Advancing nysenate.gov - a hosting platform migration

Presenters: bjmac

Approaching a platform transition requires proper planning and execution on top of a serious technical architecture. In this session, we’ll discuss the migration of NYSenate.gov from the perspective of the project manager and lead developer.

A newly developed version of nysenate.org was launched in October of 2015, a few months later the decision was made to migrate from one advanced hosting platform to another.

Facing a a strict launch deadline we provided a complete migration process, automated drush migration scripts, a large number of bug fixes, and a custom SOLR search rework in just a few days to ensure the migration went smoothly, in addition to running the migration itself. 

Migrating from one complex and feature rich platform to another was a massive undertaking. The data set alone comprised hundreds of thousands of nodes and hundreds of gigabytes of images. Moreover, numerous prior custom implementations were not compatible with the new environment. In particular, an incredibly dense custom Solr search implementation had to be decoupled and ported to be compatible with Pantheon.

Throughout the process, the Mediacurrent and Pantheon teams worked closely to expedite delivery. This heightened level of engagement was vital to the final steps of the project. During the final stages of the project, a challenge arose—unexpected issues in code compatibility that were not present on the original platform. The teams worked together to quickly resolve these issues. This heightened level of engagement was vital to ensure a timely site launch. 

Ultimately, the three teams—Mediacurrent, the New York Senate, and Pantheon—accomplished all of their initial goals within the expedited timeline. 

Audience
Experience Level
Intermediate
Schedule Info
Conference Year
2016
Date / Time
Status
Accepted
Session Track
Community and Being Human