When migrating jira to a new server do I have to copy the entire jira directory structure?

[Dan Coutu]

The instructions found at https://confluence.atlassian.com/adminjiraserver085/migrating-jira-applications-to-another-server-981154737.html

seem to be expecting that you are doing the migration on the original server.

I need to migrate to a new server.

In particular the instructions from the above URL in the section "Extract the files" step 3 specify pointing a config entry to the location of the existing jira instance home directory. I don't see how this can work when that home directory is on another machine.

Do I have to copy the entire home directory tree to the new machine in order to do the migration? If so then I'm assuming I can delete that tree once the migration is done but confirmation would be appreciated.

[Andrew Laden · Accepted solution]

So basically there are 3 "locations" that contain data related to jira. The Database, the Jira Application Directory, and the jira data directory (also referred to as JIRA_HOME).

You havent mentioned if you are moving the database, so I will assume not.

The Jira Application directory is that is created when you extract the installation package. It contains the tomcat binaries, the jira applications files, etc. Generally, you make very few changes to this directory.  One notable one is the location of the jira home directory, which is set in atlassian-jira/WEB-INF/classes/jira-application.properties 

You may also have some customizations in server.xml or some other files. 

In fact, when when you do a jira upgrade in place, Jira basically replaces the entire application directory with the new version, and then copies over the files it needs to preserve. It will actually warn you if there are files that you have changed from the default, and you are supposed to change those manually.

The JIRA_HOME location on the other hand, contain all data that is specific to your instance. When you first start jira, if there is no jira_home, it will ask you where you want it, and create it. The jira_home has everything that is specific to your instance, including your database connection information. This location will also contain jars for your plugins, your attachments, logs etc)

So, depending on where you are migrating, you can extract the jira binaries into the application directory, edit the properties to point to where you want your jira_home to be, copy over your jira_home, and you should be good to go. 

In some cases you can just copy over the entire directory structure (both the application and data) to the same path names on the new server, and just start it up on the new server and it will work just fine.

But yes, you need to copy over the jira_home directory to the new server. Not all the information is in the database. 

[Dan Coutu]

Andrew, thanks for the extra detail. The original Atlassian instructions are useful but not complete enough for all types of migrations.

I'll test this out. Thanks!