Performing the Smart IT upgrade


This topic describes how to use the GUI wizard installer to upgrade Smart IT on a single server. Other options for running the installer are described in Performing-the-Smart-IT-installation.

Before you begin

  • Complete the steps described in Preparing-for-upgrade.
  • Ensure that you have upgraded to BMC Remedy IT Service Management 20.02.
  • Installed Smart IT and Digital Workplace on separate Apache Tomcat servers.


Note

The installer will upgrade only Smart IT. If you are using BMC Digital Workplace and Smart IT, you must upgrade BMC Digital Workplace first before upgrading Smart IT.

Best practice
Do not use Xming to install the Smart IT server, because it might not perform reliably during installation. Instead, use VNC, MobaXterm, or any other client.

To upgrade Smart IT on a single server

  1. Extract the Smart IT installer (for example,  SmartIT VV.VV.VV . W indows .zip  or  SmartIT VV.VV.VV . Linux.tar.gz where VV.VV.VV and V.V.V indicate the version numbers of Smart IT).
  2. Navigate to the Disk 1 folder.
  3. Start the installer:
    • For Windows, run setup.exe.
    • For UNIX, run setup.bin.
  4. On the Welcome panel, click Next.
  5. Review the license agreement, click I agree to the terms of license agreement, and then click Next.
  6. Enter the values from the Upgrade worksheet .
    After you have entered the required information, the installer validates your input.
    If you are upgrading from any version lower than 18.05, then the installer deploys the file systems in a new directory in the same way it does for a fresh installation. If you are upgrading any version starting from 18.05, then the existing file system gets upgraded with the latest version, as the normal upgrade procedure.  
  7. (Optionally applicable if you are upgrading from any version lower than 18.05) Back up the following databases before performing an upgrade in your production environment: 

    • Remedy with Smart IT database 
    • BMC Remedy AR System database

    BMC recommends that you back up the databases in case you experience upgrade errors related to database schemas or AR System workflow. If the upgrade fails, you can use the backups to restore the databases and resume the upgrade from the last successful step.

  8. (Applicable if you are upgrading from 18.05 and later) Click Next.
  9. (Optionally applicable if you are upgrading from any version lower than 18.05) Enter a new destination directory name to store the file system of Smart IT 20.02.
    If you do not enter a new directory name, an error occurs and installation will not progress further until you provide a different directory name. Ensure that the directory name is different than the previous directory name. For example, if your previous directory name was Smart_IT_MyIT, provide a new directory name, such as SmartIT.
  10. (Optionally applicable if you are upgrading from any version lower than 18.05) In the Smart IT Database Information panel, select the option to create new schemas, enter the schema names, and database administrator credentials and click Next.
  11. Specify the path of your existing Tomcat server.
  12. Click Next.

    Important

    Starting with Smart IT version 18.05, the Smart IT and Digital Workplace installers are separated. Therefore, in steps 9 to 11, you must provide new destination directory name and Smart IT system and business schema names to avoid errors. If you are upgrading from 18.05 to 19.11, then the steps 9 to 11 are not applicable.

  13. In the Installation Preview panel, review and, if needed, correct the installation details and click Install.
    After post-installation, a summary of the installation appears.
  14. From the installation summary, review the information and any instructions or errors.
    For example, if a database failed, you can recover and run the upgrade again from the backup of your database by performing the recovery steps:
    1. Restore the database by using the backup created in step 7.
    2. View the installation log files to find and correct the cause of failure.
      For example, review any SEVERE error messages or warnings in the product installer log. See whether errors are due to network, host, or other environment-related issues. You can view a log file of the installation: 
      • (Windows) C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Temp\smartit_install_log.txt   
      • (UNIX or Linux) /tmp/smartit_install_log.txt
    3. Run the installer again.
      The upgrade will resume from the last successful step.
  15. Click Done to exit the installer.

To upgrade Smart IT in a server group

After you have upgraded at least one server, you can upgrade additional servers in the server group, either separately or in parallel, by following the steps in To upgrade Smart IT on a single server.

Post-Upgrade tasks

After the upgrade is complete, perform the following tasks:

Run the migration utilities

Stop and delete services

  • Stop and delete the relevant service:
    • (Windows) From the list of services, manually stop and delete MyITSocialService.
    • (Linux) Run the following command at a command prompt:
      service socialserviced stop
  • Stop and delete the relevant MongoDB service:
    • (Windows) From the list of services, manually stop and delete MongoDB.
    • (Linux) Run the following command at a command prompt:
      service mongod stop
  • From the pluginsvr_config.xml file, delete the SocialEventManager plug-in entry . The  pluginsvr_config.xml file is available at the following path: <C:\Program Files\BMC Software\ARSystem\pluginsvr\pluginsvr_config.xml>

Verify the Activity feeds

Verify the Activity feeds from the respective worklog forms and from the SMT:Social_Events form.

Add content security policy (CSP) property to whitelist Whatfix

BMC uses a third-party tool called Whatfix, which must be whitelisted in the content security policy (CSP) property for the Whatfix content to be displayed. If you are upgrading from an earlier version of Smart IT, a new content security policy (CSP) property must be added to allow the Whatfix content to be loaded in Smart IT. For information on how to add a CSP property, see Configuring-the-embedded-self-help.

Encrypt or decrypt password by using utility

The password encryption or decryption utility connects to the Smart IT system database schema (CONFIGURATION_PARAMETER table) and prints the encrypted or decrypted password. It doesn't change the existing password of the Remedy Application Service user in the database. If you want to change the password of the Remedy Application service, use this utility to get the encrypted password and then use SQL to update the corresponding table. Extract the password-encryption.zip file from the SmartITCustomizationUtil folder and save it to a location on the Smart IT server (e.g. c:\utility\) and run the utility. Check the readme.txt file for more details on the steps to run the utility. This readme.txt file is also available in the same location.

Where to go from here

Verifying-the-Smart-IT-server-installation

 

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