Data Migration From On-Premise to Cloud: How it Works?

In this blog, we will discuss the data migration process and the steps of data Migration From an On-Premise to a Cloud platform.

With so many businesses migrating their data, applications, and workloads to the cloud, it’s increasingly important to make sure you’re making your migration from on-premise to cloud successfully.

To help your transition go smoothly, we’ve compiled five key steps to ensure you get the best possible results from your migration from on-premise to cloud.

What is Migration From On-Premise to Cloud?

When migrating on-premise data and applications, you have to consider several things.

First, what type of environment is most appropriate for your needs?

Second, how will users access data once it’s in place?

Third, what about security?

These are all questions that need answers before you begin any migration project. In fact, one of your first steps should be figuring out whether you want a hybrid cloud solution or a straight cloud implementation.

Of course, making sure you’re adequately prepared for whatever challenges might come your way is also critical; often, migration projects do run into issues.

Of course, making sure you’re adequately prepared for whatever challenges might come your way is also critical.

Often, migration projects do run into issues like downtime and budget concerns issues that can easily derail even well-planned strategies if they aren’t handled properly.

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Why should you Migrate to the Cloud?

There are numerous reasons why organizations have moved their workloads and data centers to a cloud environment: reliability, cost savings, scalability, agility.

But if you’re making a move from on-premises data centers (your own infrastructure) or other cloud providers (like Amazon Web Services), it can be a daunting task.

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As an IT professional, there are many reasons why you might want to migrate your organization’s assets onto cloud servers instead of keeping them in an on-premises data center.

In fact, one study found that more than 40 percent of companies had migrated some business components to a public or private cloud server platform in 2014-15.

In the year 2022, 94% of enterprises use the cloud, similarly, 91% of businesses are using the public cloud and 72% are using a private cloud platform.

However, Most of the enterprises are using 69% of hybrid cloud solutions.

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Key Points for Data Migration to Cloud

1. If you’re interested in migrating systems and platforms over to a managed cloud service provider like AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, or IBM SoftLayer.
2. Depending on where you’re coming from (your on-premises infrastructure or another public cloud platform).
3. It can take time to identify exactly what information needs to be moved from one place to another.
4. You also want to understand if there is any sensitive information that has been left behind that needs special handling.

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How to Perform the Cloud Migration Process?

Migrating on-premise data to the cloud is a challenging process, but there are ways to improve your chances of success foe that follow the four key steps.

1. Create Roadmaps:

Create and prioritize migration plans based on operational needs (compliance, performance) and business priorities (ROI).

You may have some legacy systems that need improvement before they move to AWS – or alternatively, you may have others that represent good opportunities for cost reduction by moving them onto AWS.

The point here is that no one migration should be an all-or-nothing endeavor – create clear milestones so you can assess progress at every stage.

2. Assess risk:

Identify potential risks in every project, then develop actionable plans to mitigate these risks.

For example, if an ERP system doesn’t support services like encryption and network load balancing, plan how those gaps will be closed during migration.

Similarly, identify any existing security measures within existing systems that must be kept in place as part of the migration.

These must-haves could include items such as multi-factor authentication, regulatory compliance with PCI DSS, etc.

3. Utilize Toolsets:

Instead of building new tools from scratch when available tools already exist. Tools like AWS Systems Manager can streamline migration tasks while reducing errors helping you move more quickly and efficiently toward completion.

Also, keep an eye out for third-party tools created by companies with deep experience in migrating to cloud infrastructures; it never hurts to see what other people have done before diving into a migration yourself.

4. Foster Teamwork:

Keep key stakeholders informed throughout each step of the migration process. They will not only help alleviate any concerns early in the migration process but also learn to appreciate each milestone along the way.

With multiple stakeholders owning different pieces of migration projects at different times, there’s bound to be an occasional hiccup somewhere down the line.

This means bringing everyone together regularly for checkpoints helps ensure nothing falls through the cracks when you least expect it.

Step by Step Process for Cloud Migration

1. Understand cloud services and why it is good for your business.
2. List applications that you would like to move from on-premise to cloud.
3. Identify data and identify how much data are there, along with their importance for your business or organization.
4. Develop a plan in which you will be moving assets from an on-premise environment to a cloud environment, without any issues or downtime.
5. Start creating a backup of files as well as databases so that if things go wrong during the migration process then you can always restore back all files/databases.
6. For on-premise servers take backups of machines as well so that they can start running them again once the migration process has been completed successfully.
7. Create recovery plans and make sure to test them before going live into production.
8. Design new networks after the migration so that you won’t have to worry about future migration processes.

If you follow these steps then even migrating large amounts of data from on-premise infrastructure to a cloud can be executed very smoothly and efficiently.

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Key Steps for Data Migration from On-premise to Cloud

Step 1: Planning

Planning is one of the most important steps in cloud migration. In a data migration, we have to take care of various things.

Some of them are listed below – Where to keep backups? – How much data will be migrated? – What’s the plan for failures and unforeseen scenarios?

1) Where to keep backups?

For backing up purposes, you can use any of the following options:

A) Public clouds(AWS or Azure): You can go with some public cloud provider as per your business needs and budget requirements like AWS or Azure.

B) Existing infrastructure/server hosted by service providers like DigitalOcean: If you already own a VPS or server on DigitalOcean, then you can save a good amount of money by using it for backup purposes rather than buying another machine.

C) Multiple offsite (non-cloud-based solutions): Offsite systems such as FTP servers and rsync servers provide means to securely back up large volumes of data that are easily accessible from anywhere over the Internet if needed.

2) How much data will be migrated?

Data migration is not an easy task so there must be a clear idea about how much data would need to migrate before moving forward with the migration project.

3) What’s the plan for failures and unforeseen scenarios?

No matter how well prepared you are, there may still arise times when situations may not turn out exactly as planned. The best thing you can do at times like these is to prepare yourself beforehand so that at least your experience of going through cloud migration becomes smoother and trouble-free.

Step 2: Pre Migration Testing

Migration to the cloud is always a bit risky and in most cases, it leads to a great loss if anything goes wrong.

To avoid such mishaps, it is important that you carry out various tests before migrating data from on-premise infrastructure to the cloud.

These tests will help you validate your data integrity as well as compatibility issues of your legacy applications with cloud-based servers or storage platforms.

So what do we do here? What sort of testing do we need? I break it down into a number of different categories: functional tests, load/performance tests, business availability and capacity, disaster recovery (DR) tests.

Each category is different in nature and they all have to be looked at differently. For instance, if you have an app that takes a month’s worth of data migration on-premise to the cloud for a single run; then performance tests can help you validate whether your servers are capable enough to handle such migrations without any downtime.

Step 3: Scheduling Migration

Migration of data and applications is not a one-time activity and you have to repeat this process again and again at regular intervals. It is therefore important that you plan your migration schedule beforehand.

If there are many applications in use, you may end up spending a lot of time migrating all of them manually, which can be cumbersome and disruptive for operations if planned improperly.

It is best to schedule your migration using an automated solution with minimal impact on day-to-day activities.

This approach helps avoid disruption during migration and ensures that you do not forget any step of the migration process.

With automation, migration planning also becomes easier as multiple resources can be engaged in executing one or more scheduled migration tasks with minimal effort.

Step 4: Selecting Right Technology and Providers

A successful cloud migration starts with selecting the right technology and providers. It is not wise to just select any one cloud provider and migrate data from on-premise to it.

Always use tools that are purpose-built for your data migration process rather than using generic application/utility.

Migrating non-relational database systems such as Oracle, SQL Server, DB2, Informix, etc. to NoSQL solutions such as MongoDB or Cassandra can be complex and requires careful planning.

Use migration tools that specialize in migrating non-relational databases to help ease some of these complexities.

In addition, make sure you understand which steps will require manual intervention so you don’t get surprised by issues down the road when attempting to access your data in new environments or platforms.

Step 5: Migration Execution

Now that you’ve done all of your planning, it’s time to get going on your migration. Work with your vendors throughout each step and make sure they understand what you need from them.

If they seem unclear or like they are not going to provide you with everything you need, reconsider working with them and/or tell them in detail what you expect.

This is a very important part of data migration don’t forget it! Here are some key things to keep in mind As mentioned earlier, there are two types of cloud migration: physical to virtual (P2V) and virtual to virtual (V2V).

The methods outlined above will work for both forms of migration so don’t worry if your method doesn’t align exactly with one of these examples.

What matters most is that you have a good grasp on how you want to approach your migration; at least then you can start out at a good place moving forward.

Once you know what hardware and software need to be purchased, order them accordingly.

In some cases, you may need to wait until after you purchase your new equipment before doing anything else (for example, setting up an account), so be patient with yourself as necessary.

Picking a migration method: The first thing you’ll want to do is pick which type of migration path best fits your needs.

Do you prefer taking servers offline and migrating their contents while they are off (referred to as cold migration)? Or would you rather migrate them while they remain online? You should also consider whether your migration process is safe-fail or all-or-nothing.

A safe fail means that only part of your process failed but other parts were successful. All-or-nothing means every part had to be completed without failure in order for it to succeed.

Step 6: Post Migration Analysis and Follow Up

The migration process has ended, and you’re now ready to reap all of its benefits. Before you do, take some time to analyze your new cloud environment review usage statistics, and monitor application performance over a 30-day period. This will help you determine if there are any problems with your cloud setup.

Fix issues before they cause problems for your users or applications, Once your review is complete, celebrate your migration was successful!

Step 7: Learnings & Next Steps

When you start with a new application, whether it’s a cloud, mobile, web, or desktop app, you can no longer take your data for granted.

As you prepare to move these apps into production, it’s good practice to have a plan in place for migration and backup.

Many of today’s solutions are designed with microservices architecture in mind (as opposed to big monolithic platforms), which allows applications to be developed quickly and deployed on demand.

How to Prepare for Migration from on Premise to Cloud?

Following are a few questions that can be used to find out whether you are adequately prepared or not:

1) Keep Backup Support

Who within my organization should I contact in case anything goes wrong? Ensure that somebody who knows what they’re doing will answer questions and help troubleshoot issues.

Usually, developers who handle projects closely tend to get stuff done faster and better so chances of success increase when they try solving issues instead of support agents or managers.

2) Validate your Team Expertise

Are there specific people within my team whose expertise I should tap into during the migration process?

These individuals should know their jobs inside and out as well as understand where your migration fits into their daily work.

They are critical because their input will make sure everything gets covered even in unfortunate cases.

This also prevents last-minute panics by involving those who really know what’s happening behind the scenes throughout a migration project.

3) Right Vision and strategy

Does everyone involved in migration processes know how they fit into the overall strategy? Having a clear vision of the overall strategy will help you make changes to your migration plans early enough in case of failure.

4) Clear Communication

Can everyone involved in migration processes communicate effectively and efficiently? As discussed above, certain problems can occur during a migration process and communication is necessary in order to resolve them successfully.

5) Check Roles and Responsibilities

Do all parties involved in my organization clearly understand roles and responsibilities? It is quite necessary to clearly define roles and responsibilities for both technical teams as well as non-technical teams.

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Conclusion

The data migration from on-premise to cloud is simple and quick, but you need to make sure that you do it right.

It’s possible (and even probable) that new software solutions will emerge in coming years that provide better migration options but as of today, there’s no clear solution on how to make a fast, inexpensive migration of large amounts of data.

It’s important to understand what you have your source systems and their environments and where you want to end up: in a hybrid/multi-cloud environment or running everything in one particular provider’s cloud.