Moving DocRead between SharePoint farms

This post describes how to move a site collection, containing DocRead, between two SharePoint Farms. The instructions on this document should first be tested on a test environment that mimics the live environment.

Please note that you cannot move individual libraries or sites where DocRead is installed between Farms because DocRead keeps a reference to the IDs of the SharePoint groups assigned to documents. The entire site collection containing the libraries needs to be moved because this is the only way to ensure that the ID’s of the SharePoint groups assigned to documents remains the same.

Definitions:

• Source Farm: the farm containing the site collection with the sites where DocRead is installed that you want to move.
• Destination Farm: the farm where the site are to be moved to
• Source Site Collection: The site collection, on the Source Farm, containing the sites where DocRead is installed that you want to move.
• Destination Site Collection: The site collection, on the Destination Farm, that will be a copy of the Source Site Collection.
• Source Web application: The web application containing the Source Site Collection
• Destination Web application: the web application on the Destination farm  that will host the copy of the

Prerequisites:

1. Destination Farm cannot have DocRead installed.
2. Patch level on Destination and Source farms needs to be the same
3. All Prerequisites described in this article should be met
4. Do a full backup of the DocRead database on the Source Farm.
5. Do a full SharePoint Farm backup of the destination farm.

Step by step instructions:

1. Install the same version DocRead on the Destination Farm as the one you have on the Source Farm but do not configure it.  To do this just follow the steps in sections 2.4 and 2.5 of the DocRead System Administrator’s Guide . Do not follow any steps beyond the ones described in section 2.5 at this stage.
2. Move the Source Site Collection to the destination Web Application by following the instructions on this article: Backup and Restore SharePoint site collection from one Farm to another Farm using STSADM commands.
3. Restore the DocRead Database (backed up in point 4 of the prerequisites ) to the SQL server used by the Destination Farm (if this is the same SQL server as the one used by the Source Farm then please ensure you give the database a different name, we want to copy the database not replacing the existing one).
4. Proceed to step 2.6 of the DocRead System Administrator’s Guide but please ensure that in the Collaboris Database Settings section you use the name of the database used on the previous step. The scheduler database can have any name of your choice given and it will be automatically created by DocRead (if the SQL database used by the Destination Farm is the same as the one used by the Source Farm then please ensure that you give it a different name as the one used in the Source Farm).
   1. In Step 2.6.2 please ensure that you select the Destination Web Application in the “Web Application” section and ensure all the other settings are the same as the ones on the Source Farm
      Note: You do not need to complete any further steps beyond step 2.6.2. 
5. Navigate to the “Destination site Collection” and ensure that all DocRead site collection features are active (they should all still be active because they were active in the Source Site Collection).
6. Navigate to the sites under the “Destination site Collection” where DocRead should be active and ensure that all the DocRead site Features are active (they should all still be active because they were active in the Source Sites).
7. On the “destination Site Collection” under each site where DocRead is installed please perform a Synchronise Site Documents as described in section 8 of the DocRead Administrator Guide