IMPORTANT: If you are running Firefly 5 please do NOT follow these instructions. If you are running Firefly 5 and need to move Firefly to a new environment please contact the Firefly support team for tailored instructions.

Moving an entire installation (including the SQL database)

Clients sometimes need to move their Firefly installation from one server to another. To do this, you should follow these steps:

1. Backup the SQL database, the installation folder, and the resources folder to a location where you can access them on the new server (see this Microsoft TechNet article for more details).
2. If necessary install SQL Server on the new server.
3. Remember to enabled mixed mode authentication.
4. Remember to install the Full Text Indexing option in order for search to work in Firefly.
5. Restore the SQL database on the new server (see this MSDN article for more details).
6. Restore the resources folder on the new server.
7. Ensure that ASP.NET is not "prohibited" on IIS on the new server (see here).
8. Open your old Firefly.config file as a reference for you.
9. Run the Firefly installer, pointing it at the database, and resources folder you restored. When prompted to, create a new SQL user. It will be easier if you use the same username (see your old Firefly.config and the DBuser line for reference here).
10. Run the SQL Server user 'fix' script here.
11. Copy your old Template subfolders (not the standard Firefly ones) into the Templates folder in the newly installed Firefly.
12. Copy across the old sqlkeyring.config file (located in C:\Program Files (x86)\Firefly.NET\www\Plugins\SQLKeyringPlugin) to the same folder in the new installation.
13. Fire up a web browser and check Firefly is working!  We recommend running a Health Check, from the Tools menu, and addressing any suggestions it might make.
14. We recommend you do this once at your own pace as a test run, and when confident perform it again thus getting a more up to date copy of the database before switchover.

Moving Firefly alone to a new web server (keeping the SQL database in its current location)

1. Copy the resources folder from the old server to the new one
2. Open your old Firefly.config file as a reference for you.
3. Run the Firefly installer on the new server, pointing it at the existing database and the resources folder you copied over.  Use the existing username and password to access SQL Server (see your old Firefly.config file and the DBuser line for reference here).
4. Copy your custom template subfolders (not the standard Firefly ones) into the www\Templates folder in the newly installed Firefly.
5. Copy across the old sqlkeyring.config file (located in C:\Program Files (x86)\Firefly.NET\www\Plugins\SQLKeyringPlugin) to the same folder in the new installation.
6. Modify the DNS records to point to the new web server.
7. Open a web browser and check Firefly is working!
8. In addition you may also want to have a look at our recommended server specs for information on the prerequisites that should be available before installing Firefly on the new server.