Step by step guide to migrate from Search Services to Search Enterprise

From ACS Enterprise 7.1 two Search Engines are available:

• Search Services 1.x and 2.x, that is relaying on a customization of Apache SOLR 6.6
• Search Enterprise 3.x and 4.x, that is a standard client for Elasticsearch and OpenSearch

This project provides a step by step tutorial to upgrade an existing ACS running with Search Services (Solr) to a new ACS running with Search Enterprise (OpenSearch). Note that deploying the product in production environments would require additional configuration.

Docker Images from quay.io are used, since this product is only available for Alfresco Enterprise customers. In addition, Alfresco Nexus credentials are required. If you are Enterprise Customer or Partner but you are still experimenting problems to download Docker Images or download artifacts from Nexus, contact Alfresco Hyland Support in order to get required credentials and permissions.

This project provides different sample projects to support this configuration:

• docker-solr folder contains Docker Compose template to deploy ACS Enterprise 23.1 using Search Services (Solr)
• docker-esc folder contains Docker Compose template to deploy ACS Enterprise 23.1 using Search Enterprise (OpenSearch). Configuration to use Search Enterprise with Elasticsearch can be also supported with minor modifications
• alfresco-go-cli-scripts folder contains a shell script to create documents in ACS for custom content models
• models folder contains sample Alfresco content models
• docker-esc-reindexing folder contains local resources to run Alfresco Reindexing App for Search Enterprise (OpenSearch)

Running this tutorial involves following steps:

1. Prepare the source ACS 23.1 deployment with Search Services (Solr)
2. Prepare the Reindexing App for Search Enterprise (OpenSearch)
3. Prepare the target ACS 23.1 deployment with Search Enterprise (OpenSearch)
4. Run the Reindexing App for Search Enterprise (OpenSearch)

1. Prepare source ACS 23.1

Run docker-solr template

cd docker-solr
docker compose up

Custom content models

Upload models/data-dictionary/custom-content-model.xml to Repository > Data Dictionary > Models folder to deploy cfp content model. Be sure that Model Active property is enabled

Import Model models/model-manager/conference-model.zip to Model Manager in Share web application to deploy conference model. Be sure that Activate action is enabled

Note that acme-model is deployed in the Repository as an addon in acme-model-1.0.0.jar

Create sample content

Use sample Alfresco Go CLI Script provided in alfresco-go-cli-scripts to create sample content from custom content models

cd alfresco-go-cli-scripts

Download alfresco Go CLI binary from https://github.com/aborroy/alfresco-go-cli/releases

Create default endpoint and credentials for Alfresco Repository

./alfresco config set -s http://localhost:8080/alfresco -u admin -p admin

Run the script to upload files to Alfresco Repository

./create-custom-content.sh

This will create the following files in Shared/folder folder: file_acme.txt, file_cfp.txt, file_conf.txt

From this point source ACS Repository contains document from custom content models

Download Namespace to Prefix Mapping

Note that the addon model-ns-prefix-mapping is deployed in the repository as an addon in model-ns-prefix-mapping-1.0.0.jar

Save JSON mapping to a local file

curl --user admin:admin http://localhost:8080/alfresco/s/model/ns-prefix-map -o reindex.prefixes-file.json

This file will be used by the Reindexing App later.

2. Prepare Reindexing App

Download Reindexing App from Alfresco Nexus

cd docker-esc-reindexing
curl --user $NEXUS_USER:$NEXUS_PASS \
https://nexus.alfresco.com/nexus/service/local/repositories/enterprise-releases/content/org/alfresco/alfresco-elasticsearch-reindexing/4.0.0/alfresco-elasticsearch-reindexing-4.0.0-app.jar \
-o alfresco-elasticsearch-reindexing-4.0.0-app.jar

Move reindex.prefixes-file.json file to this folder

move ../alfresco-go-cli-scripts/reindex.prefixes-file.json .

3. Prepare target ACS 23.1

Template docker-esc includes ACS 23.1 with Search Enterprise (OpenSearch) and exposes all the services required by Reindexing App:

• ActiveMQ: tcp://localhost:61616
• Database: jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/alfresco
• Transform Service: http://localhost:8095/transform/config
• OpenSearch: http://localhost:9200

cd docker-esc

Replicate Database

A Replica of Alfresco Database is required. For this tutorial, existing PostgreSQL data from source Database is copied to target deployment.

mkdir data
cd data
cp -r ../../docker-solr/data/postgres-data .

Reuse Content Store

For this tutorial, existing Content Store from source is mounted as external volume in compose.yaml

  alfresco:
    volumes: 
        - ../docker-solr/data/alf-repo-data:/usr/local/tomcat/alf_data

Deploy custom models

Both cfp and conference content models are already available, since database and content store from source ACS is re-used

In addition, acme-model is deployed in the Repository as an addon in acme-model-1.0.0.jar

Create Index in OpenSearch

Run docker-esc template

docker compose up

Once the deployment is up & ready log in Alfresco Workspace using default credentials (admin/admin) and click "Search"

http://localhost:8080/workspace/

Verify the model has been created in OpenSearch using the following URL:

http://localhost:9200/alfresco/_mapping

{"alfresco":
	{"mappings":
		{"dynamic":"false","properties":
			{"ALIVE":{"type":"boolean"},"ANAME":{"type":"keyword"},"...": {"...":"..."} }
		}
	}
}

4. Run Reindexing App

Before running Reindexing App (with target ACS 23.1 up & running), identify the maximum number Id in ALF_NODE table.

# psql --u alfresco
psql (14.4 (Debian 14.4-1.pgdg110+1))
Type "help" for help.

alfresco=# select max(id) from alf_node;
 max
-----
 896
(1 row)

This result will define the limit for the reindexing process 896

At this point, Reindeing App can be run to populate OpenSearch index in target ACS

cd docker-esc-reindexing
java -jar alfresco-elasticsearch-reindexing-4.0.0-app.jar \
  --alfresco.reindex.jobName=reindexByIds \
  --alfresco.reindex.pagesize=100 \
  --alfresco.reindex.batchSize=100  \
  --alfresco.reindex.fromId=1 \
  --alfresco.reindex.toId=896 \
  --alfresco.reindex.concurrentProcessors=2 \
  --alfresco.accepted-content-media-types-cache.base-url=http://localhost:8095/transform/config \
  --spring.activemq.broker-url="tcp://localhost:61616?jms.useAsyncSend=true" \
  --spring.elasticsearch.rest.uris=http://localhost:9200 \
  --spring.datasource.url=jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/alfresco \
  --alfresco.reindex.prefixes-file=file:reindex.prefixes-file.json

Step: [reindexByIdsStep] executed in 2s185ms
Total number of indexed nodes (includes retried items) 786
Total number of failed nodes (includes retried items) 0
Total number of updated nodes with Path (includes retried items) 785
Total number of nodes with failed Path update (includes retried items) 0