you have a solid understanding, you could follow it up with a book such as Professional SharePoint 2007 Workflow Programming (first search result).
Another "warning" on designer...
The workflows you create there are allways fixed to a single list, and you cannot deploy them to a production server. So the "reusable" part from the above answer even includes a "portable" component.
Also those workflows are very static, since they only contain some speciffic actions that you can perform. (So no custom code etc).

Moving MOSS Shared Service Provider

I'm in the process of moving a complete sharepoint install to a different server.
Can anyone tell me if it's possible to just move the existing Shared Services Provider rather than starting from scratch?
All the best
You really need to move the SSP in concert with everything else in the farm. The two things to move are 1. databases and 2. the file system.
A .doc file for moving all of the SharePoint databases has been published here. Microsoft will soon have an updated procedure for this published on TechNet, according to the To The SharePoint blog.
Then to cover off any file system changes, I would set up a clean install of SharePoint (if you didn't need to already by following the document mentioned above) and do a file comparison between your source and destination SharePoint application servers. I usually use WinMerge as its free but Beyond Compare is also good. Also check any custom solutions are deployed on your destination server.
By ensuring your databases are moved correctly and all of your files are in place you should be OK. Make sure you test every custom component on your destination server before erasing the source databases and files (even better, archive the source).
Yes, create a new SSP and move the applications.
How to on migration of applications here
For moving the SSP to a new farm
Or try the Microsoft SharePoint Administration ToolKit v2.0
For another view of this

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