rinke.beimin asked a question.
Subject: Best Practice for Upgrading and Migrating FlexNet Manager Suite On-Premises
Hello,
We currently have FlexNet Manager Suite On-Premises version 2024 R2 running on Windows Server 2019. We are planning to both upgrade to version 2025 R2 and migrate the application to a new server running Windows Server 2025.
We would like to confirm the recommended best practice for this scenario.
Our understanding is that the safest approach would be to:
1. Install version 2024 R2 on Windows Server 2025.
2. Connect the existing database.
3. Verify that the application is functioning correctly.
4. Perform the upgrade from version 2024 R2 to version 2025 R2.
However, we would like to know whether the following approach is also supported and recommended:
1. Install version 2025 R2 directly on Windows Server 2025.
2. Connect the existing database from the version 2024 R2 environment.
3. Complete the upgrade as part of the first connection/startup.
Is this approach supported, or is it necessary to first install the existing version before upgrading? If installing version 2025 R2 directly is supported, are there any prerequisites or additional considerations we should be aware of?
Thank you in advance for your guidance.
An approach similar to your second option would be fine:
Not directly related to your question, but at this point in time I would generally aim to upgrade to the latest 2026 R1 release rather than 2025 R2. The prior release is starting to get a little old now.
Hello Chris,
Thank you for your reply. We have indeed decided to upgrade to FNMS 2026 R1.
Following your recommendation, we will first shut down the old FNMS server and prevent it from communicating with the databases.
Regarding your points 2 and 3, would it make more sense to upgrade the databases first, before installing the FNMS 2026 R1 application server software? That way, we could point the new installation directly to the already-updated databases.
Or would this not work? My concern is that if we install the application server software first, as described in step 2, the existing databases are still on the FNMS 2024 R2 schema and therefore cannot be used by the 2026 R1 application until they have been migrated.
Regarding the database migration scripts, I am also not completely clear on the exact procedure.
Is the following documentation the correct procedure to follow?
https://docs.flexera.com/fnms-install/upgrade-guide/upgrading-flexera-system-reference/upgrade-create-databases/
If so, should I run the migration executable against all four FNMS databases, or is there a specific order in which the databases need to be migrated? For example, if I use the following command:
mgsDatabaseUpdate.exe -i InventoryManagerMigration.xml -nsu -d FNMSInventory [-l logFile]
Will the executable prompt me for the database connection details, such as the SQL Server instance, database user, and password? Or do these details need to be provided as command-line parameters or configured elsewhere beforehand?
I would appreciate some clarification on the recommended order of operations and the database migration procedure before we proceed.
Thanks in advance for your help.
Kind regards,
Steps 2 & 3 could be done in either order, or in parallel. These steps have no dependency on each other. It isn't until step 4 is performed that the application server will make a connection to the database to start to perform operations on it.
The page at https://docs.flexera.com/fnms-install/upgrade-guide/upgrading-flexera-system-reference/upgrade-create-databases/ is the correct one containing details on migrating the database. The order to migrate databases doesn't matter, but unless you have a reason otherwise doing them in the order suggested in the documentation makes sense.
As detailed on this page, you can run mgsDatabaseUpdate.exe with command line arguments to specify the SQL Server instance name and other details to connect to. If details are not provided as command arguments, they will be read from registry where application server configuration details are kept. As you're likely to be running the database migration procedure from a computer that does not have details configured in the registry, you'll likely need to specify all the details on the command line.