Siebel Database Upgrade Guide > Overview of Siebel Database Environments >

About Siebel Upgrade Environments

There are three Siebel database environments: Development, Production Test, and Production. If you have a development environment, then you must upgrade it first. When you upgrade your development environment your previous customizations are merged with the new release. The newly merged repository and schema definitions then become inputs to the production test environment upgrade and production upgrades which you will perform after completing the development environment upgrade.

If you do not have a development environment, or have not customized your repository, then no repository merge is required. You can use the repository and schema definition files included in the new release to upgrade your production test environment and production environment.

Mapping Your Environments

You might have more or fewer environments than those described previously. Table 7 gives recommendations for mapping your environments to the ones used in Siebel Database Upgrade Guide.

Siebel upgrade environments are described in detail in the following topics:

• Development Environment
• Production Test Environment
• Production Environment

Development Environment

This environment is where developers use Siebel Tools to customize Siebel Business Applications, and where customizations are compiled in a Siebel Repository File (SRF). When your Siebel Business Applications instance goes live, the SRF is where all object definitions are retrieved, then displayed to users in your Siebel CRM user interface.

A development environment contains the following Oracle modules:

• Siebel Server
• Web server and Siebel Web Server Extension
• Siebel Gateway Name Server
• Siebel Database Server files installed on a Siebel Server
• RDBMS server and Siebel database
• Siebel Tools installed on workstations running a supported Windows environment. This includes the local database running on developers' Siebel Mobile Web Clients.
• Siebel Business Applications and test data required to verify the basic function of newly compiled SRF files.

Upgrading the Development environment involves these tasks:

• Prepare application data. These tasks prepare test data for migration.
• Upgrade database (upgrep). You run the Database Configuration Wizard in upgrep mode. They perform a basic upgrade of the Siebel database schema and load repositories to prepare for the repository merge. Both upgrep and upgphys modes are run as a single step in the Database Configuration Utility.
• Merge repository. You use Siebel Tools to merge your existing repository with the repository in the new release. Postmerge utilities upgrade form applets and verify that applets and views are configured correctly.
• Run postmerge utilities. You use Siebel Tools to run a set of utilities that examine the merged repository. The utilities analyze your customizations and apply changes to them as needed to conform to the user interface in the new release.
• Upgrade database (upgphys). You run the Database Configuration Utilities in upgphys mode. They further upgrade the Siebel database with changes resulting from the repository merge and complete the database upgrade.

  The Database Configuration Utilities also generate the customer repository definition file and logical schema definition file that are used as input to the production test environment and production upgrades.

  NOTE:  During the synchronization process, custom columns in the Siebel Schema that are not in the Siebel Repository are not deleted but custom indexes in the Siebel Schema that are not in the Siebel Repository are deleted.

Production Test Environment

This environment is where an installed and fully upgraded development environment undergoes the quality assurance process. This part of your upgrade process allows you to tune upgrade performance in preparation for the transition to your live, production environment.

The production test environment includes the following Oracle modules:

• Siebel Enterprise, including at least one Siebel Server and an RDBMS server and Siebel database
• Web server with a Siebel Web Server Extension installed
• Siebel Gateway Name Server
• Siebel Database Server files installed on a Siebel Server
• All the Siebel Business Applications currently installed in your production environment
• A copy of the Siebel database installed in your production environment

You perform the following processes in the production test environment:

• Test the upgraded release to validate its function and performance before deploying it to users.
• Tune the upgrade process to minimize the time required to perform your production upgrade.

Oracle provides an upgrade tuning application that analyzes how the upgrade scripts interacted with the production test environment database. The Upgrade Tuner enables you to tune how the scripts will execute against the Siebel database in your production environment. Tuning the scripts can significantly reduce the time required to complete the production upgrade. For this reason, the production test environment database must contain the same data volume and topography as your production database.

Upgrading the Production Test environment involves the following tasks:

• Prepare application data. These tasks are about preparing application data for migration.
• Upgrade database (upgrep). You run the Database Configuration Utilities in upgrep mode. They perform a basic upgrade of the Siebel database schema:
  • You run the utility in Prepare for Production mode before running it in upgrep mode. The Prepare for Production mode reviews the upgraded development environment database schema and creates input files. The upgrep mode uses these files to make schema changes to the Siebel database.
  • The upgrep mode imports the repository and schema definition files from the development environment upgrade. It uses these files to upgrade the Siebel database.
  • The upgphys portion runs automatically. It makes several administrative changes to table data, including updating the schema version in S_APP_VER. It does not make schema changes.

Production Environment

The production environment is your live business environment, where your internal and external users interact with applications and generate actual business data. The production environment includes all your Siebel Enterprises worldwide.

The upgrade process assumes all production environment databases are completely separate from the development environment and production test environment databases.

Oracle provides these tools to help you transition from production test to production:

• Siebel Application Deployment Manager (ADM). This module migrates administrative data such as lists of values (LOVs) from the production test environment to the production environment. For details, see Siebel Application Deployment Manager Guide.
• Siebel Anywhere. This application builds distribution kits for remote users. For details, see Siebel Anywhere Administration Guide.

Upgrading the Production environment involves the following tasks:

• Additive Schema Changes. This step is optional and is run in the production environment. You can run this mode of the Database Configuration Utilities without taking the database offline. This mode makes schema changes that do not affect the operation of the application. This reduces the amount of time the production database must be offline to perform the upgrade. Testing Additive Schema Changes is also included in the process checklist for tuning the upgrade. This allows you to verify Additive Schema Changes in the production test environment before running it in the production environment.
• Prepare application data. These tasks are about preparing application data in the production database for migration.
• Upgrade database (upgrep). In the production test environment, you start the Database Server Configuration Utilities in upgrep mode, and enter configuration information for the production environment. This includes an ODBC definition for connecting to the production Siebel database.

  This step causes the wizard to use the SQL for upgrading the production test database to upgrade the production database.

  The SQL generated for the production test database upgrade is preserved, and no new SQL is generated. This SQL has been tuned using the Upgrade Tuner and has been revised by the Prepare for Production mode. You do not have to repeat these two steps before upgrading the production database.

  You do not have to run the Database Configuration Utilities in upgphys mode. The upgphys steps are included in the production environment upgrep.

Postupgrade Tasks

Following the upgrade you perform the following tasks:

• Set up the environment. These tasks set up the postupgrade environment, which includes extracting the developers' databases and running database statistics.
• Application administration. These tasks set up the applications and include such tasks as setting up user access and visibility of views and screens.
• Application configuration. These tasks prepare applications for testing, including data migration for specific applications.
• Test the system. These tasks test the system. For development environment upgrades, you perform basic unit tests to verify the operation of the application. For production test environment upgrades, you perform a full suite of regression and stress tests to verify the system is ready for production.