Server & Site Migration SOP¶

Version: 1.0
Owner: DevOps Team

Purpose¶

Standardize the process of migrating websites and services between servers or hosting providers.

Scope¶

Full server migration including files, databases, DNS, and SSL certificates.

Prerequisites¶

SSH access to both old and new servers
Root/sudo access on both servers
DNS management access
Maintenance window scheduled

Procedure¶

1. Pre-Migration Checklist¶

New server provisioned and hardened
Same software versions installed on both servers
Enough disk space on new server
Maintenance page prepared
Rollback plan documented
Stakeholders notified

2. Backup Old Server¶

# Backup files
tar czf /tmp/site-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz /var/www/html/

# Backup MySQL database
mysqldump -u root -p --all-databases > /tmp/db-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).sql

# Backup PostgreSQL
pg_dumpall -U postgres > /tmp/pg-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).sql

# Backup configs
tar czf /tmp/config-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz \
  /etc/nginx/ \
  /etc/php/ \
  /etc/mysql/ \
  /etc/letsencrypt/

3. Transfer to New Server¶

# From old server, transfer to new server
rsync -avz --progress -e ssh /tmp/site-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz user@new-server:/tmp/
rsync -avz --progress -e ssh /tmp/db-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).sql user@new-server:/tmp/
rsync -avz --progress -e ssh /tmp/config-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz user@new-server:/tmp/

4. Restore on New Server¶

# Extract files
tar xzf /tmp/site-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz -C /
chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/

# Restore database
mysql -u root -p < /tmp/db-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).sql

# Restore configs
tar xzf /tmp/config-backup-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz -C /

5. Update Configs for New Server¶

# Update database host if changed
# Update file paths in configs
# Update .env with new server values

# Test Nginx config
nginx -t && systemctl reload nginx

6. Set Up SSL¶

# Generate new certificate if new domain
certbot --nginx -d example.com

# Or copy old certs
cp /tmp/letsencrypt/* /etc/letsencrypt/

7. Test on New Server¶

# Test locally (edit /etc/hosts first)
curl -I http://localhost
curl -I https://localhost

# Check database connections
php -r "new PDO('mysql:host=localhost;dbname=wordpress', 'user', 'pass'); echo 'OK\n';"

8. Switch DNS¶

Update DNS records to point to new server IP:

Record	Type	Value	TTL
example.com	A		300
www.example.com	CNAME	example.com	300

Set TTL low (300s) before migration, restore after.

9. Post-Migration Verification¶

# Verify DNS propagated
nslookup example.com
dig example.com +short

# Verify site works
curl -I https://example.com

# Check SSL
curl -vI https://example.com 2>&1 | grep "SSL certificate"

# Monitor error logs
tail -f /var/log/nginx/error.log

Rollback Plan¶

# Point DNS back to old server IP
# Verify old server is still running
# Restore old DNS TTL values
# Notify stakeholders

Database Migration Only¶

# Export from old
mysqldump -h old-host -u user -p database > data.sql

# Import to new
mysql -h new-host -u user -p database < data.sql

# Update wp-config or app config with new DB host

WordPress-Specific¶

# Update URLs after migration
wp search-replace "old-domain.com" "new-domain.com"

# Update wp-config with new DB credentials
# Flush permalinks
wp rewrite flush

Verification¶

All files transferred and permissions correct
Database imported and connections working
SSL certificate valid
DNS propagated to new server
Site loads correctly on new server
Forms, logins, and critical paths working
Old server still available for rollback
Monitoring alerts configured for new server