As far as the "typical" backup procedure or best practice goes, I think that a great starting point would be the Migration and Upgrade Chapter from the FME Server Admin Course that was presented at the 2017 FME UC!

I would also strongly recommend users to document their FME Server installation and configuration processes in a separate document. I have seen a few that are really well done – complete with screenshots!

Even if you use the (now discontinued - or is it?) MS Paint to sketch out your FME Server Architecture, I think it would prove very useful during a full upgrade procedure – or if you ever have to pass on the task to another colleague.

Hi @Ryan Cragg​ ,

Is there an updated version of this documentation for the latest version of FME Server? We are in a similar situation where we have a 2022.1 distributed FME Server that we need to upgrade due to the recent security vulnerability, and the standard upgrade documentation is not comprehensive, while the link above is old.

Thanks,

Marc

Hi @mgg_beca​ ,

These documents might be of help. I have tried to find current documentation equivalent to what is in the linked 2017 course chapter.

Upgrading FME Server

Backup & Restore

Performing Scheduled Backups of an FME Server Configuration

Back Up Configuration 

Hi @Merline George​ ,

Those resources are useful, but none of them explicitly address the upgrade path for a distributed server deployment, where you have:

• 1 X VM with Web Applications/FME Core
• 1 X VM with FME Engines
• 1 X SQL Server with system DB
• 1 X File Share with System Resource Folders

My interpretation is that we should use the uninstall/reinstall approach on the Web/Core VM, and the FME Engine Upgrade approach on the FME Engine VM.

Questions:

• Can you please confirm this is appropriate, and if there are any additional considerations we should be aware of, and if there is a recommended order of operations for this upgrade?
• Besides restoring the backed up configuration, do we need to run any of the post-install scripts that we had to run after the initial installation?
• For the engine upgrade, the recommendation is to name the new folder fmeengineupgrade, which I'm not a fan of. Is it ok to name the previous FME Engine folder something like <FMEServerDir>\\Server\\fmeengine_2022.1 and install the new version into the <FMEServerDir>\\Server\\fme folder?

Cheers,

Marc

Hello @mgg_beca​ ,

After consulting with my team, I recommend you go through the process/document for Distributing Components (2-Tier)

for upgrading your distributed setup tin place upgrade].

• You can start by taking a backup of your old install 
• Uninstall FME Server
• Follow the install document above to completely install the new version.

Please note that you will have to rebuild the DB with the scripts provided in the new server installer package. Please do not reuse the DB scripts from an older install as the schema might undergo changes between versions.

• Follow this document to add FME Engines on a Separate Machine
• After the installation, you can restore your setup.

Please note that any post-install configurations are not stored in the backup. For example- the HTTPS config will need to be redone.

Thanks for the advice. This process is in dire need of streamlining. Having to reconfigure half the installation after an upgrade is pretty frustrating.