Workgroup to Enterprise Migration

The migration of SolidWorks Workgroup PDM Vaults to Enterprise PDM is a very relevant topic to most SolidWorks users today. If approached with good planning and testing, these migrations can be accomplished with excellent results.  SolidWorks even provides a good tool to help in the process.

Migration Tool Availability

SolidWorks does not make the Workgroup to Enterprise Migration tool available to the customer. It is only available to VAR’s, Service Partners and SolidWorks resources, upon request. The requester for the tool must supply some specific information about the proposed migration. Some Items to be specified include the customer’s name, the size of the vault to be migrated, and target dates for test migration and production activation of the Enterprise vault.  Other information may be requested by SolidWorks before the Migration tool is provided.

Migration Environment

The migration tool must be run either directly on the Archive server or from a Workstation attached to the target Enterprise vault.

The Workgroup vault folder structure must reside on the machine where the Migration is to be performed and the where migration tool is installed. The first step in the process is to run the Workgroup Vault Export tool that is included as part of the Workgroup program installation. The export file is added to the Workgroup vault folder structure.

The Archive server where the new vault is to be generated should have free disk space at least 2.5 times larger than the source Workgroup vault. As part of the migration tool package, SolidWorks provides detailed information about minimum requirements for both hardware and software.

Discipline is Good

The more disciplined the use of the Workgroup vault has been over the lifetime of the vault, the easier the migration will be. Specifically, if the revision scheme and or lifecycles have been modified during the lifetime of the vault, the migration to Enterprise can be very complex.

Folders Get Duplicated

One of the simplest features of the migration tool is that Workgroup vault projects are replicated directly in the Enterprise vault. Selected projects can be migrated or the entire project tree can be migrated in one step. If the project folders need to be modified, they must be reorganized post migration.

Revision History and Lifecycle

There are a number of options that can be applied during the migration process depending on the fidelity desired.  The Workgroup vault document history and revisions can be duplicated very accurately, or only the latest revisions of all the files in the Workgroup vault can be placed in the Enterprise vault as Enterprise file versions.

If it is the goal to migrate the entire contents of the Workgroup vault into the Enterprise vault retaining all revisions and history, the solution can be complex. Since Workgroup allows for up to three levels of revision components, converting the revision scheme into an equivalent Enterprise scheme requires that all possible revision values that may have or ever had existed in the Workgroup vault be available in Enterprise. The migration tool does provide some default actions if this requirement is not met. But in order for fidelity to be maintained, the Enterprise vault must be able to duplicate the Workgroup revision values.

Since revisions are incremented in Enterprise via Workflow Transitions, the control over approval and revision incrementing must be considered before any production migration is attempted.

Workgroup Lifecycles can be migrated into a properly designed Enterprise Workflow. Again there is a requirement for the Enterprise Workflow to be designed to duplicate every Lifecycle status and possible status change that any document may have followed in Workgroup vault. The only method to be sure that everything works as intended is to test the migration workflow.

Migrating Users, Groups, and Properties

The migration tool does provide for migrating Users and User Groups from the Workgroup vault into the Enterprise vault. The conversion is very straight forward. If Enterprise is configured to utilize Windows or LDAP login, it may be more effective to add users and groups manually. But whatever the case, all users and groups rights will need to be reviewed post migration.

Properties may be migrated from the Workgroup vault files directly into Enterprise variables via the migration tool and from the files that support custom properties. The Enterprise vault variables and data cards must be configured to support all properties you wish to duplicate in the new vault.

All in all the process for the migration of a Workgroup vault into an Enterprise vault is simple in concept but complex in detail. The Vault Migration tool makes the process as easy as one could hope for, but the real key to a successful migration is to define the goals for the migration, planning, and testing before you start.

Tags: Enterprise PDM, EPDM, legacy data, migration, PDMWorks Enterprise, PDMWorks Workgroup, software testing, SolidWorks, solidworks components, Workgroup PDM, WPDM