Migrating from 5.x to 7 1

[tom62]

My company plans to migrate from Lotus Notes 5.x to 7 (Domino Server = 6.5).

Since we have several Lotus Notes applications running, I was wondering what kind of difficulies we could inspect during the migration; and what kind of changes we would have to make in our LN applications.

Since we can't roll-out the client update in one go (due to the amount of users and different locations), some of our users will remain on version 5.x for quiet some time, my question therefore is whether the Domino 7 server has no problems with such a mixed client environment.

Manx thanks in advance for sharing your experiences with me.

Tom.

 

[tom62]

Anyone?

 

[Sherm1701]

We are looking at doing the same thing, but are planning on going browser based at the same time. Would that not solve your version issue?

 

[pmonett]

Lotus' standing policy concerning upgrades is to remain compatible with the previous version only.

Which does not mean that an application written in R4 is not going to work on an R6 server, it just means that if it doesn't, you're not supposed to be surprised.

I have seen R4 dbs work fine on R6 servers - of course, R4 databases tend to be less sophisticated than their R6 brethren (less functionality in R4).

I suppose you can expect your R5 clients to work fine on an R7 server. The upgrade path specified by Lotus has always been to start by upgrading the servers, then the clients. The server knows how to deal with clients that are a version or two removed from its own. Heck, I've seen R3 clients talk to R6 servers fine - on dbs that it could understand, of course.

The rule of thumb, as always, is test, test and test again. Set up a test R7 server with your applications and pitch the R5 clients at them and see what gives. Make sure to establish a list of critical functionality that simply has to be respected, and check it by the numbers.

Given that your databases already have to contend with R5 clients, I would be surprised if there was any major break due to the upgrade.

Pascal.

 

[tom62]

Thank you all for your advice. We will test, test and test again our "old" applications first on a r7 testserver and hope that serious version problems pop-up.

Tom