Before you upgrade your Cisco Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator cluster:

• Note that downgrading from this release is not supported.

  If you ever want to downgrade, you can deploy a brand-new cluster using the earlier version and then restore configuration from the earlier release. Note that you cannot restore a backup created on a newer version in an older version, in other words restoring a backup from release 4.2(1) in release 3.7(1) is not supported.

• The backup/restore upgrade workflow supports upgrades from any Multi-Site Orchestrator (MSO) release 2.x and 3.x as well as Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator (NDO) release 3.x and 4.x to this release of NDO.

• Ensure that there are no configuration drifts before you back up your existing configuration.

  This applies to all template types available in your existing release, such as application, tenant policies, fabric policies, and fabric resource policies templates.

  If your existing Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator is release 3.7(1) or later, you can use the drift reconciliation workflow for application templates, as described in the "Configuration Drifts" section of the Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator Configuration Guide.

• Back up and download your existing Orchestrator configurations.

  Configuration backups are described in the "Backup and Restore" chapter of the Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator Configuration Guide for your release.

• Back up and download your existing fabrics' configurations.

  We recommend running configuration drift reconciliation after you upgrade your Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator, which may require you to redeploy configurations to your fabrics. As such, we recommend creating configuration backups of all fabrics managed by your Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator.

  For more information on creating Cisco APIC configuration backups, see the "Management" chapter of the Cisco APIC Basic Configuration Guide for your release.

  For more information on creating Cisco Cloud Network Controller configuration backups, see the "Configuring Cisco Cloud Network Controller Components" chapter of the Cisco Cloud Network Controller User Guide for your release.

  For more information on creating Cisco Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller configuration backups, see the "Backup and Restore" chapter of the Cisco NDFC Fabric Controller Configuration Guide for your release.

• Note that if versioning enabled (supported since release 3.4(1)), only the latest versions of the templates are preserved during the upgrade.

  All other existing versions of templates, including older versions that are tagged Golden, will not be transferred.

• Ensure that all templates are in a supported state before creating the configuration backup of the existing cluster:

  • Templates that are undeployed or were never deployed after they were created require no additional attention and will be migrated during the upgrade.

  • All deployed templates must have no pending configuration changes.

    If you have one or more templates that have been modified since they were last deployed, you must either deploy the latest version of the template or undo the changes to the template since it was deployed by reverting to the last-deployed version and re-deploying it.

  Note

  Attempting to restore a backup that contains invalid templates will fail and you would need to revert to your existing release, restore your backup, resolve any existing issues, and then restart the migration process. So we strongly recommend that you validate your backup locally using the provided Python script before proceeding with the upgrade, as described in the Validate Existing Configuration and Create Backup section below. If for any reason you are unable to run the script, we recommend contacting Cisco support to have them validate your configuration backup before proceeding with the upgrade.

• When installing the Orchestrator service, you can do so in one of two ways:

  • Using the Nexus Dashboard's App Store, in which case, the Cisco DC App Center must be reachable from the Nexus Dashboard via the Management Network directly or using a proxy configuration. Nexus Dashboard proxy configuration is described in the Nexus Dashboard User Guide.

    Note

    The App Store allows you to upgrade to the latest available version of the service only. If you want to upgrade to a different release, you must use the manual upgrade process as described below.

  • By manually uploading the new app image, which you can do if you are unable to establish the connection to the DC App Center or if you want to upgrade to a version of the service that is not the latest available release.

• SR-MPLS and SDA integration configurations are not transferred during the upgrade.

  If you have either of these integrations in your deployment, it will not affect the migration, but you will receive a notification and will need to reconfigure them after you complete the upgrade.

• If you plan to add and manage new Cloud Network Controller sites after you upgrade your Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator to this release, ensure that they are running Cloud Network Controller release 5.2(1) or later.

  On-boarding and managing Cloud Network Controller sites running earlier releases is not supported.

• Ensure that you have a remote location for backups that you can add to the Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator after the upgrade.

  Backing up and restoring configuration in release 4.1(2) and later requires the backup to be stored on a remote location, which must be configured in NDO UI. Detailed information about backups and remote locations is available in the Operations > Backup and Restore chapter of the Cisco Nexus Dashboard Orchestrator Configuration Guide.

  Note that if you had a remote location already configured in your existing installation, it is not preserved during configuration restore; so you will need to add the same remote location after you deploy this release in order to restore the configuration.