How can I copy all of the content to a new WebCenter Sites install?

Question

I have a running WebCenter Sites (11.1.1.8GA) environment, which was not set up properly. It works and is running the production site, but the install had issues. To resolve this, we have created a new environment, and patched it to 11.1.1.8 patch 11. Now I need to copy all of the content to the new environment.

Any suggestions on how to do this in a way that wont clobber a) the updated jars and config that patch 11 adds and b) the environmental differences (e.g. server name) in the config files?

The recommendation that we've had so far is along the lines of:

Copy the environment:

1. Copy webapp deployment directory
2. Copy Sites install directory
3. Copy shared directory
4. Export database

Make sure that the target server has the same directory structure as the source server.

On the target server.

1. Install application server
2. Configure jdbc to connect to new db instance and schema.
3. Import database
4. Place the shared in the same directory folder structure as source
5. Place sites install directory in the same directory folder structure as source
6. Deploy Web applications, custom applicationd and configure class paths
7. Make necessary changes in the .ini and .properties files to reflect new hostname/ip or domain. You might want to review your cs-cache.xml, ss-cache.xml, linked-cache.xml and cs-cache.xml files on the multicast settings. Other changes that should be done is regards to cas. (SSOConfig.xml and Custom Beans.xml)

Unfortunately this assumes that we want to copy the whole environment, including patches and config. In particular, steps 4, 5, and 6 wont work.

Do you know which directories/files need to be copied? Or is it only the content DB that I need to copy?

Answer 1

What I'll do is configure the new server as the original (by copying webapp and directory structure in the new server) but without taking the shared directory and database. Then to have the datas in your new server either export them from the production server and import them to your new server using CSDT (but you may face some file problems during export because of file naming limitations) or publish your assets to the new server.

I use this method to restore production on my study environment sometimes, it requires some time because I use CSDT (I'm not allowed to mirror my sites thru the firewalls)