2. Upgrading SharePoint Site Definitions from v2 to v3: GRADUAL UPGRADE PROCESS

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I have already prepared a couple of SPS03 VPCs and run the Gradual Upgrade on a number of sites with mixed results.

The first thing to note is that SPS03 and MOSS07 can theoretically run side-by-side on the same farm. This may be useful for testing or a simple migration.

The Gradual Upgrade process follows the following steps:

  1. Setup all your test SPS03 sites on an SPS03 VPC. Eliminate all unnecessary portals, sites and unnecessary site definitions (but be sure that all the site definitions for the sites you want to convert are present on the server).
  2. Install .Net 3.0 on the SPS03 VPC
  3. Install MOSS 2007 on the SPS03 VPC
  4. Install your v3 Site Definitions and the Definition Upgrade file that points the v2 Site Defintions to the v3 Site definitions
  5. Install your updated v3 web parts, css, master pages, etc.
  6. Run the Prescan.exe tool (it must complete successfully before you can go on to the next step - old sites created from Site Definitions that no longer exist on the server are one cause for failure)
  7. View the Prescan log file to see exactly what sites exist, what site definitions are required, and what else may need to be converted.
  8. Run the MOSS 2007 Configuration Wizard and select the Gradual Upgrade option (Documentation implies that you will no longer be able to make changes to your SPS03 site definitions after this step)
  9. Select an SPS03 Portal to Upgrade (that portal will be given a new port or host name, and the the upgraded site will be created on a new web application with the old port or host name)
  10. Select individual site collections from within the selected SPS03 portal to upgrade (but note that you must convert the root site collection before any other site collections can be upgraded)
  11. If the upgrade fails, read the log file that will be referenced in the failure message, and try to figure out what went wrong
  12. "Resume" the upgrade
  13. After all the sites are upgraded, you can "Finalize" the upgrade.

Note that even though some documentation implies that you can re-run an upgrade, or roll back an upgrade, neither seems to be the case.

What is meant by rolling back is that the SPS03 sites and portal are still there, running under a new port, and you can put them back online if necessary. You cannot re-run an upgrade, you can only Resume an upgrade, and exactly what is taking place when you Resume is unclear as yet...