Putting Aleph in Read-Only Mode during cutover to new instance

Question

How can Aleph be put in read-only mode during cutover from one version to another (or for some other reason)?

The idea is, during cutover, to have the pc_server down, but to have the Aleph OPAC, z39.50, and JBOSS/the Web Services server (which is necessary for Primo OvP) working.

Though the OPAC (and Primo) are up, users should be prevented from making any updates, requests, renewals, etc. while continuing to allow searching and access to the library card/account information.

Answer

1. Do util w/5 (View/Update Global System status) to toggle CIRC, ACQ, CAT, ILL, JOBD, QUEUE-BATCH, and ALL-UE  DOWN, while leaving SYSTEM and WWW-SERVER  UP.

2. Run $alephe_root/aleph_shutdown. {Aleph needs to be down entirely while the Oracle data is being exported from the old instance (Upgrade Express step "Export customer data").}

3. Perform the export.

4. Do util w/3 to start the www_server(s), z39_server(s), z39_gate, and jboss (the Web Services Server).   

It may be thtat the fact that CIRC, CAT, ACQ. and ILL have been toggled down in step 1 will prevent GUI users from making any updates even though the pc_server is running, but we typically recommend also leaving the pc_server(s) down.   In the OPAC (and in Primo), patrons will still be able to search the database and to check their accounts, but not be able to renew books, place requests, etc. (Note the z69 OPAC event records will continue to be written, but since the Oracle tables have already been extracted they will not be includable in future statistics.)

Note that toggling a function down -- in particular the batch queue function -- does not automatically stop it.  In order to stop all of the currently-running functions, aleph_shutdown needs to be run, followed by aleph_startup to bring up the functions which have *not* been toggled DOWN.  

Offline Circulation can be used to record circulation activity during this time that the pc_server is down -- then later be loaded onto the new server. See  the article:  How to upload offline circulation transactions to server .   The search:  "offline circulation", with Aleph as the product, shows other relevant knowledge articles.

Additional Information

In the above setup, since all the GUI modules are down, there's no way to do GUI Search.  The following article describes how -- in the case of an ILS migration -- you can have GUI Circ up (with intention of doing a "Circ refresh" at the end), with GUI Search enabled (via GUI Circ):

   Make Aleph Read-Only for Everything but Circ during Alma Cutover

• Article last edited: 5-Jun-2018