For the final production data migration, migrate data from the source production database and not the production clone.  Follow a multi-step process, or phased approach, to minimize production downtime. The exact migration approach is determined by consultation between your team and the Pega Cloud team based on the results of one or more dry runs.  Select the best approach based on downtime requirements, the amount of data being migrated, and the rate of change to the source production database.

This multi-step process shortens the downtime for users.  For example, if data migration tests have shown that the migration process takes 10 hours, then moving all the data up to “last Sunday” means that users can continue to work in the old system while the bulk of the data (say, 9.8 hours) is migrated.  Then the users can be closed out of the system for only 20 minutes (rather than the entire 10 hours), while the data that was entered since “last Sunday” is migrated.

The three data migration phases are outlined below – one or more may be leveraged for the migration activities and tailored based on your specific situation and business requirements. This will be determined by the prod dry run.

Initial Load (Bulk Migration)

The Pega migration team migrates most of the data to the target Pega Cloud Production environment at a specified date.  This date is a few days before the Go Live date. Often, this is executed during the production dry run where the bulk of the production data is migrated to your Pega Cloud production environment. The source database remains fully operational during this phase.

Replication

Database Replication is enabled between the source production database and the Pega Cloud production database to replicate any changes since the initial load. The source database remains fully operational during this phase.

Sync Up

The Pega Cloud production database is validated and access to the source environment is frozen.  The Pega Cloud team migrates any “delta” changes from the source production database to the Pega Cloud production database. The source production database is disabled during this phase.