Moving to new server

[NickFritz]

I'm planning to move to a new server as the old server company is going out of business.

I am assuming that i setup the new server with fedora and directadmin and just restore a backup ofthe old server onto the new server?

 

[jmstacey]

Basically. I would recommend the reseller level backups. They are currently the most reliable. (besides the individual user backups)

 

[NickFritz]

So you think i should use the user backups individually instead of the whole server backup?

 

[jmstacey]

reseller if possible.

Of course this will only work if your old provider was/is also using DirectAdmin.

 

[NickFritz]

My current provider is on DirectAdmin, this is where all my stuff is.

I am planning on moving to another DirectAdmin and just duplicating everything on the old server onto the new server.

 

[nobaloney]

Restoring from the sysbk backups is for experienced administrators who know what they're doing, and work slowly and methodically, always making backups of anything they change.

There is no automated sysbk restore.

When restoring between different OS distributions, even within the same OS family, it's not always intuitive as to what you have to backup and where you have to restore it. Some files you don't restore, but rather to intelligent merging or merge/replacing.

At the very least don't abandon your old server until evertyhing's working on the new server.

And if I may add to Jon's excellent advice, when you use reseller backups be sure to duplcate each reseller on the new server before you restore the reseller backup.

Then restore the reseller backups.

Only after the reseller backups are restored should you restore the reseller's users.

This will avoid problems, though there are probably things you will have to do by hand.

Jeff

 

[NickFritz]

So im assuming this is what needs to be done.

1. Setup the Directadmin settings manually to mirror the settings on the old server.

2. Setup the reseller accounts manually to mirror the other server.

3. Import the reseller's websites and content from backups from the other server.

4. Import the resellers users in one big backup to the new server, or do i have to do each user individually?

5. set the new ip's to the new users who have static ip's

6. double check all the sites work

7. change the name server domain to point to the new domain ip

 

[nobaloney]

So im assuming this is what needs to be done.

Never assume; when you assume you make an:

??? out of ? and ??

That said...

1. Setup the Directadmin settings manually to mirror the settings on the old server.

Yes, and don't forget to add any programs, perl modules, php modules, etc., that were on the old server that you'll need on the new one.

2. Setup the reseller accounts manually to mirror the other server.

Yes.

3. Import the reseller's websites and content from backups from the other server.

Yes

4. Import the resellers users in one big backup to the new server, or do i have to do each user individually?

You can do the backup and restore as the reseller, but the actual backups are individual, stored in the reseller space.

To make things easy on you, don't backup the reseller the second time around.

5. set the new ip's to the new users who have static ip's

You can identify and set those during the restore.

6. double check all the sites work

Yes

7. change the name server domain to point to the new domain ip

The new server will already be serving the sites at the new IP#.

You'll have to change the nameserver IP#s (and only the nameserver IP#s) at the registrar for the nameserver domain. You won't have to change anything for users, unless they use their own nameservers.

Since it may take a long time for the changes to occur (depending on your registrar and what time you make the changes compared to when the root servers are cycled, and the 24 hour delay before the propagation of nameserver A records from the root servers is completed) you'll probably also want to duplicate those zone files on the original server and leave it run for a day or so.

You can tar up all the zone files (ending in .db) from the /var/named directory and move them en masse to the old server if you want, and untar them into /var/named on the old server, then restart named on the old server.

Did I forget anything? I'm not sure.

Jeff

 

[NickFritz]

You can tar up all the zone files (ending in .db) from the /var/named directory and move them en masse to the old server if you want, and untar them into /var/named on the old server, then restart named on the old server.

Did I forget anything? I'm not sure.

Jeff

So by moving the zone files to the old server then people hitting the old server will be forwarded by the old server to the new ips on the new server?

 

[nobaloney]

That's correct.

Jeff