Network Computingwww.networkcomputing.com

You can take one of two paths for the server side of the upgrade: Choose just to export the current database to a program such as Crystal Reports, reinstall the box as a standalone NT Server (no more domain controller requirement), and install a fresh copy of SMS 2.0 and SQL Server 7.0. However, you'll need to propagate the database anew, as well as re-create the collections and advertisements. Or, after making sure that the databases are backed up, you can choose to upgrade the existing installation of SMS 1.2 to SMS 2.0, with the option of remaining at SQL Server 6.5 (Service Pack 5). Be aware that upgrading to SQL Server 7.0 brings significant advantages as noted above, as well as extensive capabilities regarding ease of use and dynamic size allocation.

We tested and compared both styles of upgrade in our SMS lab at the University of Michigan Medical Center, where we had two Compaq Computer Corp. ProLiant 1600 450/Rs with 640 MB of RAM and a 26-GB RAID Level 5 setup.

Conversion Upgrade
The more problematic upgrade scenario is the conversion from SMS 1.2 to the SMS 2.0 format, followed by the migration from SQL 6.5 to 7.0. This upgrade completely replaces the SMS 1.2 directory structure and installs SQL 7.0 while leaving SQL 6.5 intact. Before beginning the upgrade, make sure your server has Internet Explorer (IE) 4.01 SP1 and Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC) 2.0 SP1 installed.

Several other preparatory measures are necessary to upgrade properly to SMS 2.0. The upgrade makes extensive use of tempdb, so make sure that it is at least 30 percent the size of all databases combined. The SMS data device and transaction log size need to be at least 50 MB and 20 MB, respectively (the default value used under SMS 1.2 was 45 MB and 10 MB). The DBCC (database consistency checker) and NewAlloc should be run to verify that there is no database corruption prior to the upgrade of SQL 6.5 to 7.0.

These steps are documented in the SMS 2.0 manual. However, the Readme file for SMS 2.0 SP1 points out an error in the SMS 2.0 administrator's guide with regard to the completion order for upgrades. Specifically, SQL Server should not be upgraded to 7.0 before you upgrade to SMS 2.0.

If you have a "-" in your server name, you should run the stored procedure sp_addserver to change the name of the SQL Server because 7.0 does not accept that character. The SQL 6.5 installation issued a warning message about the hyphen, but let us continue with the installation. The SQL 7.0 installation would not continue until the stored procedure was run. If you also are using replication, you will need to run an additional stored procedure, sp_setnetname. Although absent in the manual, this precaution is mentioned in the SQL Server Upgrade Wizard and lets you exit the installation to implement these procedures. However, these steps should be taken before the SMS upgrade, along with the other measures.

The SMS upgrade converts the database without much of a wait (our test machine had a few clients, machine groups and packages). The service account being used under 1.2 stays active even though an additional "SMS Service" account is created, which is used under 2.0 for a clean installation. The service, "SMS_Server_ Bootstrap_<server name>," is used to "boot" (hence the name) other services--such as the SMS_Executive, SMS_Site_Backup and SMS_SQL_Monitor. It is probably fruitless to get into the MMC to view your new collections, as these new services take several minutes (depending on the size of your collections) to update the memberships. Meanwhile, you will get a "collection locked" message.

Leaving the SMS services active but set on manual, we initiated the SQL Server 7.0 Installation. We enjoyed pretty smooth sailing here. Because we chose the custom installation, it picked up all the nasty little settings from 6.5, such as character set, sort order, Named Pipes and Unicode collection. We were prompted to choose an account from which to run SQL's services. We're not sure why it didn't automatically choose the local system account, but we checked that option and moved on.

After the installation, it prompted us for a reboot and then the SQL Upgrade Wizard showed up after we logged in. The defaults were good, but make sure your SMS services do not start. The language in the SMS 2.0 SP1 Readme is vague and leaves the impression that you should disregard chapters 5 and 6 relating to the SQL Server Upgrade in the SMS 2.0 manual. But reading these chapters is a must, and it is in these sections that Microsoft recommends that the SMS services be set to manual before running the SQL Server 7.0 install. Doing this spares you the many warning messages pertaining to SMS still running.

If you have not run the sp_addserver stored procedure and corrected the invalid SQL Server name, the wizard will pick this up and ask you to do so. The wizard completes and updates the MDAC and MMC. It is probably a good idea to switch the SMS services back to automatic and reboot after this, as these services were stopped. Start the MMC for SQL and connect to the database, make sure things look good, then try the management console for SMS.

At this point, you may think you've completed the upgrade. However, only components that were installed under SMS 1.2 were upgraded. New features of SMS 2.0 that did not exist under 1.2 will need to be installed. To do this, run the SMS setup program on the CD again. Under the setup options, select the entry "modify or reset the current installation." You will see a list of options that you can install.

Clean Install
In our second upgrade scenario, we wiped all the drives and started with a fresh installation of NT as a standalone server, configuring it with IE 4.01, MDAC 2.01 and Windows NT SP4. The SMS 2.0 setup is smooth, assuming your machine name does not include a hyphen; it will not continue if a hyphen is present. Name your site, choose a password for the SMS service account, pick the number of SMS clients and the installation will configure things for you. If you choose a custom setup (our recommendation), no client installation methods or discovery methods are activated. The SQL Server 6.5 or 7.0 installation follows from the SMS 2.0 setup.

As for upgrading your clients, this is handled by SMS when you enable the various client installation and discovery methods. It does this by discovering the Sms.ini under the root drive and the smsrun32 entry in the registry. Boot32wn.exe starts the client installation for NT clients if "Windows Networking Logon Client Installation" was selected under the SMS 2.0 MMC. If the "Windows NT Remote Client Installation" was selected under the console, ccmbtldr.exe starts the upgrade. The log files under \winnt\sms\logs track the action. Among the changes on the NT client side are the removal of the SMS program group and the addition of control-panel applets. All the functions in SMS 2.0 are now service-based. The client footprint is large compared to SMS 1.2, ranging from 8 MB to 20 MB.

Without a doubt, the clean-install path for the server side is the easiest. If you want to reduce the overhead of your server acting as a domain controller, and can spare re-creating the different collections as well as your advertisements, this upgrade path is for you. If you cannot afford to reinstall the server, in order to keep it on duty as a domain controller as well as to carry out any additional functions, then you need to look at the conversion upgrade. Windows 2000 will include the ability to demote domain controllers to standalone servers, letting you free some CPU overhead for your servers (for SMS). At present, a third-party utility allows you to do this, but of course Microsoft will not support it.

Oscar A. Olivo Jr. is a Windows NT/Unix administrator at the University of Michigan. John T. Kaminski is a senior network consultant for Enterprise Networking Systems. Send your comments on this article to them at olivo@umich.edu or jkaminski@ens.com.