Part 5 – Rebuild vs. Migration Utility: Pros and Cons

Since the release of the FDM Migration Utility in September 2015, we’ve worked on several FDM Classic to FDMEE upgrade projects. We’ve elected to use the Utility for a handful of those implementations. Why?

Rebuild Experience

Oracle debuted FDMEE Release 11.1.2.3.0 in Spring 2013. The FDM Migration Utility was delivered more than 2 years later. During this time, you can say, we’ve become pretty good at rebuilding FDM Classic artifacts in FDMEE.

We know the success factors for FDMEE upgrade projects. We’ve developed our own methods and home-grown utilities to accelerate the rebuild process. Most importantly, we know the benefits of rebuilding FDM in FDMEE from the ground up. There’s additional justification for manually re-creating all FDM content from scratch.

Spring Cleaning and Simple Application Enhancements

FDM Artifact MigrationRemember the last time you moved from one place to another?  Maybe it was a local move to a bigger place or maybe you moved to a different state for a new job.  Either way, one of the major tasks when moving is determining what stays and what goes.  If an item is useful – it gets packed.  If it isn’t, it gets purged.  Think of your upgrade from FDM Classic to FDMEE in the same way.

Most Legacy FDM applications can benefit from some spring cleaning.  Spending the time to examine your existing FDM Classic application(s) and associated processes can yield some worthwhile benefits. The main objectives of the application evaluation phase of your project is:

  • Purge Outdated Content – Minimize application clutter by omitting outdated artifacts.
  • Enhance Existing Integration Processes – Look for opportunities where FDMEE can offer a more efficient or effective way to accomplish a given task. (Multi-dimensional mapping and EPM to EPM Data Synchronization come to mind. )

When Is the Migration Utility Beneficial?

We have one factor when deciding when to use FDM Migration Utility or go with a complete rebuild approach – Volume.  If there is a significant amount of artifacts to migrate, the Utility can be worth the time and effort spent to install, configure, and perform pre-requisite and post-migration steps.  Here are a few statistics for a recent project where we used the Utility.

  • 9 individual FDM Classic applications
  • Nearly 1,500 locations
  • Approximately 100 import formats
  • Over 1,000 unique map sets

The project also included TONS of custom scripting.  Obviously, the Utility couldn’t convert the scripts (the most time-consuming task), but it was a great way to jump start the upgrade effort.

So, now, that you have a high-level idea of both upgrade methods, what’s next?

Next: Part 6 – Legacy FDM to FDMEE: Where to Start
Blog Series: Choose the Best Way to Migrate FDM Classic to FDMEE

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