Migrating Sitecore 9.0.1 to 9.1.1.

Introduction

This guide describes how to upgrade project from Sitecore Experience Platform 9.0.1 to 9.1.1 and it was used for Brainjuice project. The process relied mostly on Sitecore-911-Upgrade-Guide.pdf.

Setup Prerequisites

Windows 10
Windows PowerShell version 5.1 or later
Sitecore Licensemust have xDB enabled
MS SQL Server 2016 SP2 or later
.Net Framework 4.7.2 or later
.Net Core 2.1 Runtime (v2.1.3)
Web Deploy 3.6
URL Rewrite 2.1
SOLR 7.2.1
Java Runtime Environment
NSSM
Sitecore Install Framework (SIF)1.0 or later

Make sure that you have all prerequisites installed. Besides these prerequisites, you will need files and scripts for upgrading to Sitecore 9.1.1. Check section 2.2 in “Sitecore-911-Upgrade-Guide”. You can download these files here - https://dev.sitecore.net/Downloads/Sitecore_Experience_Platform/91/Sitecore_Experience_Platform_91_Update1.aspx

Next step in installation process is to install Sitecore Identity server which is introduced in 9.1 version. Follow 3.1 section in guide PDF. Change physical path of Identity Server in IdentityServer.json. Instead of:

"Site.PhysicalPath": "[joinpath(environment('SystemDrive'), 'inetpub', 'wwwroot', parameter('SiteName'))]"

Put something like:

"Site.PhysicalPath": "[joinpath(environment('SystemDrive'), 'Projects', 'brainjuice', 'sandbox', parameter('SiteName'))]",

Then follow sections 4.3 and 4.4 – “To Upgrade from Sitecore XP 9.0 Initial Release or later” and “Final Preparations” (you can skip section 4.1 and 4.2 since they are irrelevant for this project)

Note: In section 4.4.2 – “Indexing and Performance” Instead of just commenting:

<handler type="Sitecore.ContentSearch.Events.PackagingEventHandler, Sitecore.ContentSearch" method="OnPackageInstallItemsEndRemoteHandler"/>

I had to comment additional handlers in order to complete Sitecore upgrade:

<!-- </event> →

Now you can start with installing upgrade package, check chapter 5 – “Install the upgrade package”. You can skip resolving warnings in this phase and do that in later steps which will be described here, but it is recommended to review all collisions, errors and warnings.
After installing "Sitecore 9.1.1 rev. 002459 (update package for 9.x).update" some configurations in web.config could be lost or overwritten. For example, in order to make Solr available again, this line in web.config:

should be changed to:

Next step is 6.4 – Update Solr (you can skip chapters 6.1, 6.2 and 6.3 for Brainjuice project). After finishing Solr update, if not all solr indexes are displayed copy all of them from previous solr version path "C:\solr\server\solr" to new solr and restart app pool. If not all of them appear in "Populate Solr Managed Schema", then enable merged configs and disable currently enabled configs.

Sitecore.ContentTesting.Solr.IndexConfiguration.merged.config

Sitecore.Marketing.Definitions.MarketingAssets.Repositories.Solr.Index.Master.merged.config

Sitecore.Marketing.Definitions.MarketingAssets.Repositories.Solr.Index.Web.merged.config

Sitecore.Marketing.Solr.Index.Master.merged.config

Sitecore.Marketing.Solr.Index.Web.merged.config

Skip chapter 7 – “xConnect Install” since xConnect is already installed (you will need to just update it for Brainjuice project) and follow chapter 8 – “Install the Sitecore Cortex™ Processing Engine”
Follow chapter 9 - Upgrade xConnect to Sitecore XP 9.1.1. For 9.4 - “Configure the Search Provider” just update connection string name. Creating Solr cores are not needed since we added them in previous steps. Skip chapter 9.5 and complete chapter 9.6 – “Resume the Services”
Next step is to configure Sitecore Identity Client – chapter 10.2 and General Maintenance – chapter 10.3 (You can skip 10.1 since it is intended for upgrading from Sitecore XP 9.1)
Skip 10.4 and follow 10.5 – xDB Maintenance
Skip 10.6 and follow 10.7 – “Upgrading from Sitecore XP 9.0, Update 1, or Update 2”
Skip chapter 11 – “Upgrade Multiple Instances” if you use single instance and skip chapter 12 – “Migrate xDB data” since it is only for upgrading from Sitecore XP 8.1 and Sitecore XP 8.2
Skip also all other chapters 13, 14 and 15
Install Score version 3.1.9 which is compatible with Sitecore 9.1.1
After finishing all steps check TDS items, some items might not be synchronized
Try to rebuild solution and open Sitecore instance. Hopefully everything will work