Testing the upgrade by using installation data from an existing installation

Before you upgrade your production environment, you can test the installation data of an existing installation to find problems that might cause the upgrade to fail without exposing your production system to these problems.

Procedure

Set up a test server that has the same operating system as the production system.
Ensure that the test server has the following characteristics:
- The same user or group that was used for the IBM® Installation Manager installation of the production system.
- Similar operating system settings, especially those, such as the ulimit setting, that can affect the installation.
Copy the following directories:
- The Business Automation Workflow installation and profile directories.
- The Installation Manager installation directory, agent data directory, registry, and shared resource directory. See Backing up IBM Installation Manager agent data and shared files for recovery with IBM Business Process Manager (BPM).
Copy the directories to the test server. Ensure that you are using the same paths and permissions as the production system for an accurate test.

Tip: Make sure that the production database cannot be accessed from the test system.
Download the repositories and apply the upgrade. From the upgrade instructions, run only the steps that are related to installing the update with Installation Manager. If the installation fails, use the test environment to further debug problems that might exist in your production system.

Important: Do not start the Business Automation Workflow servers or use the environment except to test Installation Manager and profile upgrade commands. If you run the DBUpgrade command as described in the upgrade instructions, or if you start the servers in the test environment, this will affect your production database that the test system points to.
Optional: To make sure that there are no problems in the WebSphere configuration that would cause profile upgrade to fail, go to the install_root/bin directory and run the following command:
```
BPMConfig -upgrade -profile profileName
```
where profileName is the name of the deployment manager profile.
Repeat these steps for each Business Automation Workflow installation in your environment.

Results

When you are finished, you have validated that there is no Installation Manager or Business Automation Workflow installation corruption that might cause an upgrade failure. You can discard the test system.