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Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

  • 1.  Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-23-2020 09:30
    Edited by Christopher Becker 09-23-2020 10:26
    We just finished a massive migration project to move our on prem implementation of CIC 2018 r2 to new hardware/database.  All hardware is now Win 2016, with SQL Server 2016 as back end database. We are a unique set up where we really only use Interactive Attendant and custom web services to take payments over the phone (no voice, only keypad prompts.)

    I am looking at migrating the existing system from the current CiC 2018 r2 to a fairly recent version. I would like the most current, but I am fact finding now to see if there is any reason i would not go to 2020 r3.

    From what i have assessed, this should be as 'simple' as  downloading the new version, running the install, running setup assistant and validating.  I expect to be able to do this on my QA environment in a days time.

    Hoping to have this ready to soon, just seeking any info or somethings i am not considering or if anyone has had issues.  I am assuming the large jump (2018 to 2020) is not a problem and i should not have to upgrade to 2019, then 2020, as i have had to do with other 3rd party software in the pass. 

    Any and all info is greatly appreciated. I hope after this venture to become a more active community member as well.
    #ArchitectureandDesign #imlementation 

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - IT
    ------------------------------


  • 2.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-23-2020 10:33
    Hi Christopher,

    I just recently upgraded  to 2020 R2, and while i was already on a 2019 Release  I don't recall seeing any documentation or notice about needing to be on 2019 Rx prior to upgrading to 2020.

     The only issue i ran into when upgrading was Setup Assistant error out when trying to update the Database Schema, i found out that TLS1.0/1.1 is required for that process to run. So if have your system running on TLS1.2 you will want to make sure you enable TLS1.0/1.1 on both the database and CIC server before the upgrade.


    Thank you


    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 3.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-23-2020 13:57
    Thanks for the response - I opened a case as well, and while I was told earlier I could do the steps as above, I was just referred to the Migrator documentation. I was thinking I would not need to go through the entire migrator process as well. To me, using the migrator is about the same as a fresh install. So i have feedback from one tech, no mention of migrator, and now I am to use the migrator.  Am i to assume they just expect me to use the migrator and will this be needed come R2021?

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 4.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-23-2020 15:27
    I am not sure why they are pointing you to Migrator unless they are thinking you are turning up new servers with 2020 R3, then migrate the configuration off the 2018R2 servers to 2020 R3 servers.

    If the Servers are not changing, you do not need to run migrator. You will just run the installer on the servers your 2018 R2 is on to upgrade.

    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 5.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 08:39
    Scott - if you do not mind providing additional insight, I know i have to upgrade my media server first, because if I upgrade the CIC first, it will cause an issue (or so I have been told by a co-worker.)  I want to know when you did your upgrade, did you upgrade the media server, reconnect, and verify then upgrade the CIC or did you upgrade the Media, then the CIC, run setup assistant and verify?

    I am starting to write our my plan and want to try and account for all the steps.

    I appreciate any feedback as i am still quite new to this and hope to become an active contributing member of the community

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 6.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 09:31
    Hi Christopher,

    You do not need to run setup assistant, that will automatically kick off during the CIC installer/upgrade. This is where TLS1.0/1.1 is required to be enabled on database and CIC servers, which you can disable after the upgrade, but the upgrade of the CIC will fail if you don't enabled TLS1.0/1.1.

    Each server will have 2 installers that need to be ran, a Release installer and a patch installer. On the CIC these installers can take hours to run, so you are looking at 2 to 4 hours to just upgrade the CIC server.  I also make sure i have a SNAP of all our Virtual servers incase i need to back out of the upgrade.

    At a high level this is the process I follow, you may not have some of these servers in your environment.

    - Media Server
    - Video Server
    - Fail over to backup CIC server
    - Upgrade primary CIC server
    - Upgrade 2 Session Managers
    - Upgrade 1 CCS server
    - Failover to primary CIC server
    - Test system 
    - Upgrade remaining Session  Managers
    - Upgrade remaining CCS server
    - Failover and test again.
    - Fail back over to Primary CIC server ( Upgrade completed)

    let me know if you need anything else.

    Thank you



    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 7.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 09:51
    so very helpful.  I have been choosing 'configure later' on the database step of the setup assistant so I can complete the install and I end up with a working system (we only use Interactive Attendant) but i want to get the data source working so I can try to leverage ICBM and see more info about our calls into Interactive Attendant, without having to look through the call logs.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 8.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 10:09
    I left off information about re-publishing your custom handlers. The reason i always do my primary CIC server first is so i can republish my custom handlers. To do that i open a Admin CMD prompt from the CIC server and do the following:

    1. Navigate to Custom Handler Folder
    2. Dir /b *.ihd >publishlist.lst
    3. Idu /publish:publishlist.lst


    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 9.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-24-2020 12:10
    So we have a fully hardened environment, and I have been unable to use Setup assistant to set up my database. I do not think I will be able to have the lower protocols enabled, but this helps as I thought this was my version of the SQL driver. 

    I think I can add in the needed database connection in the Interactive Admin screen, or will the connection continue to need to be able tot communicate on the lower protocol?

    Oddly enough, our implementation works fine without the database connections, as we use only Interactive Attendant and custom handlers to communicate to web services, which handle all the database activity.

    Any insight is appreciated.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 10.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-24-2020 12:14
    Edited by Paul Simpson 09-24-2020 12:14
    Christopher,

    The database connection set up by Setup Assistant is the one used for reporting, not the one that gets used by Handlers and / or Attendant Database Actions.

    This may explain the behavior you are seeing, especially if you don't use the reporting features ;-)

    ------------------------------
    Paul Simpson
    Senior Technical Instructor
    ------------------------------



  • 11.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 08:33
    Hello Paul,

    I do remember this from class, however, I thought there was a way where I can manually configure these connections, or I misunderstood that part of the data sources topic in the most excellent handlers class.

    Can i manually configure this or is this data source only configurable via Setup Assistant.  If it is only configurable via Setup Assistant, are there plans to address this, as my servers live in a PCI zone and are all expected to communicate via TLS 1.2 and disallow all lower protocols.

    Any further information is greatly appreciated.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 12.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 09:33
    Hey Christopher,

    As far as I am aware, there is nothing to prevent you from updating the Data Sources used for Reporting manually, however it is obviously not the preferred method.

    I was specifically responding to your comment "Oddly enough, our implementation works fine without the database connections, as we use only Interactive Attendant and custom handlers to communicate to web services, which handle all the database activity." If you are not using the Reporting features, then it isn't surprising that there were no issues with not using Setup Assistant....

    I hope that clarifies.


  • 13.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-29-2020 09:51
    Hi Christopher,

    TLS1.0/1.1 only has to be enabled when you are using Setup Assistant to make a database change to the Core Database,  after you make that change you can disabled TLS1.0/1.1. The Core Database is normally named I3_IC_PRD in the SQL instant and is where all your call, queue and recording information is stored.

    The Setup Assistant and TLS1.2 issue was suppose to be fixed in 2019 R1 so I was surprised when i ran into the issue on 2020 R2 installer. I haven't pushed Genesys for an update on when this will be fixed or if this was just a bug in 2020 R2 and its working in other releases, so you might try and run the 2020 R3 installer in your Dev system to see if it errors out.

    You can configure other Database connections for your system to pull from and does not require Setup Assistant to setup those up. While I haven't done it before i believe you can do it either in the IC Data Sources in IA or through  ODBC (64-bit) data Source Administrator application on the server.


    Thank you

    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 14.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 09-30-2020 15:27
    Just a couple of weeks ago, we did a migration from 2018 R3 to 2020 R2, and I can confirm there is no need for any incremental in between.
    One catch we did run into was the requirement for .NET 4.7 or higher, a couple of our servers were on 4.5, so we had to take a pause and get that updated and the servers rebooted first, before continuing.  .NET 4.7 is included in the CIC download ISOs, so not a big deal.

    If you have a Dialer Server (CCS), then the install will prompt you to install SQL Server Client v11 first (also included in the ISOs)

    We split our components out over multiple days on our Live Production instance
    1. Storage servers the first day
    2. ASR and Media servers were done a few days later
    3. IC Server and Dialer Server a week later

    For reference, our servers are Windows 2012 R2 and our DB is SQL Server 2012.

    ------------------------------
    William Wyszomirski
    Excellus Health Plan Inc
    ------------------------------



  • 15.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-14-2020 14:25
    I am currently planning out my Prod Upgrade and I am trying to figure out how much downtime I should plan for.  From the steps I have, i believe I will stop the communications to the primary media server, apply the upgrade/patch to this server, reestablish communications and repeat the process with the second Media server. 
    If i understand this correctly, i will have minimal down time and these steps could be performed in low traffic hours without a disruption of service.

    Then I would perform the switch over to my secondary server for the CIC server upgrade/patch of the primary, switch over, validate and proceed to upgrade the secondary server.  Again, this seems like it would be a minimum amount of actual downtime. 

    Am I over simplifying this or missing something?  Should I plan on the system being unavailable for the duration of the upgrades?

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 16.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-14-2020 15:00
    Hi Christopher,

    if you have multiple Media and Video servers, then the only downtime should be when you do your failovers. 

    thank you,

    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 17.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-15-2020 10:09
    Assuming you have multiple servers for each server type (storage, ASR, Media), then as long as you do one server at a time, there should be no impact to the users.
    As Scott mentioned, the only "pause" would be doing the "failover/switchover" of the IC Servers, which is really only a couple seconds while application restores connection to any currently connected user applications.

    For the IC Server, what we did was upgrade the current backup IC Server first, then performed a manual switchover to make it the new primary.
    Validated the system was up and running, then proceeded to upgrade the second IC Server, which is now in backup mode after the manual switchover.

    Just make sure all your other server types are completed first, before doing the IC Servers.  The IC Servers are the last servers to be upgraded in the group.

    ------------------------------
    William Wyszomirski
    Excellus Health Plan Inc
    ------------------------------



  • 18.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-15-2020 15:17
    That is, indeed, the correct procedure.

    Just one (minor) point / correction. "then proceeded to upgrade the second IC Server, which is now in backup mode after the manual switchover." This is not the case, unless you rebooted it (or unless they have changed the way it works!) Following a Switchover (Manual or automatic) the former Primary is no longer acting as a server and does not become a backup without intervention (reboot).


  • 19.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-16-2020 08:45
    So switchover is a pain point for me, as I have little (i have performed it only 2x) experience with it.  Our QA/Dev region is a single server chain, so I cannot practice a switch over and I have not convinced management that this is something we should do as part of our monthly Microsoft Patching. 

    So, if I want to do a manual switchover, I go to the server I want to become the primary (the secondary server lets say P2), and set it as primary. at this point, I would reboot the former primary server (P1) and when it comes back, the switchover util on both servers will show P2 as primary and P1 as secondary.  I would then apply my changes to P1, perform switchover again, by setting this server (P1) as primary, validate, and reboot P2 so it comes up as secondary.
    Rinse and repeat to update secondary.  

    Sorry for over complicating this.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 20.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-16-2020 08:59
    Hi Christopher,

    If you have a maintenance schedule set that first and wait for all active calls to drop. Then on CIC server that is currently primary you will log in and launch the Switchover Control Panel util verify they are in a backup state and press Switch. The system will switch over and in the Switchover Control Panel you will see it only show your former backup CIC server( now Primary) and nothing showing as Backup. Reboot the server you were in and when it comes back up you will see it showing as backup. Repeat this process to get back to your normal primary server. 

    Thank you,


    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 21.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-16-2020 09:44
    So i have it backwards in my example. in your example, I login to P1, perform switch over to P2, see that P2 is primary, reboot P1 and perform Upgrade on P1.
    after upgrade, log into P2, execute Switchover, validate Upgrade on P1 a success, reboot P2 and perform upgrade.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 22.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-16-2020 10:00
    Either way works, I just find it easier to log into the Active Primary Server to do the switchover so that i am already in the server to reboot it after it switches over.

    Also you don't need to reboot if you are doing a switchover for upgrade, you can simply start the upgrade after the switchover. Two reboots will be needed during the upgrade process; After the Release installed and then after the patch is installed.

    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 23.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-23-2020 11:00
    So in the continuing saga that is my upgrade, it looks like I may be able to 'Fix' my QA.  Our current QA has only a single CIC/Media server chain and no pair. I am proposing the first step of the implementation be to build out the other 2 servers needed to have a functioning pair, so that I can execute my upgrade plan on the new QA that will be almost identical to Prod.

    I think this should be straight forward, i.e. just apply the software and patches for the new version, sync them up and validate.  That said, if memory serves me, I will not need to run the migrator on the second server, as once i get through setup assistant, it will sync up and refresh. Also, I want to do the second CIC before the second media (the opposite of the steps for the software upgrade) as I did in the original install.

    Once I have this new setup running and can perform the switch over, i would feel much more confident in the production upgrade.   I have considered loading the new servers with the 2020 R3 software after I upgrade the current servers from 2018 to 2020, but this only saves me a few hours and then does not offer me the ability to validate the process pre production.

    Am I missing something in my assessment and process?

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 24.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-23-2020 12:30
    Firstly, Media Servers. ALWAYS upgrade your Media Servers first. All of them. They are designed to be backward-compatible with older IC Server versions, but the reverse is not the case. I have seen a complete system brought down by one Media Server that hadn't been upgraded....

    Secondly, unless you are upgrading the hardware, there should be no need to use Migrator.

    Finally, "just apply the software and patches for the new version, sync them up and validate" for the most part, sync is stopped when the two servers are on different versions.

    The process (in fairly quick succession) should be:-

    1. Update all your Media Servers. If you have the recommended N+1 per site, this can be done with no downtime (just go to each in turn and stop it accepting connections, wait for any existing calls to finish, upgrade, start it accepting connections again and move on...)
    2. Upgrade your Backup. At this point you are in a state known as "Upgrade Higher". Most sync is not happening.
    3. Perform a manual Switch (while in "Upgrade Higher" is won't automatically switch in case of failure.)
    4. Upgrade the former Primary.
    5. (Optional, switch back if it matters to you which server is Primary)
    6. Upgrade all the clients.

    All of this is covered in both ICCS (Customer) & ICCE (Partner) classes and I strongly recommend you attend one of these if you are supporting a system at this level.


  • 25.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-23-2020 13:17
    Ok, so maybe I am not clear, but if I have 2 brand new servers (just OS, .net 4.7 and .net 3.5) that I am building from scratch to add to 2 servers (1 CIC and 1 Media), I would still start with the media server? 
    Our QA, when implemented, was not built out to match production - we have 1 CIC server and 1 Media server in QA, but we have 2 CIC and 2 QA in prod - paired.  I want to bring QA in line with prod by adding an additional CIC and Media server.

    I have taken and passed my Certification for th boot camp, but it focuses on the aspects of the system we do not use, and for the install material I have reviewed it a few times. 

    If we should always start from the media servers, I need to change my DR toolkit to reflect this as well, because the instructions within would have me build the CIC first, followed by media servers.   Sorry if I am asking questions of too basic of nature for the purposes of this forum.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 26.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-23-2020 13:49
    Paul is talking about upgrading the system, but from a building standpoint i have done it both ways. I would suggest doing the CIC server first, that way when you add the media server you can add both CIC at once, instead of adding one, then having to go back and add the second one....not that its very hard to do.

    You are correct when building the second CIC server you do not need to run Migrator. Install the software and once the system is up and running, launch Setup Assistant and click Options. Follow the instructions for SwitchOver configuration and when asking for a Certificate, make sure you have the server group certificate from the other servers. ** i don't believe you have to re-create a certificate on the original server, but it has been a few years since i built out a new system

    ------------------------------
    Scott Williams
    Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority
    ------------------------------



  • 27.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-23-2020 14:20
    Thanks again for the feedback.  I do know I will need to load the Certs from the original CIC over to the second CIC.  Once fully upgraded, I hope to investigate and replace all the Certs using our PKI Cert chains.

    ------------------------------
    Christopher Becker
    State of Michigan - Oakland County - WRC
    ------------------------------



  • 28.  RE: Upgrade 2016 env from 2018 R2 to Latest version (2020 r3)

    Posted 10-24-2020 10:32
    You are correct when you say that I am referencing an upgrade (see original thread title, I also read your QA build-out plan as doing IC before Media when updating :-) ) however one point that needs to be clarified, concerning versions...

    Now, it is true that you can build your IC Severs and Media Servers in any order and, as @Scott Williams correctly points out, there are benefits to getting the IC Server pair up and running before provisioning your Media Servers.

    However...

    Please, please, please do not mix releases / patch versions when doing this. If you absolutely have no choice, then the Media Server MUST be using software that is on the same, or later, version / release than the IC Server.

    This is the main warning I was giving at the start of my reply.



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