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Server 2007 farm and set all of the content database to read-only from within SQL
Server. Not only will this set the data to read-only, preventing any data inconsistency
during the upgrade window, it will trim the user interface by taking away New or Edit
functionality for all users, which helps avoid confusion. After all databases are read-only,
Randy will perform a backup of the databases and restore them to his new computer
running SQL Server. With the databases in-place he can then begin attaching the
databases by using Windows PowerShell. During testing, he confirmed his hardware was
powerful enough that he could open multiple Windows PowerShell windows, each one
upgrading a different database, all at the same time. This allowed him to shorten his
upgrade window.
With all of his company’s SharePoint content upgraded and available, Randy then had
DNS updated to resolve all of his Web applications to the new farm. His content owners
then confirmed the production upgrade was successful and switched their visuals to
SharePoint Server 2010 as appropriate. Each content owner had previously determined
the necessary course of action for moving to the new visuals and the time frame for
making the change. Randy has set a hard date of 30 days before he will use Windows
PowerShell to force all visuals to the SharePoint Server 2010 look and feel.
Randy has had a very successful upgrade to SharePoint Server 2010 thanks to his using
out-of-the-box SharePoint tools and performing lots of planning and testing. Because
he worked out the kinks throughout the testing phase, he was able to accomplish the
upgrade with minimal impact on his business users.
Patch Management Improvements
While upgrade is used to move from version to version, updating (also called
"patching") uses the same principles to move from build to build. To allow control and
flexibility of the update process, several capabilities are available. The update
management user interface and update reporting cmdlet allow for the monitoring of
updates throughout the farm. There are also update status health rules that will alert an
administrator to inconsistencies. To allow for more flexibility while applying updates in
farm scenarios, SharePoint Server 2010 supports backward compatibility of updates. This
will permit an administrator to apply updates to the servers in the farm without applying
the updates to the databases for a temporary period. This allows the scheduling of
downtime for the database upgrade portion of the update, or the use of the downtime