Maintenance and deployment considerations for dual cell environments

When you deploy customizations, apply upgrades, or apply maintenance, you need to apply the process two times; once for each cell.

You need to deploy customizations or apply upgrades to both cells separately because each cell has its own WebSphere Commerce Enterprise Archive and WebSphere Commerce installation directory. When you apply maintenance upgrades, ensure that you update the installation directory in both cells. Do not simply update the instance.

Upgrading to a higher fix pack version

A fix pack installation includes updates to the WebSphere Commerce Enterprise application and to the database. In a dual cell environment, install the fix pack to both cells independently and ensure that you separate the WebSphere Commerce Enterprise application updates from the database updates. You need to update the WebSphere Commerce Enterprise application in both cells, but you need to update the database only once because the cells share a database.

For example, if you are installing a fix pack with the Update Installer wizard, in step 7.g, when you are prompted to update the database, select No. Instead, manually update the database in the first cell by using the updatedb utility.

WebSphere Commerce Version 7.0.0.7 or later If you are on Fix Pack 7 or later, it is recommended that you use the zero downtime method to install a fix pack. For more information, see Installing WebSphere Commerce fix packs (zero downtime).

Enabling features after you set up your second cell

To enable features, you need to enable the same feature on both cells. When you run feature enablement, the utility checks the status of the instance, and then checks the status of the database. Therefore, when you run feature enablement on the first cell, the first instance and the shared database are updated. When you run feature enablement on the second cell, the second instance is updated but the database process is skipped since the shared database is up-to-date.

Note: You still need to enter database credentials when you run feature enablement for the second cell.