Migrating IBM Websphere Commerce Version 8 to HCL Commerce Version 9.1

The following section outlines the high-level steps that you must complete to migrate to HCL Commerce Version 9.1. Begin by migrating your development environment, which includes your development database, custom assets, storefront, and search application. With a successfully migrated development environment, you can migrate your production databases, and deploy your migrated assets to your HCL Commerce Version 9.1 production environments.

Before you begin

  1. Review Planning to migrate HCL Commerce.
  2. Apply Mod Pack 1 or higher to your IBM Websphere Commerce Version 8 development and production environments.
  3. Update your development and production databases to one of the following versions.
  4. Update to NIST SP 800-131A security standards.
    Note: HCL Commerce Version 9 only allows a 32-bit merchant key. This step will migrate your existing database to 32-bit encryption prior to migrating to version 9. If you do not take this step, the version 9 application will not be able to read encrypted data (for example passwords or payment data) from the migrated database.
  5. From your IBM Websphere Commerce Version 8 environment, ensure that all tasks are approved and all workspaces are closed.
  6. From your IBM Websphere Commerce Version 8 environment, use the following utilities to ensure that your staging database and production database are synchronized:
    1. stagingprop utility
    2. Propagating the search index
    Note: Once the staging and production databases are in sync, a content-freeze must be in effect until the live production database is migrated.
  7. Install your HCL Commerce Version 9 development environment, including the latest maintenance package.
  8. Plan and deploy your HCL Commerce Version 9 production environment, including your staging environment and the latest maintenance package.

About this task

The following sections outline the entire migration process. It is likely that your migration is completed in planned chunks, starting with migrating your development environments. If you are interested in only migrating your development environment now, complete that section only. The remaining topics cover how to package and deploy your migrated assets for your production environment, and how to migrate your production database and switch your live traffic to your Version 9 production environment.

Procedure