Introduction to migrating domains

Migration is used to deploy changes from one application domain to another, for example from the development environment to the test environment. Note that you cannot migrate sites.

When you migrate an application domain you must first pack the source application domain (see Packing sites and application domains) and then use the package file to migrate the source application domain to the target application domain. During the migration, the configurations of the StreamServer applications in the source environment are deployed to the StreamServer applications in the target environment.

Administrator privileges

You must have administrator privileges to be able to migrate application domains.

Comparing application domains

Before you migrate, you should compare the source and target application domains to see what differs in the two domains:

1	In Control Center, right-click the site node and select Compare Domains. The Compare Domains dialog box opens.

2	Select the domains to compare (SHIFT + SELECT) and click Compare.

Use this information to decide whether to migrate.

Backup before migrating

Before you migrate, you should pack the target application domain in order to create a backup. You can then use the backup to migrate back to the previous state if you need to.

One to many

The configuration of a StreamServer application in the source domain is deployed to all StreamServer applications with the same logical name in the target environment. For example, if the source domain has one StreamServer application Invoice, and the target domain has two StreamServer applications with the same logical name (for example for load balancing), the Invoice configuration is deployed to both Invoice applications in the target domain.

Figure 5

Deploying one to many

New StreamServer applications in source environment

Migration does only deploy changes from StreamServer applications in the source environment to StreamServer applications in the target environment, and does not add any new StreamServer applications to the target environment. If the source application domain includes StreamServer applications that are not yet included in the target application domain, you must create these StreamServer applications in the target domain before you migrate. Note that the logical names must be the same in the source and target environment.

Incremental migration

Package files from different source domains can be deployed to the target domain at different points in time. For example, if several developers have separate development domains, each developer can migrate his domain to the test domain when he is ready to do so. In this case, only StreamServer applications in the target domain that have the same logical names as the StreamServer applications in the source domain are affected.

Figure 6

Incremental migration

Additional files

When the package file was created, there was an option to export additional files from the working directories of the applications to the package. All export items with Copy Type set to Migrate are copied to the working directories of the applications in the target environment when migrating an application domain. See Exporting additional files to a package.