Hi, I really wish there was an “Upgrade” Forum. We are on Navision Financials 2.6 and are planning to upgrade to 3.1. At this stage we do not want to go SQL because of the performance issues. My questions: 1. Does anyone have an idea of how long it would take to upgrade from 2.6 to 3.1. We have a lot of customisations, many fields added to tables and additional forms, dataports and reports. 2. Is there a toolkit for upgrading from 2.6 to 3.1? 3. Would it take much longer to go straight to 3.6? Thank you Anret
Hi Anret, Please do a search on this site for ‘upgrade’ and you will find lots of information. There has been a few threads on this subject over the last 4-5 months and between them you should be able to find the answers you require. Good Luck Robin
Hi Anret With all of the issues surrounding 3.1 I would recommend going straight to 3.60 if it does not prove greatly different from a time/cost perspective.
I agree about going straight to 3.6. If you’re going to expend the effort to upgrade, go to the latest version. The amount of time and effort it will take is a function of the number of modifications and what they touch. There is also sometimes the issue of “Navision now has standard a function similar to what we created custom - shall we use the new standard function or bring over our customization?”. In some cases bringing forward customizations requires that they be redesigned in order to fit within the new environment. In other words there’s no quick answer, you’ll have to do the analysis, then you could ask the question with more detail and maybe get some useful feedback.
anret, I should also agree on going straight from 2.6 to 3.1… inclusively the executables on 3.1 are giving much more trouble than on 3.6. The time it takes on upgrading it’s usually between 3 days (almost standard databases) and 2 weeks, depending on how customized your database is and how big it’s (there are several tests and process that will take a lot of time if having a lot of data on your database).In databases highly customized with big changes to the posting routines and heavily interacting with mods like advanced distribution and contracts it can take you inclusively a bit more as those mods have been redesigned on 3.6, so you’ve to take special care on those mods your database it’s having interacting with them. There’s also a toolkit that will help you on upgrading to the 3.6 version (there’s usually a toolkit per new version), that will guide you on the steps and the procedures to execute for the upgrade (contact your local NSC or NTR for getting the toolkit). The process that can take you more time on upgrading it’s upgrading the application objects. Using Mergetool it’s usually a good idea when upgrading the tables on the database, as it really helps you a lot on them for having all the keys and all the fields properly updated. Another way it’s exporting in text mode the objects from your 2.6 version and from a standard 2.6 version and using a comparing tool for checking the differences between those two files and making the proper changes on 3.6… but that’s what mergetool does more or less… so i should recommend you using it instead.
From bitter experience [:(] I can also agree with a majority of what has already been said but I must add a word of caution when using the Navision Developers Toolkit. As has been mentioned the whole process is effected by the amount of modifications to the system you are upgrading from. The point I would like to add is that this also plays a huge factor in the ability of the toolkit to perform merges. If you use the merge tool make sure that you check it’s output thoroughly afterward. We have used it in the past only to discover it has done some very odd things to objects that contained high levels of customisation. Just to take one example, option fields often were found to be totally innaccurate.[B)]. Ultimately, although I agree the merge tool can be a very useful function, I would urge that you approach its use with caution. If you search this site as Robin suggests, you should get some options on how to best approach this task. Good luck!!
Hi everyone, Thanks for all the replies. We are only busy planning this, but I will defnitely rather have them look at 3.6 now.
Through a number of upgrades for different Solution Centers, different versions, different types of mods, different databases (Financials, Mfg, AD, SQL), we have found no substitute for the active involvement of a skilled Navision Developer in the process. I think they should be involved in the evaluation of heavily modified sections, the actual code upgrade and the testing. As far as the amount of time, we have had them take anywhere from two days to over a person month, depending on the quantity of mods and the specific areas affected, as well as the data volume.