Upgrading from an Earlier Greenplum 6 Release

The upgrade path supported for this release is Greenplum Database 6.x to a newer Greenplum Database 6.x release.

Important
Set the Greenplum Database timezone to a value that is compatible with your host systems. Setting the Greenplum Database timezone prevents Greenplum Database from selecting a timezone each time the cluster is restarted and sets the timezone for the Greenplum Database master and segment instances. After you upgrade to this release and if you have not set a Greenplum Database timezone value, verify that the selected Greenplum Database timezone is acceptable for your deployment. See Configuring Timezone and Localization Settings for more information.

Prerequisites

Before starting the upgrade process, perform the following checks.

Verify the health of the Greenplum Database host hardware, and verify that the hosts meet the requirements for running Greenplum Database. The Greenplum Database gpcheckperf utility can assist you in confirming the host requirements.

Note
If you need to run the gpcheckcat utility, run it a few weeks before the upgrade during a maintenance period. If necessary, you can resolve any issues found by the utility before the scheduled upgrade.

The utility is in $GPHOME/bin. Place Greenplum Database in restricted mode when you run the gpcheckcat utility. See the Greenplum Database Utility Guide for information about the gpcheckcat utility.

If gpcheckcat reports catalog inconsistencies, you can run gpcheckcat with the -g option to generate SQL scripts to fix the inconsistencies.

After you run the SQL scripts, run gpcheckcat again. You might need to repeat the process of running gpcheckcat and creating SQL scripts to ensure that there are no inconsistencies. Run the SQL scripts generated by gpcheckcat on a quiescent system. The utility might report false alerts if there is activity on the system.

Important
VMware customers should ontact VMware Support if the gpcheckcat utility reports errors but does not generate a SQL script to fix the errors. Information for contacting VMware Support is at https://tanzu.vmware.com/support.
If you have configured the Greenplum Platform Extension Framework (PXF) in your previous Greenplum Database installation, you must stop the PXF service, and you might need to back up PXF configuration files before upgrading to a new version of Greenplum Database. Refer to PXF Pre-Upgrade Actions for instructions.

If you have not yet configured PXF, no action is necessary.
If you have configured and used the VMware Greenplum Streaming Server (GPSS) in your previous VMware Greenplum Database installation, you must stop any running GPSS jobs and service instances before you upgrade to a new version of Greenplum Database. Refer to GPSS Pre-Upgrade Actions for instructions.

If you do not plan to use GPSS, or you have not yet configured GPSS, no action is necessary.

Parent topic: Upgrading to Greenplum 6

Upgrading from 6.x to a Newer 6.x Release

An upgrade from Greenplum Database 6.x to a newer 6.x release involves stopping Greenplum Database, updating the Greenplum Database software binaries, and restarting Greenplum Database. If you are using Greenplum Database extension packages there are additional requirements. See Prerequisites in the previous section.

Log in to your Greenplum Database master host as the Greenplum administrative user:
```
$ su - gpadmin
```
Perform a smart shutdown of your Greenplum Database 6.x system (there can be no active connections to the database). This example uses the -a option to deactivate confirmation prompts:
```
$ gpstop -a
```
Copy the new Greenplum Database software installation package to the gpadmin user's home directory on each master, standby, and segment host.
If you used yum or apt to install Greenplum Database to the default location, run these commands on each host to upgrade to the new software release.

For RHEL/CentOS systems:
```
$ sudo yum upgrade ./greenplum-db-<version>-<platform>.rpm
```
For Ubuntu systems:
```
# apt install ./greenplum-db-<version>-<platform>.deb
```
The yum or apt command installs the new Greenplum Database software files into a version-specific directory under /usr/local and updates the symbolic link /usr/local/greenplum-db to point to the new installation directory.
If you used rpm to install Greenplum Database to a non-default location on RHEL/CentOS systems, run rpm on each host to upgrade to the new software release and specify the same custom installation directory with the --prefix option. For example:
```
$ sudo rpm -U ./greenplum-db-<version>-<platform>.rpm --prefix=<directory>
```
The rpm command installs the new Greenplum Database software files into a version-specific directory under the <directory> you specify, and updates the symbolic link <directory>/greenplum-db to point to the new installation directory.
Update the permissions for the new installation. For example, run this command as root to change the user and group of the installed files to gpadmin.
```
$ sudo chown -R gpadmin:gpadmin /usr/local/greenplum*
```
If needed, update the greenplum_path.sh file on the master and standby master hosts for use with your specific installation. These are some examples.
- If Greenplum Database uses LDAP authentication, edit the greenplum_path.sh file to add the line:
```
export LDAPCONF=/etc/openldap/ldap.conf
```
- If Greenplum Database uses PL/Java, you might need to set or update the environment variables JAVA_HOME and LD_LIBRARY_PATH in greenplum_path.sh.
Note
When comparing the previous and new greenplum_path.sh files, be aware that installing some Greenplum Database extensions also updates the greenplum_path.sh file. The greenplum_path.sh from the previous release might contain updates that were the result of installing those extensions.
Edit the environment of the Greenplum Database superuser (gpadmin) and make sure you are sourcing the greenplum_path.sh file for the new installation. For example change the following line in the .bashrc or your chosen profile file:
```
source /usr/local/greenplum-db-<current_version>/greenplum_path.sh
```
to:
```
source /usr/local/greenplum-db-<new_version>/greenplum_path.sh
```
Or if you are sourcing a symbolic link (/usr/local/greenplum-db) in your profile files, update the link to point to the newly installed version. For example:
```
$ sudo rm /usr/local/greenplum-db
$ sudo ln -s /usr/local/greenplum-db-<new_version> /usr/local/greenplum-db
```
Source the environment file you just edited. For example:
```
$ source ~/.bashrc
```
After all segment hosts have been upgraded, log in as the gpadmin user and restart your Greenplum Database system:
```
# su - gpadmin
$ gpstart
```
For VMware Greenplum Database, use the gppkg utility to re-install VMware Greenplum Database extensions. If you were previously using any VMware Greenplum Database extensions such as pgcrypto, PL/R, PL/Java, or PostGIS, download the corresponding packages from Broadcom Support Portal, and install using this utility. See the extension documentation for details.

Also copy any files that are used by the extensions (such as JAR files, shared object files, and libraries) from the previous version installation directory to the new version installation directory on the master and segment host systems.
If you configured PXF in your previous Greenplum Database installation, you may need to install PXF in your new Greenplum installation, and you may be required to re-initialize or register the PXF service after you upgrade Greenplum Database. Refer to the Step 2 PXF upgrade procedure for instructions.
For VMware Greenplum Database, if you configured GPSS in your previous installation, you may be required to perform some upgrade actions, and you must re-restart the GPSS service instances and jobs. Refer to Step 2 of the GPSS upgrade procedure for instructions.

After upgrading Greenplum Database, ensure that all features work as expected. For example, test that backup and restore perform as expected, and Greenplum Database features such as user-defined functions, and extensions such as MADlib and PostGIS perform as expected.

Troubleshooting a Failed Upgrade

If you experience issues during the migration process and have active entitlements for Greenplum Database or VMware Greenplum Database that were purchased through VMware, contact VMware Support. Information for contacting VMware Support is at https://tanzu.vmware.com/support.

Be prepared to provide the following information:

A completed Upgrade Procedure
Log output from gpcheckcat (located in ~/gpAdminLogs)