TFS 2010 Migration procedure

Question

I have tried migrating my production TFS to a sandbox environment several times and failed.  I have App and DB on a single server and one build server.  (This is about as simple as TFS gets.)  I have read and tried to apply the procedure at

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms404869(v=VS.100).aspx

(The Restore Data to a Different Server or Instance topic.)

I have googled and tried various recommendations like

tfsConfig PrepSQL ...

tfsConfig RemapDBs ...

tfsConfig Accounts /ResetOwner ...

tfsConfig Accounts /add /AccountType:ApplicationTier ...

tfsConfig Accounts /add /AccountType:ReportingDataSource ...

Clearing the restoration cache...

Nothing seems to get me all the way there.  I need to be able to take a backup of TFS dbs, Report dbs and SharePoint dbs from my TFS production server and load them to a different machine.  This is needed to support disaster recovery as well as to allow us the option of moving from cloud storage to local stoarge if we choose to do that. 

I am under pressure to get this done. 

I have tried the "detach/attach" procedure with our primary collection, and, while this process seems to succeed, I find that I cannot execute builds once I have reattached. (I go to the build machine, delete the existing build tasks and controller, unregister, reboot the build machine and then reregister with the newly attached collection.)  This process also does not provide Reporting or SharePoint db content.

Does anyone have a proven procedure?

 

 

Answer 1

Hi,

 

Did you backup and restore Reporting database (ReportServer) and SharePoint database (WSS_Content)?

 

Once you have restored the databases on the new server, you might need to use “Team Foundation Server Administrative Console” configure/upgrade TFS.

 

Regards,
Adhi

Answer 2

I used the Power Tool backup and got dumps of all the dbs.  TFS, Report and SharePoint.  These have not been detached, however.  When I load them to a different machine, it appears that extra steps are needed. 

I have tried using the admin console as suggested in several posts.  I have also tried uninstalling and reinstalling TFS on the sandbox. 

On one or two occasions, I appeared to successfully load the TFS dbs, but I was not able to reliably repeat the procedure and I have never been able to reconnect the Report or SharePoint dbs

Answer 3

Ok, this is an update.

I have succeeded in moving our production TFS (including SharePoint and Reports) to our Sandbox.  At this point everything appears functional.  The procedure described at various places does appear to work, but it was complicated enough that I could not get it to work consistently until I put most of it in a Powershell script. 

I do feel that there should be an easier way.  Something as fundamental and essential as moving TFS to another server should not be so hard.

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AJ_3

Answer 4

Ouch!  It would seem anything related to upgrading/disaster recovery would be very well documented, easy to find and perform.  We are just now looking at adopting TFS (for 400+ developers)  from using ClearCase for the last 17 years.  I'm a ClearCase administrator as well as a MCSD.net and I'm a stickler for proper administration and simplified disaster recovery.  It would appear I need to do some research into TFS upgrade/disaster recover procedures as it doesn't sound like your encounter went very well.

Answer 5

Another update.  At this point I believe I can restore to a simple 2 machine configuration (one app/db server and one build server).  My solution involved a good deal of trial and error, however, and please note that I have not yet scheduled a trial "disaster".  We are discussing a migration from cloud to local HW (because of file comparison and unit test db access delays caused by the internet), and that may flush out some other issues.

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AJ_3