Reducing The Stress Of Data Migration

Life is never static, and for businesses the occasional relocation of data archives, mission-critical applications, infrastructure and services may prove necessary. It can be a complex and at times risky endeavor. There are ways to make the process less stressful, and to reduce the potential for such migrations to be costly, disruptive, or in some cases even disastrous. That’s what we’ll be looking at today.

 

The Need For Migration

Organizational changes, operational needs and financial considerations are among the factors that may dictate a complete or partial move to new premises. Space within an existing site may become too restricted, or land rates and rental charges too high. A downturn in the market or a hostile takeover may force the closure of some offices, or a compulsory relocation to a new host site. Regulatory compliance issues may also make a move necessary.

 

Benefits And Drawbacks

There can be any number of motivations for migrating data center operations, and a number of positive considerations such as moving to a new environment better suited to your organization’s needs, and providing a higher level of protection for an enterprise’s vital information. A shift to virtual infrastructures may reduce a company’s need for physical servers or other hardware.

 

In addition, migration may yield other benefits such as:

 

· Reduced operating and business costs

· The opportunity to construct new operating platforms

· Consolidation of data center resources after an acquisition

· Opportunities to exploit “as a Service” options to improve and streamline business operations

· Making use of containers and virtualization to enhance infrastructure

· Segregating portions of a business that may have been sold off

· Improving network resiliency and Data Recovery

· Enabling service providers to better manage their clients

 

Weighing against these are the persistent nagging doubt that something could go disastrously wrong during the move, and a number of other factors including:

 

· The competency or otherwise of IT staff to effectively complete a move, based on the latest technologies

· Inadequate knowledge or understanding of the applications, hardware and infrastructure that has to be moved

· Poor planning and migration strategy

· An overload of inputs from various divisions within the enterprise, leading to a lack of overall clarity and/or over-reaching ambitions

· A lack of flexibility in the face of changes which will inevitably occur during the migration process – which can be both time-consuming and extensive

· Escalating or unbudgeted costs

· Technical hitches such as data cleansing, the migration of perimeter defenses, moving legacy applications, etc.

 

Little wonder that the prospect of migrating may be a source of tension and dread. But a systematic approach and careful planning will go a long way toward easing the process.

Knowing What You Have To Move

Whether it’s to another floor, another state, or virtually to another continent, you’ll need to take stock of your existing data center assets, to determine which of them will be involved in the move – and the optimal order in which they should be migrated.

This will require you to take a comprehensive inventory of what you have – one which may involve delving into archives, silos, and physical repositories to root out bits of legacy hardware and software whose presence might otherwise be missed.

 

It’s necessary to not only know what assets you have, but also how they work and how they integrate with each other. This includes the legacy infrastructure and applications whose operations may not currently be documented.

 

Prior to the move (and as part of the planning process) network tracing tools may be deployed to observe how various components of your system interact over time – an aid in establishing the components of active legacy applications, and their relationships with other software and hardware.

 

Minimizing Downtime And Data Losses

Contingency measures should be put in place to minimize unplanned or extended downtime during the migration process. This is especially important for mission-critical applications and assets. Some additional investment in fault tolerance and robust equipment may be called for.

 

Sensitive and business-critical data will also require protection against its potential corruption or loss during a move, and being able to call on clean backups is a must. Encryption of sensitive information should be maintained throughout, and disaster recovery protocols should also remain active during the migration period.

 

Doing A Test Run

It’s a good idea to conduct a test of your migration strategy under controlled conditions, to observe how your existing software and assets perform in their new environment. This may reveal issues that would otherwise not have shown up until after the move – by which point it will be too late to take remedial action, if any is required.

 

Compatibility Issues

If your on-site legacy applications aren’t compatible with hardware in the new location, it may be necessary to physically relocate your existing equipment. Alternatively, it may be possible to use an emulator to facilitate the move. Some allowance may also be made for the time and expense required for making changes to software code, to ensure compatibility.

 

Addressing The Characteristics Of The New Network

The new environment will have its own unique characteristics, which may or may not raise issues with your existing applications, domain settings, security policies, etc. Because of this, it’s essential to have a detailed plan in place for positioning each element of your network in its new setting. If this necessitates rewriting application code or buying in new assets, then provision should be made for this in advance.

 

Minimizing Latency

Servers may be relocated in batches, to reduce downtime. But this may have the effect of increasing latency, as applications remaining on site are required to communicate with assets in the new location over greater distances. Having a detailed knowledge of which applications operate together and how frequently they exchange data will help in drawing up a migration schedule that minimizes this effect.

 

Migrating To The Cloud

It’s possible that the new data center won’t be in a set physical location, but in the cloud. Whether it’s a public, private, or hybrid deployment, there are certain precautions that may be taken to help ensure a smooth transition.

 

Ensure Business Continuity And Disaster Recovery

Take the time to determine how your business functions line up with your systems and applications, and their various inter-relationships. You should have a business continuity and Disaster Recovery (DR) plan in place, and you should ensure that its business impact analysis section is fully up to date at the time of the move. You should also check that your recovery time objectives (RTOs) have been correctly assigned in terms of the business, your clients, and a regulatory compliance perspective.

 

 

Establish Your And Your Provider’s Roles

The Service Level Agreement (SLA) with your provider should spell out their responsibility as regards redundancy, uptime, etc. In choosing a vendor, their approach to data handling, backups, and data recovery should be taken into account before any contract is signed.

 

Establish How Software Licenses Are Affected

You’ll need to do an audit to find out how your various application licenses (generally site-based) apply in the case of relocation. Some may allow the running of a secondary instance of the software at no additional charge, while others may charge a reduced rate for the provision of a separate license. Your cloud vendor may also include licensing as part of their package. You’ll need to check this.

 

Don’t Neglect Security

Encryption, backups, and Disaster Recovery are just part of the picture. You’ll need to consider the ongoing security measures in place as migration proceeds, and take steps to ensure the integrity and safety of your data and equipment both on site and in transit. Your Risk Assessments, project management and governance skills will be called into action. In addition, you may also call upon the services of a specialist consultant, or a dedicated migration management platform, to assist.

Infographic Flowchart

This data migration chart will help you remember these steps as you plan your data center move.