Migrate your search collections between portal versions

Portal Express, Version 6.0
Operating systems: i5/OS, Linux, Windows

Migrate your search collections between portal versions

This topic describes how you migrate your search collections between portal versions.

When you migrate or upgrade your IBM^® WebSphere^® Portal Express from one version to a higher version, be aware that the data storage format and index structure of Portal Search is not backward compatible between the different product versions. If you migrate the portal to a higher version and you want to continue using your search collections for Portal Search, you need to preserve them before you migrate the portal.

This applies to migrating between any of the versions of WebSphere Portal Express. Migrating your search collections might also be required when you install an interim fix. Refer to the instructions in the ReadMe file of the interim fix.

If you do not want to migrate your search collections, delete them before upgrading the portal. Otherwise the collections will be corrupted.
To preserve your search collections, proceed by the following steps:

To migrate your search collections, use the Import or Export Collection option of the Manage Search portlet to export and import the search collections. For more details about these tasks and the Manage Search portlet refer to the portlet help. To migrate your search collections, proceed by the following steps:

Before you migrate the portal to a later version, export your search collections. This exports the configuration data and all document URLs of your search collections.
Notes:

Before you export a collection, make sure that the portal application process has write access to the target directory location. Otherwise you might get an error message, such as File not found.
When you specify the target directory location for the export, be aware that the export can overwrite files in that directory.

Document all of the following data:

The target file names and directory locations to which you export the collections.
The following configuration data of the collections:

The location, name, description, and language for each of the collections
The settings for the options Specify collection language and Remove common words from queries for each collection.

Delete the search collections from your existing portal. Otherwise they can be corrupted by the import step that follows later.
Upgrade your WebSphere Portal Express to a later version as required.
After you have completed the portal upgrade, create the search collections again. This task creates the empty shell for the search collection. Fill in the following data entry fields and select the following options according to the data that you documented:

Location of Collection: Fill this in with the new collection location. The location can match the old setting, but does not have to match it.
Name of Collection: Fill this in with the collection name. The name can match the old setting, but does not have to match it.
Description of Collection: Fill this in with the collection description. The description can match the old setting, but does not have to match it.
Specify Collection Language: Select this to match the old setting.
Select Categorizer: You do not need to select this option. the value will be overwritten by the import.
Select Summarizer: You do not need to select this option. the value will be overwritten by the import.
Remove common words from queries (e. g. in, of, on, etc.): Check or uncheck this to match the old setting.
You do not have to add content sources or documents, as that will be completed by the import task.
Import the data of your search collections back into the portal. For the import source information use your documented file names and directory locations to which you exported the collections before the portal upgrade.
Use the Manage Search portlet for the tasks related to the search collections. You can use the Import or Export Collection option of the Manage Search portlet for both exporting and importing. For more details about these tasks refer to Exporting and importing search collections and to the Manage Search portlet help.
Notes:

If you do not perform these steps, the search collections are lost after you upgrade your WebSphere Portal Express.
Before you export a collection, make sure that the portal application process has write access to the target directory location. Otherwise you might get an error message, such as File not found.
Import collection data only into an empty collection. Do not import collection data into a target collection that has content sources or documents already.
When you import search collection data into a collection, most of the collection configuration data are also imported. For example, this includes the content sources, schedulers, filters, and language settings. If you configured such settings when creating the new collection, they are overwritten by the imported settings.
When you import a collection, a background process fetches, crawls, and indexes all documents which are listed by URL in the previously exported file. Therefore be aware of the Memory required for crawls and the Time required for crawls and imports and availability of documents.
For information about migrating a Search and Browse portlet between portal versions refer to Migrating the Search and Browse portlet between portal versions.

Parent topic:
Migrating Portal Search between portal versions