bmc engage 2014: remedy migrations from the field

© Copyright 04/10/2023 BMC Software, Inc1

Remedy Migrations:Success Cookbooks & Tales from the Field When Moving to the CloudAl Lawlor: EUC Practice LeadLong View Systems

Rick Brooks-Hill: Director Product ManagementBMC Remedy on Demand


Agenda

1. Introduction Who is Long View and why did RoD make sense for our MSP business model?

2. What we expectedRod Migration ‘cookbook’ with minor tweaks

3. What we learned Cookbook modifications and partnership learnings

4. TodayHow has Long View’s experience been on RoD after the successful Migration?


Who is Long View Systems?

• Long View Systems is a North American IT solutions and services provider

• Combines business and technology through a Hybrid IT methodology

• One such LVS hybrid solution offering is ITSM

• Long View’s MSP model uses Remedy on Demand to manage over 200 customers’ ITSM offerings


Why LV Migrated to Remedy on Demand

• 5 year operational cost savings of 42%• Allow Long View to concentrate on the ITSM

business, not the infrastructure behind the ITSM business

• Allow for a more optimized version management process

• Further enhance partnership with BMC• Become more competitive in the market


Financial BenefitItems we considered when projecting Remedy on Premise costs

– License fees (one-time)– Maintenance & support (recurring)– Additional licenses per module based on project growth (one-time fee)– Maintenance and support based on additional licenses (recurring)– Infrastructure maintenance and support (annually)– Datacenter resources costs (annually)– Infrastructure refresh (one-time)

Items we considered when projecting Remedy OnDemand– Activation fee (one-time)– Subscription fee (annually)– Subscription fee increase based on additional licenses (annually after first year)– Support staff license has access to all modules, based on permissions, No limit to end users

for SRM

RESULT:

$4.2M for RoP over 5 years

vs.$2.4M for RoD over 5 years


Remedy OnDemand Just Gets Betterwith Long View

Remedy OnDemand Enhancements & Successes Non-Unicode

DBs Now Supported

CMDB Handling Fix for Non-

Unicode Staging System Meta-

Data

Post Fixes, Migration Took Only 20 Days

Bugs Removed Quickly with

OverlaysPost Cutover, Only One

Weekend to Full Production

Cookbook Migration Process to Remedy OnDemand Steps 1 to 5

01

02

03

04

05

BMC Imports On-Premises Production Database

Install Entire Remedy OnDemand Stack in BMC Cloud

Migrate Data to RoD Staging Delta Data Migration (DDM)

Restore DB on BMC Staging

Apply Customizations & Integrations on RoD Dev Platform

Promote Custom Work to Production & Validate

Go Live


What we expected• To migrate using the standard BMC migration

cookbook• LVS had customizations that while not extensive did

require mitigation• LVS data retention policies did not match RoD• LVS would upgrade a copy of their system to the

required RoD levels and give that database to BMC RoD operations

• VPN between BMC RoD and LVS to facilitate integrations (LDAP, event mgmt. tool integration)


What we learned

• Upgraded database could not be restored in the RoD environment

• Unicode requirement not covered in the original workshop

• Necessary to build Unicode staging server, move data to it

• Delay in project due to problems encountered during movement of data (both application and infrastructure-related)

Original LVS implementation was NOT Unicode

Atrium CMDB meta-data corrupted given Unicode Complications• Caused by data migration• Fieldid 179 is NOT a unique index in the

OBJSTR:* forms that comprise the Atrium meta-data

• Copying data caused duplicate records/missing records

• Atrium server process would not start


Final Cutover

Stage One

• After a good Unicode staging server was constructed it was 20 days to final cutover

• DDM to move 3 months worth of data from production server to new Unicode system

• Used SQL transaction log backups and did ‘manual’ log shipping via FTP

Stage Two

• BMC-required hot fixes applied to Unicode server• BMC audits Unicode DB• Production server turned off• Final DDM run, final run of multi-tenancy update• Final transaction log sent to BMC• BMC does ‘pre-production’ preparation• System turned over to LVS• Signoff by LVS technical staff, LVS stakeholders (Service Desk,

NOC)• ‘Burn in’ period over a weekend


Lessons Learned

People and Partnership• Partnership with BMC was important to the entire

process• Good LVS technical resources were important to the

project• Timely access to BMC 3rd/4th level technical resources

were appreciated• BMC project manager familiar with RoD

implementation/migration was a huge help


Lessons Learned

Technical• BMC has added Unicode theme to Migration

Cookbook• Migration to Unicode server should NOT use DDM• BMC needs to coach its partners better on testing• LVS needs to improve some of its testing discipline


Remedy OnDemand Just Gets Betterwith Long View

Remedy OnDemand Enhancements & Successes Non-Unicode

DBs Now Supported

CMDB Handling Fix for Non-

Unicode Staging System Meta-

Data

Post Fixes, Migration Took Only 20 Days

Bugs Removed Quickly with

OverlaysPost Cutover, Only One

Weekend to Full Production

Cookbook Migration Process to Remedy OnDemand Steps 1 to 5

01

02

03

04

05

BMC Imports On-Premises Production Database

Install Entire Remedy OnDemand Stack in BMC Cloud

Migrate Data to RoD Staging Delta Data Migration (DDM)

Restore DB on BMC Staging

Apply Customizations & Integrations on RoD Dev Platform

Promote Custom Work to Production & Validate

Go Live


Today

We’re Pleased!Remedy on Demand is more than meeting our needs

• In full production• Have implemented multiple customizations - - the RoD

CAB approval process is not onerous and has not rejected any customization requests

• Implementing MyIT• UDM/Pentaho used for various integration points


Thank You.

bmc engage 2014: remedy migrations from the field

Technology