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Maintaining a Test Environment

Where possible, all environments should closely mirror Production, because the closer the test or training environment is to the live environment, the better the results. Consequently, we recommend that the IMOS database administrator create a script to facilitate the database copy/restoration process.

For best practice, the copy/restoration script should include the following tasks:

Back up the Production database.
Restore Production to Test or Other.
Change all user passwords in the Test or Other database to a different password than that used in Production, to ensure that users are not logged into the wrong system by accident. Note that this is only applicable when IMOS is not using Windows Authentication.

Database Backup and Restore

Microsoft instructions for performing database backups and restores using Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio can be found in How to: Back Up a Database (SQL Server Management Studio): http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms187510.aspx and How to: Restore a Database Backup (SQL Server Management Studio): http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms177429.aspx.

Rollback Plan

A migration rollback plan is a recovery method that aims to return the system to its last known working state. The effectiveness and speed of the rollback depend on a number of factors. Note that the steps suggested below go beyond the steps needed to ensure that the Production system remains available and backed up; they are best practice scenarios.

Back up the Production directories, applications, and database before upgrading.
Print and document the Configuration files and their individual settings. These tend to change little once installed and configured.
Regularly test restoration from backups.

Historical Schema Changes

For every major release, the schema definition is stored within the application files at /docs/database/*. This documentation is generated directly from the code that builds the db update script for schema changes. This can be used to compare tables and fields between two IMOS major versions.

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