Quick and easy way to Clone a WebCenter Content Environment for Development
One of the most common requirements for a development team is to have an environment that is a clone or a mirror-image of the existing Production or UAT environment. This helps the developer test custom components, custom code etc. without having any negative consequences or impact on production.
To create a cloned environment, the easiest way is to use a combination of the following tools:
- The Configuration Migration Utility.
- Copying the File system (Weblayout and Vault) of the source to the destination environment.
- Database import and export operation.
The following steps are required:
- Install a new WebCenter Content environment and apply all the relevant patches.
- Check ‘config.cfg’ on the source environment and make sure the relevant settings are copied to the destination environment.
- Use Configuration Migration Utility (CMU) to export all the relevant metadata sections from source environment.
- Use the bundle created in Step 3 and import it into the destination environment.
- Copy the ‘weblayout’ and ‘vault’ directory from source to the destination environment.
- Refer to the ‘weblayout and vault’ locations (if a new file location is created) from the destination server’s ‘intradoc.cfg’ file.
- Use a database export operation to bundle all the tables and data from source database environment.
- Use a database import operation to ingest the data to destination server’s database.
- Restart the WebCenter Content server.
- Run a collection rebuild.
- Verify all the content items exist in the content servers collection by performing a test search.
Steps to Migrate WebCenter Content Configuration
Configuration Export Steps
- Browse to the WebCenter Content Console as an administrative user and navigate to →Administration →Configuration Migration Utility (CMU).
- Select Configuration Migration Utility – Configuration Templates.
- Navigate to Template →Actions →Create New Template.
- Select ‘Content Server Sections’. This will show the list of configurations that can be selected for Export.
- Select the specific sections which needs to be exported to the destination server. The screenshot below illustrates an example of Content Metadata being selected for export.
- From the following sub-section, select the appropriate metadata for export.
- After selecting the metadata sections for export, Navigate to Actions → This will show the configurations selected for export.
- Navigate to ‘actions’ and select ‘export’. This will bundle all the selected configurations and create a CMU Bundle on the server. The status of this operation is pictured below.
- This bundle can be verified from the Configuration Migration Utility → Configuration Bundles screen.
- Select this bundle and in the right-hand corner icon, select Actions → Download.
Configuration Import Steps
- Browse to the destination WebCenter Content Server console and Navigate to Administration → Configuration Migration Utility →Upload Bundle
- Select the bundle downloaded in the previous step.
- Once the bundle has been uploaded, navigate to ‘Configuration Bundles’ and select Actions → Preview.
- Once the preview has been completed, from Actions → select Import.
- The Import status will be displayed. This lists which sections have imported successfully and which sections may have errors to be resolved.
Points of Note
1. A CMU bundle can migrate database views from a source WebCenter Content environment to a destination environment, but the values stored within these views will not be migrated. These will need to be migrated using a database import / export operation.
2. WSDL – There are no current methods using CMU to migrate custom WSDL’s.
This can be accomplished by either copying the WSDL folder location from source to target or by using the steps mentioned in the following Oracle Knowledge Base article:
Doc ID 2109878.1 – How to export custom WSDL’s from source Webcenter Content server and import to target server using RIDC
If you need further assistance please feel free to contact us directly.
