Migrate data between simple application servers - Simple Application Server

If you cannot upgrade your simple application server to meet your business requirements or you want to migrate your simple application server from one region to another, you can migrate data on the simple application server to another simple application server in the same region or across regions. This topic describes how to migrate data between simple application servers within the same region and across regions.

Prerequisites

The simple application server whose data you want to migrate is in the Running state. If the simple application server is expired, you must renew the server first. For more information, see Upgrade and renew a simple application server.
The image versions of the simple application servers that are involved in the migration are consistent. If the image versions are inconsistent, you must reset the OS of the destination simple application server. For more information, see Reset a simple application server.

Scenarios

In this example, the Mantis Bug Tracker (MantisBT) system that is deployed on a simple application server is migrated to another simple application server. After the migration is complete, the MantisBT system runs as expected on the destination simple application server and all data remains intact. The following table describes the specific migration scenarios.

Note

If your business requirements can be met by upgrading your simple application server, we recommend that you directly upgrade the configurations of your simple application server. For more information, see Upgrade a simple application server.

Scenario	Source server configuration	Destination server configuration
Migration within the same region	Server name: Simple Application Server A Region: China (Hong Kong) Image: LAMP 7.4 application image Firewall: Traffic is allowed over ports 80, 443, and 22. Application: The MantisBT system is deployed in the following website root directory: /data/wwwroot/default. Note In this example, the MantisBT system is deployed on Simple Application Server A by default. For more information, see Deploy MantisBT.	Server name: Simple Application Server B Region: Migration within the same region: China (Hong Kong) Migration across regions: Singapore Image: LAMP 7.4 application image Firewall: Traffic is allowed over ports 80, 443, and 22.
Migration across regions

Preparations and precautions

Before you perform the migration, make the following preparations:

Create a snapshot to back up data.
We recommend that you create a snapshot to back up data of your destination simple application server. If server data exceptions caused by migration failures occur, you can use the snapshot to roll back the disks of the destination simple application server. For more information, see Create a snapshot.
Check the network settings.
Make sure that the source and destination simple application servers can access the Internet. If you migrate data across countries, you may experience low migration speeds caused by network instability
Consider the impacts of the migration on licensed applications.
Simple application servers in different regions reside in different virtual private clouds (VPCs). If you migrate data across regions, the underlying hardware devices may change after the migration. As a result, the licenses that are bound to the hardware devices may become invalid. You must consider the impacts of the migration on the licensed applications on your simple application server.

Before you migrate data, take note of the following items:

The runtime environments of the simple application servers must be of the same version.
Specific websites have high requirements on runtime environment versions. If the runtime environment versions of the source simple application server and the destination simple application server are different, the websites cannot run as expected after the migration is complete. We recommend that you specify the same image version for the simple application servers that are involved in the migration. If the image versions are different, you must reset the OS of the destination simple application server. For more information, see Reset a simple application server.
Note
Website building is complex. When you perform the migration operation, you must manually configure the destination simple application server to make sure that the destination simple application server has the same configurations as the source simple application server that is about to expire. For example, you must configure applications such as NGINX and Apache on the destination simple application server in the same manner as you configured them on the source simple application server.
The public IP address that you can use to access the MantisBT system changes after you complete the migration.
The public IP addresses of simple application servers are different from each other. If you bound a domain name for the source simple application server, you must also bind and resolve a domain name for the destination simple application server after you complete the migration.

Procedure

You can decide to migrate data between simple application servers within the same region or across regions based on your business requirements.

Migration within the same region

The following steps describe how to migrate data from Simple Application Server A to Simple Application Server B within the same region.

Create a snapshot for Simple Application Server A. For more information, see Create a snapshot.
Create a custom image based on the snapshot. For more information, see Create a custom image.

Check whether Simple Application Server B exists within the region of Simple Application Server A.

If Simple Application Server B exists within the same region, reset the OS of Simple Application Server B.
For more information, see Reset a simple application server.
1. In the left-side navigation pane, click Servers.
2. Click the instance ID in the card of Simple Application Server B.
3. Click the Server Resetting tab.
4. In the Change to other images section, click Custom Image.
5. Select the custom image that you created in Step 2 and click Confirm to replace.
6. In the Replace Image message, click OK.

If Simple Application Server B does not exist within the same region, perform the following operations to create Simple Application Server B based on the custom image.

For more information, see Use a custom image to create simple application servers.

In the left-side navigation pane, click Image.
Find the custom image created in Step 2 and choose > Create Simple Application Server in the Actions column.

On the server buy page, configure parameters to create Simple Application Server B.

By default, the instance type, region, zone, and image are automatically configured based on the custom image. You only need to configure other parameters based on your business requirements. The following table describes the parameters.

Parameter	Description
Instance Plan	The system selects a plan by default based on the size of the system disk data contained in the custom image. You can select a plan that provides higher configurations than the default plan based on your business requirements. You are charged additional fees for outbound data transfers over the Internet beyond the plan. For more information, see Billing overview.
Data Disk	Optional. To increase storage capacity on the simple application server, you can create and attach a data disk of a specific size. Note If the custom image contains the data of a data disk, the default value of Data Disk is greater than or equal to the size of data disk data contained in the custom image. The default value of Data Disk specifies the default size of the data disk that is attached to the simple application server to be created based on the custom image.
Subscription Time	Select a subscription period for the simple application server. You can select Auto-renewal based on your business requirements.
Quantity	Select the number of simple application servers that you want to create. Default value: 1. Note You can create a maximum of 50 simple application servers in a region for an Alibaba Cloud account.

Click Buy Now and follow the on-screen instructions to complete the payment.

Verify the migration result.
Enter <Public IP address of Simple Application Server B>/index.php in the browser on your on-premises computer. If you can view and use the MantisBT system as expected, the migration is successful.
Note
You can obtain the public IP address of Simple Application Server B from the card of Simple Application Server B.

Migration across regions

The following steps describe how to migrate data from Simple Application Server A to Simple Application Server B across regions.

Create a snapshot for Simple Application Server A. For more information, see Create a snapshot.
Create a custom image based on the snapshot. For more information, see Create a custom image.

Copy the custom image.

To copy the custom image to the destination region, perform the following operations. For more information, see Copy a custom image.

In the left-side navigation pane, click Image.
On the Image page, find the custom image that you want to copy and click Copy Image in the Actions column.

In the Copy Image dialog box, configure parameters based on your business requirements.

The following table describes the parameters.

Parameter	Description
Destination region	Select a destination region to which you want to copy the custom image. In this example, Singapore is selected.
Name of the custom image	Enter a name for the copy of the custom image. The name must be 2 to 128 characters in length and can contain underscores (_) and hyphens (-). The name cannot start with a special character or digit.
Description	Enter a description for the copy of the custom image. The default description contains the ID and region of the source custom image. You can modify the default description. The description must be 2 to 256 characters in length and cannot start with http:// or https://.

Click Confirm.
You can switch to the destination region. On the Image page, you can see that the custom image is in the Copying state. Wait until the custom image exits the Copying state.
Note
The Server ID/Name column that corresponds to the copy of the custom image is empty. This indicates that the copy of the custom image does not contain the name and ID of the source custom image. You can specify a new name and ID for the copy of the custom image.

Check whether Simple Application Server B exists within the region of Simple Application Server A.

If Simple Application Server B exists within the same region, reset the OS of Simple Application Server B.
For more information, see Reset a simple application server.
1. In the left-side navigation pane, click Servers.
2. Click the instance ID in the card of Simple Application Server B.
3. Click the Server Resetting tab.
4. In the Change to other images section, click Custom Image.
5. Select the custom image that you created in Step 2 and click Confirm to replace.
6. In the Replace Image message, click OK.

If Simple Application Server B does not exist within the same region, perform the following operations to create Simple Application Server B based on the custom image.

For more information, see Use a custom image to create simple application servers.

In the left-side navigation pane, click Image.
Find the custom image created in Step 2 and choose > Create Simple Application Server in the Actions column.

On the server buy page, configure parameters to create Simple Application Server B.

Parameter	Description
Instance Plan	The system selects a plan by default based on the size of the system disk data contained in the custom image. You can select a plan that provides higher configurations than the default plan based on your business requirements. You are charged additional fees for outbound data transfers over the Internet beyond the plan. For more information, see Billing overview.
Data Disk	Optional. To increase storage capacity on the simple application server, you can create and attach a data disk of a specific size. Note If the custom image contains the data of a data disk, the default value of Data Disk is greater than or equal to the size of data disk data contained in the custom image. The default value of Data Disk specifies the default size of the data disk that is attached to the simple application server to be created based on the custom image.
Subscription Time	Select a subscription period for the simple application server. You can select Auto-renewal based on your business requirements.
Quantity	Select the number of simple application servers that you want to create. Default value: 1. Note You can create a maximum of 50 simple application servers in a region for an Alibaba Cloud account.

Click Buy Now and follow the on-screen instructions to complete the payment.

Verify the migration result.
Enter <Public IP address of Simple Application Server B>/index.php in the browser on your on-premises computer. If you can view and use the MantisBT system as expected, the migration is successful.
Note
You can obtain the public IP address of Simple Application Server B from the card of Simple Application Server B.

Related operations

The public IP addresses of the source simple application server and the destination simple application server are different. If you bound and resolved a domain name for the source simple application server, you must unbind the domain name from the source simple application server and bind and resolve the domain name to the destination simple application server after you complete the migration. For more information, see Bind and resolve a domain name.