Peoplesoft update and upgrade using Change Assistant

I went through people books to know when and where the Change assistant is used. The following details gives a brief idea for the same. Hope you will find this useful

PeopleSoft software updates refers to updating a PeopleSoft application with a maintenance build. Change Assistant is a tool that expedites the software update process. It includes the process of finding, analyzing, downloading and applying software patches and updates.

The software upgrade process refers to the process of upgrading your existing versions of PeopleTools and your PeopleSoft application. This process uses Change Assistant, and the Environment Management Framework when running remote upgrade processes.

Environment Management Framework (EMF) is a product that gathers and publishes PeopleSoft installation, configuration, and update information. It enables you to identify and view data about PeopleSoft environments. You can use EMF to obtain a snapshot of configuration and setup information about the file servers, the web servers, the application servers, the individual hosts, and the PeopleSoft Process Scheduler servers that comprise your PeopleSoft system

Before you can begin the update process, you must set up your update environment by:

· Configuring and running the Environment Management components.

· Installing and configuring Change Assistant.

Software update process:

1. After installing and configuring Change Assistant and the Environment Management components, you upload the environment data, including the patch history, to PeopleSoft Customer Connection.

2. Using the application environment data provided by Change Assistant, PeopleSoft Customer Connection can identify all the unapplied updates in a given environment. This is the discovery phase.

3. As a Change Assistant user, you can access PeopleSoft Customer Connection to obtain a list of update IDs. You can download those update IDs to an Excel spreadsheet and review them offline.

4. Once you have determined which updates you want to apply, then use Change Assistant to request all the change packages associated with the selected update IDs to be downloaded.

5. You can download an individual change package or multiple change packages.

6. After you have downloaded the change packages, you can then apply them in a batch or individually. If requisites are required, they will be included in the list as well.

Change Assistant:

· Change Assistant is a standalone application that enables you to assemble and organize the steps necessary to apply patches and fixes for maintenance updates.

· In order to perform reliable and accurate updates, Change Assistant gathers all the necessary information including the change log from the Environment Management hub and uploads it to PeopleSoft Customer Connection. With the environment data available, PeopleSoft Customer Connection can determine what updates apply to your environment.

· When you access PeopleSoft Customer Connection, you can obtain a list of all updates that have not been applied for a given application environment including all prerequisites. You can then download a set of change packages associated with the update IDs and install the patches and fixes with minimal effort.

Software Upgrade process:

You use Change Assistant to help automate and customize the PeopleSoft upgrade process. A PeopleSoft upgrade typically includes a PeopleTools and a PeopleSoft application upgrade. Change Assistant replaces PeopleSoft Upgrade Assistant to automate all upgrades beginning with PeopleTools release 8.46. Any upgrades performed to a system running on a PeopleTools release prior to release 8.46, and using the conventional upgrade in place method of performing an upgrade should continue to use PeopleSoft Upgrade Assistant to perform the upgrade.

The following list describes the major steps within an upgrade when using Change Assistant.

· Download the Change Assistant template and documentation from Customer Connection for the specific upgrade process that you will be performing.

· Import the template into Change Assistant.

· Use the Database Configuration Wizard to define which databases are to be used during the upgrade.

· Create an upgrade job to define all the steps required to perform the upgrade that is catered to your specific environment

· Set the documentation directory.

· Use Change Assistant to guide you step-by-step through the upgrade processes. Change Assistant shows you documentation for each step, automates many of the steps, and keeps track of the upgrade progress.

The above details give you a brief idea about peoplesoft update and upgrade process. For the configuration of change assistant for upgrade and update, please refer peoplebooks.

Happy learning.