8.2 Preparations

The preparation steps will not affect the running system and can be done in advance.

1. Ensure that the environment variables are set correctly:

   Variable	Description
   MZ_HOME	This environment variable specifies where the software is installed.
   JAVA_HOME	This environment variable specifies where the JDK is installed.
   PATH	This environment variable specifies the search path and must contain the following directories: $JAVA_HOME/bin:$MZ_HOME/bin

   
   

   Example - Setting Environment Variables

   export MZ_HOME=/opt/mz
   export JAVA_HOME=/opt/jdk/jdk1.8.0_121
   export PATH=$JAVA_HOME/bin:$MZ_HOME/bin:$PATH

   Note!

   You must specify the Java version required for the version that you are upgrading from.

2. Make a backup of all your configurations with System Export.

   $ mzsh mzadmin/<password> systemexport <backup directory>/<filename>

   Note!

   These configurations must be imported after the upgrade.

3. For safety, make an online backup of the database(s). For information about how to perform an online backup, see Backup and Disaster Recovery Procedures in the System Administrator's Guide.
    

4. If you are performing an upgrade of a system with large configurations, you may need to increase the maximum number of file descriptors.

   Example - Changing the Maximum Number of File Descriptors on Linux.

   $ cat /proc/sys/fs/file-max 
    5000 
    $ su - root 
    Password: 
    $sysctl -w fs.filemax=10000

   Next:

   8.3 Shut Down Platform and Execution