SharePlex 11.3 - Upgrade Guide

About this Guide

This guide contains instructions for upgrading SharePlex environment. It is intended for administrators, consultants, analysts, and any other IT professionals tasked with upgrading SharePlex™.

Other SharePlex documentation

For the complete SharePlex documentation set, go to https://support.quest.com/shareplex/technical-documents.

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Revision History

Before you upgrade

This section contains important information that you need to know before you select a SharePlex installer and begin the upgrade procedure.

Gather the Required Information

You will need the following information about the installation that you want to upgrade:

• Location of the SharePlex product directory
• Location of the SharePlex variable-data directory (or directories) in this instance of SharePlex.
• Name of the SharePlex administrator group (that contains the SharePlex administrator user).
• The ORACLE_SID and ORACLE_HOME (Oracle) or the database name (Open Target) associated with the installation you are upgrading. To determine this, look in the default.yaml file in the data sub-directory of the product directory.

• DSN name from var/odbc/ODBC.ini file.

Check interoperability

If you are upgrading some SharePlex installations in a configuration, but not others, view the SharePlex Release Notes for interoperability support between versions. Parameter settings may be required.

Who should perform the upgrade

Some steps in the upgrade procedures require the Administrator authorization level, which normally is only granted to the person or persons designated as the SharePlex Administrators. An upgrade can only be performed by a person who has this authorization and is familiar with SharePlex.

Check for new and deprecated parameters

• Review the release notes and Deprecated Parameters section of the SharePlex Reference Guide to determine if any of the parameters that you are using were deprecated in this release. SharePlex retains backward compatibility of your current parameter settings, including those that are newly deprecated, so that you do not need to stop processes to reconfigure settings. However, you should familiarize yourself with the new parameter or default functionality that replaces a deprecated parameter to determine whether any configuration changes are appropriate.
• Review the What's New in this Release and Enhancements in this release sections of the Release Notes for any new parameters that affect your current configuration. If any upgrade steps are required, they will be noted.

Upgrade on a source system

These requirements apply to SharePlex when it captures from an Oracle or PostgreSQL source database.

Verify inclusion of one-off builds

If you have received one-off builds of SharePlex, confirm that those builds are included as fixes in the new release that you are installing. This applies to Linux/Unix only as applicable.

To verify one-offs:

1. Run the sp-bininfo utility from the util subdirectory of the product directory of your current SharePlex installation.

   $ cd path_to_SharePlex_proddir/util

   $ ./sp-bininfo

2. Compare the CRs of each one-off shown in the sp-bininfo output with the CRs in the Resolved Issues section of the Release Notes that are included with the new SharePlexversion.
3. If any CRs of your one-offs are not shown in the Resolved Issues, the new version does not include that functionality, and you should not proceed with the upgrade. Contact SharePlex support to obtain the missing fixes.

Requirements to support character set conversion for Oracle database as a source

When replicating to an open target (non-Oracle), SharePlex supports replication from any Oracle Unicode character set and the US7ASCII character set. SharePlex posts data to Open Target in the Unicode character set, and therefore if the source data is Unicode or US7ASCII, no conversion on the target is required.

However, if the following are true, conversion is required on the target:

• If the character set of the source data is anything other than Oracle Unicode or US7ASCII, you must install an Oracle client on the target to perform the conversion to Unicode for posting to the target.
• If the data must be posted to the target database in any character set other than Unicode, you must install an Oracle client on the target to perform the conversion and use the target command to identify the target character set for Post to use.
• If you are replicating LOB data, conversion is required regardless of what the source character set is.

To perform conversion with an Oracle client on Linux:

1. Install an Oracle Administrator client on the target system. The client must be the Administrator installation type. The Instant Client and Runtime installation types are not supported.
2. Set ORACLE_HOME to the client installation. Set ORACLE_SID to an alias or a non-existing SID. SharePlex does not use them and a database does not have to be running.
3. Upgrade SharePlex using the Linux/Unix installer for your operating system.
4. Make certain the SP_OPX_NLS_CONVERSION parameter is set to the default of 1.

To apply Unicode and US7ASCII data without conversion:

If the source data is Unicode or US7ASCII and you are not replicating LOB data, no conversion or Oracle client is needed. Set the SP_OPX_NLS_CONVERSION parameter to 0 to disable conversion, and then restart Post if it is running.

Download the SharePlex installer

Download the SharePlex Installer

There are different installers for SharePlex based on the type of operating system. This topic helps you understand the differences and the naming conventions used.

Linux and Unix

The SharePlex installer on Linux and Unix, as applicable, is a self-extracting installation file with the extension .tpm.

Oracle and Open Target:

There is a separate SharePlex installer build for each supported platform.

SharePlex-release#-build#-platform-chipset.tpm

For Oracle Solaris (Sun), there is a separate SharePlex installer build for each supported operating system version. If the operating system version that you have is not listed, choose the highest number that is below your version.

SharePlex-release#-build#-platform-version-chipset.tpm

The installer creates a temporary target directory, within the current directory, for extraction. This temporary target directory is removed upon installation completion. You can extract the files to a file system that is separate from the SharePlex installation location by using the -t option when running the .tpm file.

Note: The installation file (.tpm) file for the PostgreSQL database is available only for the Linux platform.

Where to get SharePlex installers

Download the SharePlex installation package that matches the operating system you are using.

Additionally, download any SharePlex patches, so that you can install them after you install the base software.

Perform the below steps to download the SharePlex patches:

1. Go to the Quest Software Support page: http://support.quest.com/

2. Click Download Software.

3. In the search box, type SharePlexand press Go.

4. Click the arrow in the Download column for the version you need. You can also click the file name for access to more information and to download the file(s).

5. Transfer the file to system where you are installing SharePlex.

6. You are ready to begin the installation process. Be sure to thoroughly read the version specific Release Notes prior to running the installer.