Cognos 11.1.7 - October 9 to 30, 2020

The latest Cognos Analytics (11.1.7) upgrade has been released!  You can find information on what’s new in this upgrade here:

https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSEP7J_11.1.0/com.ibm.swg.ba.cognos.ca_new.doc/c_ca_nf_11_1_7_container.html

We will follow our standard upgrade procedures listed below. 

All upgrades for Cognos Analytics occur in place. High level, the strategy for all upgrades is:

1. ITS-BIA will review the upgrade in our sandbox prior to planning an upgrade of DEV
2. Perform upgrades of the DEV environment on the weekend before the 3rd week of a month as this is generally the quietest period of the month for most teams.
3. Allow one week for review of the upgrade in the DEV environment.
   1. At the end of the week a GO/ROLLBACK determination will be made.
   2. GO – the upgrade is applied to QA over the weekend following the DEV upgrade. (Upgrade is NOT applied to PROD.)
   3. ROLLBACK – the upgrade is rolled back from DEV
   4. During the one week period where DEV has been upgraded and QA / PROD have not, all teams will be in a “code freeze” in that no migrations from DEV can occur.
4. Allow two weeks for review of the upgrade in the QA environment.
   1. At the end of the week a GO/ROLLBACK determination will be made.
   2. GO – the upgrade is applied to PROD over the weekend following the QA upgrade.
   3. ROLLBACK – the upgrade is rolled back from DEV and QA.
   4. During the one week period where DEV and QA have been upgraded and PROD has not, all teams will be in a “code freeze” in that no migrations to PROD can occur. Migrations from DEV to QA may be conducted.
5. Upgrade the PROD environment.
   1. Based on GO determination from both Cognos QA and Cognos DEV environments based directly on your feedback.

Given that strategy, the plan for the upgrade from 11.1.3 (current) to 11.1.7 is as follows:

Calendar layout at bottom of email.

1. Now thru 5:00 PM, Friday, October 9:  ITS-BIA will review the upgrade in our sandbox prior to planning an upgrade of DEV.  The 11.1.7 upgrade has already been installed on our sandbox.
2. 5:00 PM on Friday, October 9: 
   1. A backup of the DEV content store will be conducted.  This will be insurance against any unforeseen issue during the upgrade process.
   2. The admin team will perform the upgrade of the DEV environment.
3. Post DEV upgrade Friday, October 9 thru 5:00 PM Thursday, October 15:
   1. All development teams to review content in Cognos DEV and test for issues related to the upgrade.
   2. Any issues are to be reported by sending an email to busintel@ucsd.edu
   3. If an issue is deemed critical, a rollback of DEV to 11.1.3 will be scheduled as soon as possible.
   4. NO MIGRATIONS TO QA/PROD can occur as the content from the upgraded environment will not work in environments on an earlier version.
4. Friday, October 16
   
   1. GO/ROLLBACK determination for QA upgrade will be made.
   2. GO – the upgrade is applied to QA only over the weekend following the DEV upgrade. 
      1. This will be the determination if no new issue(s) are found in the upgraded version or if any new issue noted is deemed insignificant enough to move forward.
   3. ROLLBACK – the upgrade is rolled back from DEV
      1. This will be the determination only if new issues are found in the upgraded version and those issues are deemed significant.
5. 5:00 PM on Friday, October 16 (based on GO determination in previous step):
   1. A backup of the QA content store will be conducted.  This will be insurance against any unforeseen issue during the upgrade process.
   2. The admin team will perform the upgrade of the QA environment.
6. Post QA upgrade Friday, October 16 thru 5:00 PM Thursday, October 29:
   1. All development teams to review content in Cognos QA and work with end users to test for issues related to the upgrade.
   2. Any issues are to be reported by sending an email to busintel@ucsd.edu
   3. If an issue is deemed critical, a rollback of QA and DEV to 11.1.3 will be scheduled as soon as possible.
   4. NO MIGRATIONS TO PROD can occur as the content from the upgraded environment will not work in environments on an earlier version.  Content may be migrated from DEV to QA.
7. Friday, October 30
   
   1. GO/ROLLBACK determination for PROD upgrade will be made.
   2. GO – the upgrade is applied to PROD over the weekend following the QA upgrade. 
      1. This will be the determination if no new issue(s) are found in the upgraded version or if any new issue noted is deemed insignificant enough to move forward.
   3. ROLLBACK – the upgrade is rolled back from DEV and QA. 
      1. This will be the determination only if new issues are found in the upgraded version and those issues are deemed significant.
8. 5:00 PM on Friday, October 30 (based on GO determination in previous step):
   1. A backup of the PROD content store will be conducted.  This will be insurance against any unforeseen issue during the upgrade process.
   2. The admin team will perform the upgrade of the PROD environment.

Please take note of the 3 week period from Friday, October 9 through Friday, October 30 where content may not be migrated to PROD.  Please be sure all required content is migrated from DEV to PROD prior to the DEV upgrade at 5:00 PM on Friday, October 9.  Please be sure all required content is migrated from QA to PROD prior to the QA upgrade at 5:00 PM on Friday, October 16.