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Upgrade to Informatica Version 9.x: Upgrade Approaches and Upgrade FAQs

Shannon Heustess

IPS Emerging Technologies

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Shannon Heustess

• Senior Consultant with Informatica Professional

Services SEAL Team

• Based in Atlanta, Georgia

• 7+ years with Informatica Professional Services

• 4+ years experience with Enterprise Upgrades

• Delivered or assisted with many large scale enterprise

upgrades during this time.

Biography

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Agenda

• 9.5.0 Upgrade Paths

• Upgrade Strategies

• Styles of upgrades you can conduct

• How to conduct them

• When should you leverage them

• Frequently Asked Upgrade Questions

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Upgrade Paths for 9.x

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9.5 Upgrade Paths

• Informatica v9.5.0 supports direct upgrade from PowerCenter &

PowerExchange 8.6.1 and higher, and Data Services, Data

Explorer & Data Quality 9.0.1 and higher.

• No upgrade from 8.6.0 or earlier for PowerCenter;

• No upgrade from 9.0.0 (assumes no customers are on 9.0.0)

• For versions that are not mentioned above, customers need to

upgrade to an intermediate version first, then upgrade to 9.5.0

• Overall upgrade process is the same as 9.1 – Upgrade installer

for domain and upgrade wizard for services are unchanged.

• Domain and Metadata repositories will upgrade to 9.5 in a single step

• Upgrade steps from different 8.6.1 to 9.5 are identical to

corresponding 8.x to 9.1.0 upgrade paths

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9.5 Upgrade Paths

• No specific caveats for upgrade in 9.5, please refer to 9.1

upgrade documentation / enablement material for prior caveats

• 9.1 contained caveats for MM, DA, RTM, 8.6.2 IDQ and customers using Sybase.

• To upgrade from PowerCenter versions older than 8.6.1 or

PowerCenter 9.0.0, upgrade to Informatica 9.1.0 first, and then

upgrade from Informatica 9.1.0 to Informatica 9.5.0.

• To upgrade from Data Transformation 9.0.1 and earlier versions,

uninstall the earlier version and then perform a fresh installation

of Data Transformation 9.5.0.

• To upgrade to Metadata Manager 9.5.0 the Metadata Manager

Warehouse must first be upgraded to 9.1.0.

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Upgrade Support Matrix for 9.5.0

• Versions not listed here are NOT supported.

Product 8.6.0 or earlier 8.6.1 / 8.6.2 9.0.1 9.1.0

PowerCenter Not Supported Supported Supported Supported

PowerExchange Not Supported Supported Supported Supported

Data Explorer Not Supported Not Supported Supported Supported

Data Quality Not Supported Not Supported Supported Supported

Data Services N/A N/A Supported Supported

Data

Transformation

Not Supported Not Supported Not Supported Supported

Direct upgrade paths from earlier versions to 9.5

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Upgrade Support Matrix 9.1.0 (for reference)

See 9.1 enablement for full details about upgrade.

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Upgrade Type Strategies

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In Place Upgrade Process

• This is the process of

leveraging the installer or the

application service wizard

upgrading the original

metadata without providing a

parallel environment.

• Typically Seen During

• Very Short Upgrade Cycles

• After Certifying a Sandbox Build Out

• Environments with many installations and lifecycles

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Steps to Perform In Place Upgrade

To Upgrade Domain

• Run pre installation check tool

i9pi to make sure all pre

requisite are met

• Backup Domain and repository

• Run the installer to upgrade

Domain

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Steps Perform In Place Upgrade

To Upgrade Services

• Navigate to Administrator Tool

• Select upgrade from manage drop

down

• Select services to upgrade

• Specify the user name and

password required

• Execute the upgrade process

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In Place Upgrade Pro’s and Cons

• Pros • Simplifies the upgrade

process

• No additional schemas needed for parallelism

• Minimized risk due to setting differences

• No Need to migrate users and groups (8.5.1 and higher upgrades)

• Cons • Makes it harder for parallel

version development

• Can not change domain names

• Can not change node name

• Requires an outage for the domain restore and installation

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Parallel Upgrade Process

• This is the process of installing a fresh copy of the server and taking a

snapshot of your ETL repository environment and upgrading the

snapshot.

• Typically Seen During

• Longer Upgrade Cycles

• A Sandbox Build Out

• Pre-Production Go Live

• Where outage windows are tight

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Steps to Perform Parallel Upgrade

To perform Parallel Upgrade

• Install fresh Informatica 9 and

create new Domain

• Use comand exportusergroup and

importusergroup to import and

users and groups from previous

version (8.5 and higher)

• Navigate to the legacy domain and

create an empty repository

• Use copy content from option to

take snapshot of desired repository

into the empty repository

• Stop new repository service in

legacy domain

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Steps to Perform Parallel Upgrade

Parallel Upgrade Continued

• Navigate to Informatica 9.x

instance

• Create an empty repository

service with the same DB

credentials as the one

repository you just copied the

contents into

• Enable the service

• Upgrade the repository using

actions drop down or upgrade

wizard

• Upgrade users and groups

(8.1.x only)

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Parallel Upgrade Pro’s and Cons

• Pros • Allows for a parallel

environment to be built out

• Faster Go Live strategy

• Can change domain names

• Can change node name

• Does not requires an outage for the domain installation

• No additional caveats for https enabled domains

• Cons • Needs additional schemas

for level of parallelism

• Need to migrate users and groups (8.5.1 and higher upgrades)

• Small risk due to potential setting differences for services

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Cloned Upgrade Process

• This is the process of taking a snapshot of your domain and

upgrading the domain snapshot using the Informatica 9.x

installer

• Typically Seen During

• Pre-Production Go Live

• A Sandbox Build Out

• Where outage windows are tight

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Steps to Perform Cloned Upgrade

To Perform Cloned upgrade

• Take a backup of domain from

previous version.

• Stop domain and restore to new

schema

• Start existing domain

• Run the installer and choose

option to upgrade

• Enable Allow changes to the node

host name and port numbers

option

• Provide domain configuration

where it has been restored

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Steps to Perform Cloned Upgrade

Cloned Upgrade Continued

• Adjust port numbers to prevent

port conflicts

• Navigate to 9.1.0 Administrator

after successful upgrade

• Run the upgrade wizard to

upgrade any services you want

to upgrade in place.

• If you need to create parallel

repository services then follow

the same approach outlined

early by copying contents

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Cloned Upgrade Pro’s and Cons

• Pros • Allows for your identical

clone of your environment to ready for go live

• Faster Go Live strategy

• Minimized risk due to setting differences

• No Need to migrate users and groups (8.5.1 and higher upgrades)

• Cons • Needs additional schemas

for level of parallelism

• Can not change domain names

• Can not change node name

• Requires an outage for the domain restore and installation

• Additional caveats for https enabled domains

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Phased Upgrade Approach

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Phased Upgrade Process

• Typically the first style of

upgrade one considers

• Requires the most

resources and effort to

accomplish

• Client has many projects

that have individual go

live dates

• The upgrade process

usually takes the longest

to complete because of

the amount work involved.

USE AS A LAST OPTION

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Steps to Conduct a Phased Upgrade

To perform Phased upgrade

• Backup your desired PC

Repository

• Restore it into a repository that is

going to act as your final repository

• Delete out all of the folders from

the final repository

• Leaves a blank repository with

nothing but connections

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Steps to Conduct a Phased Upgrade

• To perform Phased upgrade

• Install version 9

• Create an instance of the final repository

• Upgrade instance of final repository

• Restore backup into temp repository.

• Stop temp repository service

• Create instance of temp repository inside of 9

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Steps to Conduct a Phased Upgrade

• To perform Phased upgrade

• Upgrade temp instance of the repository

• Open Repository 9 Manager

• Create a query to conduct find all objects in a folder

• Export all desired objects out of temporary repository

• Import all object to final repository.

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Phased Upgrade Approach Timeline

Folder migrations from v8 to v9 on development and new development instance to

support new code projects

Infa V8 DEV

Infa V8 QA

Infa V9 New Dev Projects

Infa V8 SIT

Infa V8 PROD

Infa V9 DEV

Infa V9 SIT

Infa V9 QA

Infa V9 PROD

Temporary Infa Dev

March April May June

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7

10

11

16

12 15

13 18

2

17

19

21

14 20

1 4

3

5

8

9

*

*

*

*

* - No modifications allowed for existing project code unless the developer will complete the same code changes in both Infa8 and Infa9 environments.

*

*

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Parallel Build Out

Parallel Build Out with Full Repository Restore

Infa V8 QA

Infa V8 SIT

Infa V8 PROD

Infa V9 DEV

Infa V9 SIT

Infa V9 QA

Infa V9 PROD

March April May June

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* - No modifications allowed for existing project code unless the developer will complete the same code changes in both Infa8 and Infa9 environments.

Infa V8 DEV

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When to use upgrade types

Cases Types of upgrade

Very Short Upgrade Cycles In place

Environments with many installations and lifecycles In place

Longer Upgrade Cycles Parallel / Phased

A Sandbox Build Out Parallel, Clone

Pre-Production Go Live Parallel, Clone

Where outage windows are tight Parallel, Clone

Minimize risk due to no setting differences In place, Clone

If want to change Domain and node name Parallel

If want to avoid outages Parallel

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Frequently Asked Upgrade Questions

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Answer:

The best places to find information like this are the following

locations:

• My Support Forums

• Informatica World

• Break Out Sessions

• Birds of a Feather Discussions

• Informatica User Group Meetings

• Your sales team concerning customer references

Frequently Asked Upgrade Questions

“We are planning to upgrade our Informatica

8 Servers to Informatica 9.x. Can someone

share their upgrade experience, known

issues and challenges faced. Thanks in

advance.” My Support Forum Poster

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Frequently Asked Upgrade Questions

“Where can I find the new features, bug fixes,

or issues when upgrading to the newest

release?” Various

Answer:

The best places to find information like this are the following

locations:

• Support Flash

• Contains the latest hotfix information

• EBF’s that have been created

• Support Announcements

• Top support Articles

• Release Notes and Release Guides

• Released with each major release and hotfix

• Contains a running history of all fixes and known issues

• Contains a running history of all new features

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Frequently Asked Upgrade Questions

“Can I export a mapping from a previous

version of Informatica into the new version

of Informatica”

Various

Answer:

It depends!

If a repository service upgrade is required then no it is not

supported / endorsed to conduct an export import. This

could lead to corruption of the repository.

So when can you?

Exporting from 8.5 and importing into 8.6.x

Exporting from 9.0.1 and importing into 9.1.0

Support

Statement

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Frequently Asked Upgrade Questions

“Do I have to conduct a set of full regression

tests? If I do it will take too long for me to

complete my upgrade!” Various

Answer:

It depends!

At a minimum you want to test those mappings that are mission

critical for the enterprise.

If everything is mission critical then you start looking at design

patterns and reduce the number of mappings based on these

patterns.

Look to leverage DVO where you maybe able to fully regression test

for the same amount of time for low % partial regression test with far

less resources.

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Questions

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