I’ve read around the forums for a like for like case but I can’t find anything similar. Perhaps I am trying to do to much in one step. Any assistance that can be offer would be greatly appreciated.
What is the correct steps (and the correct order of the steps) I should take to upgrade from v0.30 to current whilst migrating multiple email users across multiple domains and then also changing the hostname (main domain name) for the box?
I’m looking at a server migration to be able to upgrade to current (likely can not retain IP address), a domain name change for the box and I need to preserve user emails.
There is no clear simple process. Especially if you or your users are using NextCloud.
Is there a particular reason that you have to change the hostname of the MiaB or move it to a different VPS? Most VPS providers have tools such as restoring from snapshots which make this easier.
I have done a few of these migrations over the past few months for clients. They have taken from 4 to 16 hours to complete as there can be a rather intense amount of manual labor involved.
If you’d like to discuss hiring me to accomplish this for you, please send a PM. Otherwise, I’ll be happy to give you a general overview of the process if you’ll answer the questions/comments below.
Specific questions:
Are your users using Next/OwnCloud?
If yes, can they live with losing that data.
Who is your VPS provider?
Why do you believe that retaining your IP address is not possible?
How many domains, email accounts, and aliases (non Miab generated) are you using, and how much current storage?
Are any aspects of your MiaB server not functioning at present?
Why now? What is the motivation to upgrade now? Probably related to the last question.
Thank you for your response. Your offer of assistance is greatly appreciated, it may be that I explore the option of hiring you to achieve this but since there is no budget for this operation at this moment I’m trying to find as much support as possible to achieve this myself.
We do not use Next/OwnCloud so that is not a concern however after the update we would like to start using it.
The MIAB box is hosted with Digital Ocean however the current box is with one ‘Team’ my personal team and it must be moved to my work ‘team’.
There are 7 domains, 18 email accounts, 30 aliases, I’ve got 63% of system memory free on a 2GB droplet and the droplet is size at 50GB storage with and additional 300GB volume attached, box reports the disk has 168.59 GB space remaining.
All aspects of the server is works exactly as I would like, to your final point my concerns are around security rather than features although update NextCloud is appealing as I’d like to explore the utility of that for our businesses.
The change of box domain/host name is because I have secured a more preferable domain name.
Actually you may not be in too bad of shape. I missed the fact that your MiaB installation is updated as far as v0.30. If that is the case, you initial actions should not be much more than a normal migration to a new server via the backup restoration process. The devs have seemingly put a lot of work in to the migration process since the early days of Ubuntu 18.04. At that time an upgrade was much more problematic than it is now. I am sure that you have come across some of the threads on this forum from that time period.
So start here and follow the procedures (mostly) as written.
I say mostly because some things I do in my own way - as an example, I do not download the encrypted backups to my desktop machine. Instead, I rsync them to a folder on the new VPS, etc.
This is good, as you are going to dodge a major bullet. HOWEVER … once you start using NextCloud on the new server, please keep it up to date with new releases as this is the single most difficult aspect of MiaB to deal with if not kept up to date.
Yes, sadly this requirement will remove any chances of maintaining the current IP address unfortunately. You will have to start over with building a sending reputation with Google/Microsoft/Verizon I am afraid. Or use a SMTP relay.
Ok, so I am not certain how you attached this additional storage - if you mounted it at /home/user-data/ or set a STORAGE_ROOT environment variable when you created the MiaB originally. You will need to figure out how to implement this into the instructions at the link I gave earlier.
I am going to think that the path of least resistance here will be to simply move the MiaB as is retaining the original hostname. After that move is done, you can go back and reconfigure the MiaB with the new hostname.
One of the big things to take into consideration - and something I forgot to ask - is whether or not MiaB handles DNS for the domains, or if you are using External DNS.
That’s some great info. I thought the droplet being in the wrong ‘team’ was a problem.
I can’t remember how the additional storage is mounted. I know that it was an ‘after the fact’ addition to the droplet and MITB as I quickly ran out of storage in the initial config.
You are going to have to create a backup to migrate to a new VPS.
That or you do it the complete manual way which entails basically setting up the new v0.54 MiaB box and adding all of the users/domains/forwarders manually and then migrating the emails via rsync.
You do realize that if you are using Block Storage from DO that the storage is not included with the droplet backups, right? You have to make a manual snapshot of the Block Storage…
I was not aware of that. So droplet backup would restore MITB functions however if anything happened to the email data that would be gone? There’s hole in the backup plan.
Exactly. Which is why I was bringing it to your attention.
Personally, for some of my clients, I employ a backup strategy which copies the encrypted backups folder to an external server. So if everything blew up there’d be a minimal chance of restoration - rather than no chance. So far though, the one time I needed it - it came through and worked like a charm.
