I have a Sonatype Nexus repository on an older machine, and I have purchased a newer server which will become my new repository host. In the installation of Nexus on the older machine I have an extensive collection of artifacts, the vast majority of which are now obsolete and can be safely removed from Nexus.
I know it is possible for me to move all of the artifacts from the old installation into the new installation by simply copying the sonatype-work directory to the new box. My question is this: If I want to prune the artifacts in that directory down to only what I need right now (probably about 20% of the repository contents) what steps would I have to take other than deleting the unwanted artifacts? For example, would I need to force Nexus to rebuild indexes? Thanks for the help!
You could just install the new Nexus and proxy off the old one via one proxy repo in addition to Central and other repos. Then you run this for a while and only things not found in other public repositories you configure will be proxied from the old Nexus instance.
At a later stage you could run scheduled task on the old repo that removed old items.
When you are satisfied you got everything you need, you do one last backup and then take the old Nexus instance offline.
Of course the other option is to just not worry and migrate it all. In the end you really only have to migrate what you actually deployed (so probably releases and 3rd party repos).
The easiest option btw. is to just copy the whole sonatype-work folder over to the new machine and fire it up with a new Nexus install there and flick the switch.