We have a large DNN installation and we are moving everything from DNN 3.1 to DNN 4.0 and needed to do some testing. So, first we need to get the DNN database from the local SQL Server 2000 to a remote SQL Server 2005.
Here is what I did...
- Went into DNS and created a new subdomain called dev.somedomainname.com and pointed it to the development server IP address.
- Copied the entire DNN directory on the production server to the development server.
- Reset permissions on the dev server for the DNN folder I copied from production to allow Network Service full permission.
- Created a new website on Dev in IIS and setup a host header for the new subdomain and for localhost, pointing it to the DNN folder I copied from Prod.
- Detached the production DNN database form the SQL Server 2000 instance.
- Copied the MDF and LDF files for the DNN database from \mssql\MSSQL\Data on Prod and moved them to \Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\Data on Dev (actually I just made a copy of the files in the same folder so I could quickly get Prod running again and would not have to wait on the slower network connection to move 3 Gb of data over, then moved them over to Dev and renamed them by removing "Copy of " from the filename).
- Attached the database I copied from Prod using SQL Server Management Studio. Part of this process automatically upgrades database to from 2000 to 2005. WARNING! You cannot move a SQL Server 2005 database back to SQL Server 2000 using the same method. Nor can you use replication from SQL Server 2005 to a 2000 instance...or not atleast when I tried it in CTP release a couple of months ago.
- Opened web.config and changed the server name, username, and password for the remote SQL Server.
- Opened up a browser on the Dev server and went to http://dev.somedomainname.com and confirmed site was assessible.
I will repeat these tasks again when I have done thorough testing on Dev with the exception of copying the DNN root over. I will post any issues I encounter...