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Upgrading BMC Digital Workplace

The  BMC Digital Workplace  installer supports direct upgrade to BMC Digital Workplace  18.05.00 from BMC Digital Workplace  3.3.02, 3.4, 3.5, or 18.02.

Note

With this release of BMC Digital Workplace , the installer will only upgrade BMC Digital Workplace . If you are using BMC Digital Workplace and Smart IT, you must upgrade BMC Digital Workplace before upgrading Smart IT. For information on upgrading Smart IT (after you upgrade BMC Digital Workplace ), see Performing the Smart IT upgrade .

Considerations prior to upgrading

The following table provides information about specific scenarios that you should consider prior to upgrading to  BMC Digital Workplace  18.05:


ScenarioConsideration or action requiredAdditional information
You are using BMC Remedy ITSM 9.1.x or later.

Upgrading to BMC Digital Workplace 18.05 restarts the BMC Remedy AR plug-in server process.

The server restart causes a downtime of a few seconds. This allows you to schedule a planned downtime.
You are using BMC MyIT 2.6, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 or BMC Digital Workplace 3.3.

You plan to upgrade to BMC Digital Workplace 18.05.

  • Before upgrading to BMC Digital Workplace 18.05, you must upgrade to BMC Digital Workplace 3.3.02 or later.
  • Install BMC Digital Workplace and BMC Remedy Smart IT on separate servers.
  • Use separate Apache Tomcat servers for BMC Digital Workplace and BMC Remedy Smart IT
  • Use a separate database schema for BMC Digital Workplace and BMC Remedy Smart IT


The AppZone integration is removed when you upgrade to BMC Digital Workplace 18.05.

For more information, watch the following BMC webinar. (Go to 29:07 in the video to learn about the upgrade process.)

 https://youtu.be/nAt58AZpuxw

Upgrade recovery

The installer provides the option to recover from an upgrade failure. If the upgrade fails, the installer rolls back all the changes made to the database and configuration files. Rerunning the installer resumes the upgrade process from the point where the upgrade failed in the previous attempt.

Notes

  • Do not exit the installer while the upgrade is in progress.
  • It is recommended that you take a back up of  the BMC Remedy AR server database, the BMC Digital Workplace database, and the MongoDB database indicated as a step in the upgrade process.


Upgrade process

Use the following flowchart to make high-level decisions about the upgrade:

Upgrade_process_1805

This topic describes the general upgrade process.

Best practice

Install BMC Digital Workplace on a dedicated server. To avoid performance issues, do not install BMC Digital Workplace on servers that host other applications, such as BMC Remedy Mid Tier.

BMC Digital Workplace upgrade comprises the following stages:

Stage 1: Prepare to upgrade BMC Digital Workplace

TaskActionAdditional information
1

Review the system requirements

Make sure that you meet the system requirements for this release.
2Review the known and corrected issues
3Complete the upgrade worksheetsBefore you start installing the products, you must gather information about the parameters that the installer requires for each product. The planning spreadsheet provided in this section helps you gather these parameter values. To avoid installation errors, refer to this spreadsheet when you run the installation.
4Downloading the BMC Digital Workplace installation filesThis topic explains how to obtain the files that you need for the upgrade from the BMC Electronic Product Distribution (EPD) site.
5

Apply patch 1 for BMC Remedy AR System 9.1.04

This patch enables cognitive service management.
6

Prepare your relational database by estimating the space (and time) required to copy the social and notification data stored in the MongoDB database to your RDBMS.

Tip

Run the upgrade on at least one environment to get the social data migration utility.

Before migrating your social data, you must estimate the space you will need on your relational database. The space required on your relational database, and time needed for the upgrade can vary according to how much notification data you keep, determined by the setting described below.

Note

The MongoDB database contains a lot of data that will not be moved to your relational database. In some cases the vast majority will not need to be copied over because it is redundant or not needed for . So, the current size of your MongoDB database does not indicate the space you will need in the relational database after the migration.

  • The retention period for notifications will have a direct impact on the space and time required.
    For instance, 1 month of data requires ~500 MB and takes ~15 minutes to transfer
  • Use the historical data consumption values on your MongoDB as a reference to calculate the free space required on your relational database.
    For instance, if the space required for 1 month is 500 MB, you need to factor in a proportional increase in capacity to accommodate the data.
  1. Navigate to the social data migration utility
    1. <DigitalWorkplaceHome>\DWP\social2-migration\migration-scripts\scripts\windows (Windows)
    2. /opt/bmc/DWP/social2-migration/migration-scripts/scripts/linux (Linux)
  2. Stop all the social services that communicate with the MongoDB
  3. Edit the setenv.bat or setenv.sh file to provide the following details for your environment:

    set MONGO_DB_CONNECTION_URL=mongodb://<MongoDB_database_server>:<port_number>/<database_name>
    set CONSULT_MIGRATION_NOTIFICATIONS_PERIOD_1_IN_DAYS=<First period for which you want to estimate the data size. Default is 30>
    set CONSULT_MIGRATION_NOTIFICATIONS_PERIOD_2_IN_DAYS=<Second period for which you want to estimate the data size. Default is 90>
    set CONSULT_MIGRATION_NOTIFICATIONS_PERIOD_3_IN_DAYS=<Third period for which you want to estimate the data size. Default is 365>
    set SOCIAL2_MIGRATION_LOG_LEVEL=<The log level>
    set SOCIAL2_MIGRATION_LOG_FILE=<Name and location of the log file>
    set SOCIAL2_MIGRATION_LOG_FILE_MAX_SIZE=<The size to limit the log file>
  4. Run the following script to receive an estimate on the number of notifications and size required for the same.

    Tip

    The default estimation periods are set to 30, 90, and 365 days. Edit the set_env file to change the default estimation periods.

    1. migrationNotificationConsult.bat (Windows)

    2. migrationNotificationConsult.sh (Linux)
Example output of the migrationNotificationConsult script
┌───────────────────┬───────────────────┬───────────────────┬──────────────────┐
│Period in days     │Number           of│Estimated migration│Estimated DB  size│
│                   │notifications   not│time (secs)        │required (MB)     │
│                   │older than period  │                   │                  │
├───────────────────┼───────────────────┼───────────────────┼──────────────────┤
│30                 │0                  │0                  │0                 │
│90                 │1                  │0                  │0                 │
│365                │5357346            │8928               │7663              │
│All                │5663115            │9438               │8101              │
└───────────────────┴───────────────────┴───────────────────┴──────────────────┘

7

(optional) Estimate the size of the attachments on your existing BMC Digital Workplace installation and decide if you want to only move attachments larger than 5 MB.

Before migrating your BMC Digital Workplace data, you may check for and move attachments that are larger than 5 MB, and choose to not migrate these attachments.

Tip

This step is optional. You must use the utility provided with your current version of BMC Digital Workplace to identify large attachments. The utility provided with version 18.05 will not work with older versions of BMC Digital Workplace .

The pre-export tool provides the following information:

  • The number of records and total size of attachments in the ATTACHMENT and SOCIAL_ATTACHMENT tables.
  • The first 20 attachments in the database that are larger than 5 MB from each table.
  • The heap size required for the data transfer. Set the JAVA_OPTS parameter in the set_env.bat before exporting.
    • For example, if you need 15GB, set JAVA_OPTS="-Xmx15G”

To run the pre-export

  1. Open set_env.bat and fill in all required fields.
  2. Modify .\connection\<database_type>.connection.properties  and provide your current BMC Digital Workplace database information.
  3. Type "run_pre_export.bat" from the console.

To run the export

  1. Open set_env.bat and fill in all required fields.
  2. Modify .\connection\<database_type>.connection.properties  and specify required DB information there.
  3. Type "run_export.bat" from the console.

Use the "--overwrite" option with the run_export.bat to overwrite the output_file_path file.

To run the data_dump

  1. Open set_env.bat and fill in all required fields.
  2. Export the data from the database and save it to a zip file
    1. For Windows, run data_dump.bat
    2. For Linux, run data_dump.sh

    Attachment count
    USER_SESSION
    table size
    ExportImport
    Max heap
    (GB)
    Duration
    (minutes)
    Max heap
    (GB)
    Duration
    (minutes)
    1618 MB9.513610.612
    20005.5 GB9.721810.316.5
    49008.8 GB10.725313.728.3

    Note

    The above values depict the time required on various test environments, however the actual time required will depend on your environment and network factors such as latency.

8

If you are upgrading from the versions 3.3.02-3.5 or 18.05, you must Install the ITSM integration patch.


Before you upgrade BMC Digital Workplace , you must install the ITSM integration patch. This patch enables  BMC Remedy IT Service Management (BMC Remedy ITSM) to work with BMC Digital Workplace . Without this patch, timelines, email notifications, and social features do not work in BMC Digital Workplace . The installation applies required BMC Remedy ITSM patches.

Note

This patch replaces the User Experience patch that was provided with previous releases of BMC Digital Workplace .


9Upgrade to 64-bit Java Runtime Environment (JRE) 8.

Upgrade to JRE 8 on all the servers where you have BMC Digital Workplace installed.

10

Take a backup of BMC Remedy AR server database, MongoDB database, and BMC Digital Workplace database.

To recover from any unexpected upgrade failure and resume upgrade from the last executed stage, take a back up of the following databases:

  • BMC Remedy AR Server
  • MongoDB
  • BMC Digital Workplace

For more information, watch the following BMC webinar. (Go to 22:39 in the video to learn about data migration.)

 https://youtu.be/nAt58AZpuxw

Stage 2: Upgrade BMC Digital Workplace

Note

If you are on BMC Remedy IT Service Management (ITSM) 9.1.x and later, upgrading to BMC Digital Workplace 18.05.00 restarts the AR System plug-in server process. The server restart causes a downtime of a few seconds.This allows you to schedule a planned downtime.

TaskActionAdditional information
1Resolve issues indicated by the installer, if any

Ensure that all the following pre-install checks run by the installer are successful before proceeding with the installation:

  • Disk space
  • JAVA runtime version
  • Database version
  • Directory permissions
  • BMC Digital Workplace installed version
  • Components operation status

Installation does not proceed if the pre-install check detects inconsistencies in the required components.

2

Performing the BMC Digital Workplace upgrade

Do not use Xming to install the  BMC Digital Workplace server, because it might not perform reliably during installation. Instead, use VNC, MobaXterm, or any other client.

3Verifying the BMC Digital Workplace installationVerify whether the upgrade is successful.

Stage 3: Review BMC Digital Workplace configurations 

TaskActionAdditional information
1Configuring SSL for the Tomcat server

To provide communication security among applications, configure SSL for the Apache Tomcat server. If you enabled SSL as part of the installation , SSL is already configured.

2Modifying ports for BMC Digital Workplace

Post-upgrade, you might need to change the ports if you did not specify an open port during installation, or if these ports are in use. These ports are used to connect the web and mobile clients to the BMC Digital Workplace server.

3

Integrating Remedy Single Sign-On

This topic describes how to configure the integration of Remedy Single Sign-On with BMC Digital Workplace .

BMC Remedy Single Sign-On authentication applies to both the universal client and to mobile applications. When a user logs in to a mobile device, the user is prompted to enter the hostname and port. If the server has SSO enabled, the mobile client opens a browser to the SSO login page. The SSO server sets the SSO cookies after authentication on to the device browser. When the user relaunches the application, if the cookies are not expired, the mobile client displays the application. If the cookies are expired, the user is shown the login page again for authentication.

4

Setting up administrator authentication

The BMC Digital Workplace server supports both user and administrator logons. Both types of logons are authenticated using BMC Remedy Action Request AR System (BMC Remedy AR System). To assign BMC Digital Workplace administration permissions to BMC Remedy AR System users, you add the users to the  MyIT Admin  group in BMC Remedy AR System. The system creates this group automatically during installation.
5

Assigning administrator permissions

Administrators can grant or restrict access to the areas of the BMC Digital Workplace Admin console for other administrator.
6

Setting up service requests through BMC Service Request Management

If you use BMC Service Request Management to process requests and incidents submitted by BMC Digital Workplace users, you must create a series of service request definitions (SRDs) specifically for use with BMC Digital Workplace . You configure SRDs in the BMC Service Request Management Console.
7

Localizing titles and messages

  • Contact options that appear when a user taps Account Problems on the Login screen or IT Contact Information from the Assistance screen.
  • The name of the screen that lists a user’s appointments and the instructions that tell users what to enter when creating an appointment.
  • The names of asset actions that appear when a user clicks an icon on a floor map. Using a similar procedure, you can edit asset actions.
8

Changing terminology used in the application

BMC Digital Workplace enables you to customize the names of items that appear on your users' desktop browsers and mobile devices. For example, you can update the name of the service desk to My Company Service Desk.
9

Changing client functionality options

Within BMC Digital Workplace , you can enable and disable features that you might not want to use immediately in your deployment. For example, if you are not set up to support location services, you can disable that functionality. You can also configure the settings for features such as the Contact IT button and Virtual Chat cross-launch. 
10

Making configuration changes to integrated applications

You can change the settings that BMC Digital Workplace uses to connect to the following applications:

  • BMC Service Request Management
  • BMC Remedy IT Service Management (BMC Remedy ITSM, the enterprise application)
  • BMC Remedy Action Request System (BMC Remedy AR System, dedicated to the MyIT application)
11Configuring multitenancyThe multitenancy feature of BMC Remedy IT Service Management (BMC Remedy ITSM) provides the ability to segregate data by operating company and customer company. 
12Configuring email notificationsTo allow BMC Digital Workplace users to accept email notifications for services, you must configure your company's mail server information and verify that users have valid email accounts with the specified server. Users can then select email notifications for specific services.
13Setting up VM requests through BMC Cloud Lifecycle ManagementAfter integrating BMC Digital Workplace with BMC Cloud Lifecycle Management, BMC Digital Workplace users can view and request available VM offerings as part of the Unified Catalog. Create sections and then add BMC Cloud Lifecycle Management offerings to the section.
14Setting up service requests through BMC Service Request ManagementTo create a service catalog, BMC Digital Workplace pulls in services, apps, VMs, and other resources available to employees from different sources, including BMC Service Request Management. 
15Integrating Digital Workplace with BMC HR Case Management

Self-service users use BMC Digital Workplace to open HR cases and to search HR knowledge articles. BMC HR Case Management can be installed either on the same server with BMC Remedy IT Service Management (BMC Remedy ITSM) or on a separate server.

Note: The BMC HR Case Management server requires BMC Remedy Action Request System 9.1.

Also review the following configurations:

TaskActionAdditional information
16Enabling a maps license.Review the configuration. The desktop universal client, Admin console, and Android mobile client will show location maps only if the maps license is enabled.
17Integrating with BMC TrueSight Operations Management

If you enable the integration of BMC TrueSight Operations Management, services monitored by TrueSight Operations Management are listed in BMC Digital Workplace and the availability status is updated by BMC TrueSight Operations Management.

18Enabling and configuring the enhanced catalog for BMC Digital Workplace BMC Digital Workplace Catalog enables you to collaborate with others within your organization or external third parties, to on board, manage, deliver, and analyze the use of IT and business services from multiple sources.

Stage 4: Deploy BMC Digital Workplace to users

TaskActionAdditional information
1

Deploying clients

IT users access BMC Digital Workplace through Apple iOS and Google Android mobile clients, as well as through the universal client. The universal client provides access through a web browser.

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