Upgrading the Bitbucket server from 4.13 to latest version on different server

[Ramana Rainn]

We are currently have Bitbucket server 4.13.0 version on Windows 2008 server. We plan to install latest version 5.13 on Windows 2016 server and migrate the data and configs to new server.

I see that there is a documentation for upgrading the Bitbucket version on same server but I would like to have instructions for migrating the data and config to new server where it has latest version. Please provide if you have any procedures for this.

For DR solution, We plan to use VMWARE SRM technology to replicate the server synchronously to different data center. If we have any issue on production server then we just need to bring up DR server which will have same hostname but different  IP. Anyway we plan to create DNS CNAME for bitbucket so that we don't need to make any changes after moving to DR server. Let us know if we have any issue from Bitbucket application for this approach.

Or 

is there any replicate feature available for Birbucket server 5.13 so that we will create new server on DR data center and will enable the replication so that both prod and dr servers are in sync.

[Ramana Rainn]

Thanks Daniel for quick response. We will create new database for new server so it will not use same database. My next question is, when we copy the home directories, how does it works for projects and configurations?

For DR solution, do you see any issue if we use VMWARE SRM?. Also when we bring up the DR server via SRM , we will just update database instance and will start the Bitbucket instance. Databases will be synchronized via log shipping between prod and dr database servers. Let me know if any issue with this approach?  

[Ramana Rainn]

Could someone advise the above query?

[Daniel Wester]

It’s pretty simple. Copy the Bitbucket Home directories to the new server (preserving file permissions etc). If you’re switching DBs as well - duplicate it and just update the db credentials in the Bitbucket Home. Then start up the new Bitbucket instance. Bitbucket Server will then upgrade the db structure for you. 

The only gotcha is that you cannot have 2 versions(or even instances) using the same db at the same time. So if you’re not switching db servers - you have to shut down the first instance.