Summary

Guidance for upgrading Tachyon.

Upgrade scenarios

If you have one of the following, then you can simply run Tachyon Setup on your existing server to upgrade to Tachyon 5.1.

  • Tachyon 5.0
  • Tachyon 4.1
  • Tachyon 3.3
  • SLA Platform 3.3 with AppClarity 6.1 and/or Application Migration 2.5

The pictures below show the architecture changes when upgrading from each of the above. There are no architecture changes between Tachyon 5.0 and 5.1.



Before you upgrade


Before doing a re-installation or upgrade of the Tachyon Server, make a backup of the following (but first see the note below about automatic backups):

  • TachyonMaster database


    Backing up the Tachyon Responses database is not usually needed, unless there are instruction responses that you need to keep. Tachyon responses are not permanently held data and will naturally expire according to the settings specified when an instruction was run, typically in hours or possibly days. If in doubt, there is no harm in backing up the Tachyon Responses database as well.



  • Tachyon Server installation directory
    • including the config files, which may have been manually updated in the previous installation
    • Switch certificate files

  • Earlier versions of Product Packs that have been modified

    You will not be able to load pre-3.1 Product Packs into . From version 3.1 onwards, Product Packs completely changed both in format and licensing.

    Product Packs from version 3.1 onwards can be loaded directly into .


If the upgrade is done by means of the Tachyon Setup application, then it will automatically perform a backup of the following items:

  • Tachyon Server installation directory. This is backed up to a subfolder named Tachyon.bak under the root installation folder for Tachyon. All files, including the .config files and certificate files, will be copied.
  • IIS configuration. This is done by taking a copy of the applicationhost.config file from the Windows system folders. The backup file is placed at the same location, and is named like the original file with a suffix that indicates the date and time when the copy was taken.
  • The following databases are backed up to the default location for backups that is configured in the database server. By default, this points to a subfolder named "Backups" under the folder where the executable for SQL Server is installed. Unless you are installing a small lab or proof-of-concept, this is usually not a good location for the backups, so make sure that you configure the backup location in SQL Server to an adequate folder before starting the Tachyon upgrade:
    • TachyonMaster
    • TachyonExperience
    • SLA-Data
    • SLA-Shared
    • SLA-Integrate
    • SLA-BI
    • ActiveEfficiency
    • 1ECatalog

The Product packs are not copied by themselves, but they are kept in a table within the TachyonMaster database, which is backed-up.




Upgrading to

Partial Upgrades

Before version 4.1, if you tried to run Tachyon Setup when any of the products were already installed and their versions did not allow an update to the new versions provided with the installer, then you were shown an error message and installation was blocked unless you uninstalled the conflicting versions. This effectively prevented any components from being upgraded unless all of them could be upgraded.

For version 4.1 and later, this behavior has been modified. For instance, you could be upgrading a combination of Tachyon v4.1 and 1E Catalog v1.2 to Tachyon v5.0 and 1E Catalog v1.2. Note how the 1E Catalog version is unchanged – this would have blocked the upgrade in earlier versions. In the current version it is possible to perform this upgrade. You will see a warning message in the Welcome screen informing you of the affected version numbers, but you can proceed through the Setup steps until you reach the Ready to Install stage. Here you will once again see a warning message indicating that the existing version is the same that you are trying to install, and therefore the installation of this component will be skipped. You can safely click on the button to proceed with installation and everything will be done as expected.

You may still be asked at some intermediate steps about configuration information for the components that will not be installed. You should still provide it, because it may be relevant for Tachyon Setup at the time of configuring other components that are being installed so that they can interact with the components that are not being installed but are already present in the system.


The following process is used when upgrading Tachyon Server from Tachyon 3.x, 4.x or 5.0 to and keeping the same configuration and the TachyonMaster database.

Keeping the same configuration means using the same installer properties as the previous installation. If changing the configuration, please refer below to Changing the Tachyon Server configuration when re-installing or upgrading.

RefStepNotes
1

Ensure you have prerequisites ready for installation of the new version.

Review Known Issues for Upgrades.

Preparation for an in-place upgrade is not as complex compared to a new installation, provided the configuration remains the same. If changing the configuration, please refer below to Changing the Tachyon Server configuration when re-installing or upgrading.

Determine if you will re-use the existing Web certificate or a new one. If re-using the certificate and upgrading from a version of Tachyon prior to 5.0 then ensure you make a copy of the certificate files in the Switch SSL folder. If using a new certificate then follow the guidance in Server Provisioning.  If you are upgrading from Tachyon 5.0 the certificates will already be in the local Windows Computer Certificate Store so there is no need to backup.

If in doubt about your configuration review each of the configuration in the Tachyon installation folder. A later step in this process asks you to make a backup copy of the installation folder. This allows you to review configuration settings and also retain a backup of the Switch certificate files.

1E recommends using the same server installation account as the original installation, but this is not mandatory provided the account is an existing Tachyon administrator user. You can check which is the original installation account by looking in the Permissions page and finding the user which does not have an edit or delete icon.

For Tachyon 5.1 you will need a new license when upgrading.  Please contact your 1E Sales account manager for license enquires. 


2

Inform Tachyon users when you plan to upgrade the system.

You should notify Tachyon users about the impending upgrade. This includes users of external consumers such as the extension described in Using Tachyon in Configuration Manager.

To help identify the users of the Tachyon system you can review the Tachyon Permissions. You can also review the Tachyon Consumers in order to remind yourself of any 3rd party systems that will be affected by the upgrade.

Any instructions that are running or pending approval prior to the Platform and Agent upgrade will not be affected, other than be delayed by services being temporarily down.

3

Shutdown the existing Tachyon system.

  1. Stop or uninstall external or third-party Consumers (if any)
  2. Stop the Tachyon services
    • 1E Tachyon Switch Host
    • 1E Tachyon Coordinator

If you want to keep any instruction responses, review the notes in the next step before shutting down the system.

Shutting down the system gracefully ensures there are no instructions in process and prevents access. The installer will internally shutdown the services if you do not stop them manually. Stopping them manually gives you a greater control about when they are stopped. The services will be restarted automatically after the upgrade.

Both the Tachyon Switch Host and the Coordinator can take some time stopping their services.

No other services for the applications associated with Tachyon need to be stopped.


Do not stop or disable the Tachyon website or application pools. The installer needs them to be active in order to complete all installation tasks.


4Close all active connections to the Tachyon databases.

To avoid a particular known issue when upgrading you must ensure there are no active connections to the databases.

You can use the following SQL script to identify which programs have active connections to the Tachyon databases.

SELECT DB_NAME(dbid) as [database], loginame, hostname, program_name
FROM sys.sysprocesses 
WHERE DB_NAME(dbid) LIKE 'Tachyon%' AND program_name LIKE 'Tachyon%'
ORDER BY DB_NAME(dbid), loginame, hostname, program_name;

With the Tachyon services stopped, any open connections to the database, such as Tachyon Consumer and Tachyon Portal, should not cause the upgrade to fail and can be safely ignored.


5Backup the databases.

If you use Tachyon Setup to perform the upgrade it backs up the following databases:

  • TachyonMaster
  • TachyonExperience
  • SLA-Data
  • SLA-Shared
  • SLA-Integrate
  • SLA-BI
  • ActiveEfficiency
  • 1ECatalog

The following notes apply to the Responses database and whether you would need to create a backup of that database too:

6Make a copy of the Tachyon Server installation folder.

The installation folder contains the following non-default files:

  • Switch certificate files in the SSL folder, these are required during the upgrade and should be copied to the directory with the TachyonServer.msi.
  • Configuration files for the website, web applications, services and Switch (*.config files)
  • Other customisations
  • Content in the Background folders (these are the Content and Updates folder in %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\1E\Tachyon).
7Install Tachyon Server.

Install Tachyon Server using the same configuration as before. Do not drop the databases.

Please refer to Tachyon Setup for more details.

8Post-install tasks.

Repeat any Tachyon Server post-installation tasks that are relevant for an upgrade installation and are not performed automatically by Tachyon Setup.

9Customizations.

Re-instate non-default settings.

  • Configuration files for the website, web applications, services and Switch (*.config files)

    Tachyon Setup will automatically backup and restore any entries in the .config files that it modifies during installation. Do not simply replace config files. Instead compare the old and new versions and consider which changes can or need to be re-instated. In some cases, new versions may contain fixes for workarounds included in the old files. Please contact 1E if you have any difficulties.


  • Other customisations

    The Tachyon Setup installer will backup and restore customized mail headers.


  • Content in the Background folders (these are the Content and Updates folder in %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\1E\Tachyon)
10Verify.See Verifying page.


After upgrading to Tachyon Server 5.1

After upgrading, you should perform a sync for all configured Connectors followed by the Basic Inventory Consolidation report. 

The following points should be considered after upgrading to Tachyon Server 5.1:

  • If you have previously configured any Schedules these will be converted to using UTC time. You will need to revisit these to ensure the time you want the Schedules to run is still correctly configured
  • If you have previously configured any Schedules for Tachyon or Configuration Manager Connector syncs these will need to be deleted and re-created - as the sync process for both of these types of connector has been redefined. Please refer to Tachyon connector and System Center Configuration Manager connector for more details.


Changing Tachyon Server configuration when reinstalling or upgrading

Keep the DNS Names

Moving Server

Agents use the DNS Name FQDN to connect to the Switch and Background Channel. Provided the DNS Name FQDN remains the same, the server can be renamed or moved without having to re-configure clients.

If the server hosting a Tachyon Server is renamed or moved, then it will need a new certificate and Tachyon Server must be re-installed. The database can be kept. There is also a known issue where new website URLs do not get updated in the database tables.

Please contact 1E for advice if a new configuration is required when re-installing or upgrading a server.


Upgrading Instructions and Product Packs

Tachyon Instructions are designed as far as possible to be backwards compatible, but as a general rule we recommend that you update your Tachyon product packs to the latest version so that you can gain the benefit of newer features.

When upgrading you should be able to safely continue to use your existing Instructions. We recommend that newer versions of Instructions are verified in a test environment to ensure that they still behave as expected before updating in your production environment.

Your Tachyon license should retain any code signing certificates you may have registered. This means your custom instructions should continue to be licensed as normal following an upgrade of Tachyon. You may want to check the Writing Tachyon Instructions in the Tachyon SDK pages to check for any changes to the Tachyon SCALE language.


Moving Switch certificate files to the Windows Certificate Store

Prior to version 5.0, the Switch component used certificate files located on disk. From version 5.0 onward, the Switch uses certificates in the Windows Certificate Store. When upgrading, you might still be using file-based certificates that don't exist in the certificate store. This is more likely if your server certificate (used for IIS components) is different to the certificate your switch (or switches) present. This certificate needs to be imported into the certificate store:

  1. If you don't have a .pfx file, you can assemble one from the existing switch certificate files and OpenSSL. If you do, skip this step:

    openssl pkcs12 -export -out <outPfxFilePath> -inkey <keyFilePath> -in <cerFilePath>
//example:
openssl pkcs12 -export -out c:\mycerts\mypfx.pfx -inkey c:\mycerts\hello.cer -in c:\mycerts\hello.key


  2. Import it into the Local Machine's Personal certificate store. This can also be done though mmc:

    certutil -f -p <pfxPassword> -importpfx <pfxFilePath>
//example:
certutil -f -p Password -importpfx c:\mycerts\mypfx.pfx


  3. In Tachyon.Setup, select the certificate when it appears on the Server Certificate screen:

    This will set both the server (IIS) certificate and the Switch certificate. If your switch needs to use a different certificate, modify the Tachyon.Switch.Host.exe.config.



Upgrading devices to 1E Client 5.1

In version 4.1 the Tachyon Agent was replaced by the 1E Client, which provides additional features and includes all the functionality of the older Tachyon Agent. During an upgrade, the Tachyon Agent, if present, will be uninstalled and the 1E Client will be deployed in its place.


Upgrading Tachyon Agent on Windows

Installer properties are described in 1E Client configuration settings and installer properties. You can perform the upgrade on Windows computers by following the same process as Deploying 1E Client on Windows.

The following is important if you are upgrading Tachyon Agents from version 3.2 or earlier, to version 3.3 or later, or to 1E Client.

Each Tachyon Agent determines a unique identifier (GUID) for the device that they run on. From Tachyon version 3.3 the way that the identifiers are determined has changed to be consistent with other 1E products. As a result, when upgrading the Tachyon Agents from version 3.2 or earlier to version 3.3 or later, Tachyon will create new Tachyon Agent entries on the Tachyon Server and will not remove the old Tachyon Agent entries. The old Tachyon Agent entries will appear in Tachyon Explorer as offline, and upgraded Agents will appear as duplicates and online. The old Agents will naturally disappear according to the inactive days setting. It may be the case that Tachyon will temporarily indicate that your license has been exceeded, because of the duplicate Agents, but in this instance the indication may safely be ignored.

You can do either of the following:

  • Allow the offline Agent device entries to naturally disappear after the defined number of days from the day they were upgraded. For Tachyon 5.0 and earlier the default is 90 days. For Tachyon 5.1 and later the default is 99.

  • Reduce the number of days by editing the  RemoveDeviceAfterInactiveDays value in  C:\Program Files\1E\Tachyon\Coordinator\Tachyon.Server.Coordinator.exe.config  then restart the 1E Tachyon Coordinator service. You will then only need to wait for the changed days before the offline devices disappear. This will also make devices that are inactive for any other reason disappear sooner. 

    When you have completed your Tachyon Agent upgrade deployment then you must change this back to the default.


These options will not have any effect on a device's ability to receive and run instructions when it is next online.

The following sub-headings are excerpts from the 1E Client 5.1 documentation. The links in the excerpts will also navigate to that documentation space.