Zimbra Server Migration (zimbra -> zimbra)

[ezajko]

Hi everyone,

I have searched for a way to move current zimbra install to another machine
(same distro - but I don't think that should be a problem, zimbra is more or less
chrooted and selfcontained into /opt/zimbra).
Only thread I could find is Changing Linux distros & keeping Zimbra data?

The idea is basicly:
1. install Zimbra on Zimbra-Server-2
2. shutdown Zimbra at Zimbra-Server-1
3. as root make archive of /opt/zimbra/ (I belive that tar.gz would work)
4. copy archive to Zimbra-Server-2, unpack it to /opt/zimbra (should rewrite everything)
5. run /opt/zimbra/bin/zmfixperms.sh
6. setup dns records (mx, etc.)
7. run Zimbra install again on Zimbra-Server-2 (choose update)
8. shutdown Zimbra-Server-1
9. reboot Zimbra-Server-2


Thing I am interested has anyone tried this before....

[phoenix]

Yes, it's been done several times although not by me. I assume that you're moving to a new server with the same version of Zimbra, if so it should work the way you've described.

[Maja]

I just recently went through this process. Basically the process I followed was:

- zmcontrol stop on current server
- install zimbra on new server
- verify install of zimbra (start all services)
- zmcontrol stop on new server
- tar up /opt/zimbra on old server
- lay down tar file from the /opt directory on new server
- run zmfixperms.sh (this is key. i didnt know this script existed, so i had to go through the process by hand! ugh!)
- restart all zimbra processes

Once I resolved the permissions issues, everything worked flawlessly.

[SamTzu]

Just moved our three node VMWare multi node installation to Proxmox.
It took 6 hours, but I sleep so much better now

Thx for the advice.

Sam

PS. After the initial ./install on the new server with default=old values (maybe on an isolated environment so as not to get the other nodes confused?) you should move the TAR file that you previously made on the old server with tar pczvf zimbra.tar.gz /opt/zimbra/ command.
This way you don't have to worry about filepermissions and zmfixperms.sh when you untar it in /opt folder with pxzvf zimbra.tar.gz in place of the new/default/oldvalues zimbra folder.