Installing a new SIMS server ... in exam season !!

[bobwright]

So all you Project Managers, suggestions please :-

 

We are having an Infrastructure refurbishment this summer holiday, including new curriculum servers and also a new SIMS server for the administration group. We have a Curriculum / Admin domain. Curriculum is 2003 setup with current Admin (SIMS) server a Windows 2000 member.

Domain structure will remain but all servers will become AD 2003 RM servers.

 

Unfortunately timescales/ RM availability will push this changeover tight to the exam season !!

 

- Is it straightforward to build / parallel run, a new SIMS server, different name with a temporary/default SIMS db, maybe even have SQL services turned off whilst commissioning takes place. Then when the exams stuff has been downloaded and out of the way back end of Aug. to make the switchover by renaming the server to its correct SIMS name and attach the live SIMS db ?

 

Would this be possible, is it straightforward to rename an Adv. Server 2003, what else do I need to consider ............

 

Any helpful suggestions appreciated.

 

Bob

[steve]

I saw a good idea over on the sims support forum today that I'm going to look into for our sims rebuild.

 

Setup a laptop with sims on it for the hoildays.

 

Just have to look at how to ensure its backed up.

[tosca925]

link steve?

[deano]

Would it not be easier to capture the image of your SIMS server one night after work when nobody is on the network with something like ghost or acronis trueimage.

 

Then place the image onto the new server with updated drivers then simply remove the SIMS old server one day and replace instantly with the new one. In theory the rest of the network would not know any difference

[steve]

Link

 

Capita Support forum

[zag]

Its not difficult at all, you can run a new server in parallel. It only takes 30 minutes to install and setup. Then just copy the database across from the backup directory, use dbattach on the new server. And you are good to go.

[Oops_my_bad]

So am I right in thinking that you can't run SIMS on SQL 2005 yet? I was thinking of transferring SIMS onto an old server while I rebuild the existing SIMS server

 

Also where can I get hold of a SIMS CD? :? The latest one i have is from 2004

[ctbjs]

Teddy they do not recommend putting sql 2005 on until after the Autumn or August upgrade as it hasn't been tested yet. I am doing the same in the summer.

[glensc]

Would it not be easier to capture the image of your SIMS server one night after work when nobody is on the network with something like ghost or acronis trueimage.

 

Then place the image onto the new server with updated drivers then simply remove the SIMS old server one day and replace instantly with the new one. In theory the rest of the network would not know any difference

 

Probably won't work like that unfortunately, unless the old SIMS server was commisioned as a RM CC3 server they will want to rebuild it as one and then load SIMS and restore the SIMS database from a backup ( probably taken just prior to taking it down )

 

It's well worth getting RM to do this ( rather than the LEA who may not understand how CC3 works ) and install the SIMS modules set up usertypes etc. That way when the updated packages are released you can assign them out using the management console. There are several reasons why SIMS is difficult to get rolled out on a CC3 network unless you do it the way RM recomend ( guess who's LEA thought they knew better )

 

In theory you can make the SIMS server a non CC3 member server but considering you'll have to be doing the other server updates and patches through RM releases it will actually work out easier with running the same patches on each server in series.

 

A ray of hope for you, if you make sure all your RM servers ( presuming some already are ) patched up to date before the RM guy arrives to do it and that you've made and verified backups there's a good chance he'll finish ahead of schedule.