Lotus Notes To SharePoint Migration Approach

Now a days most of the customer moving towards futuristic platforms and preferred SharePoint as an enterprise-wide portal platform.

For Lotus Notes application migration SharePoint is the best target platform only when minimal customisation consideration and mapped most of the feature with SharePoint out of the box functionality.

Detail migration Approach

Migration methodology will significantly increase the chance of success. Whether it be large no of applications, migration methodology delivers a well-planned and measured approach that also uncovers many of the pitfalls associated with application migration projects.

The following are the detailed server to server migration approach:

Detail migration Approach
Analysis (Discover)

By manual approach we can analyse notes application (NSF) files. The following are the list of data will be captured as a part of analysis of Lotus Notes applications:

Gather Lotus Note database information from business users:
- Specify the Lotus Notes app lock down date for design.
- Share the migration questioner to customer and get the responses.
- Understand the functionality of the Lotus Notes application.
Extract information regarding Lotus Note design elements:
- List of fields and its detailed information for forms/Views.
- Lotus Note developer should extract this information using reusable script.
Use the extracted Lotus Note information from above two steps and design SharePoint site for:
- Identifying SharePoint site template
- Forms
- Lists/Views
- Workflows
- Any other customization required

2. Design

Once project scope is identified, the applications that will undergo migration provide the scope for the design phase. The design phase covered the following aspects:

Prepare functional understanding & design and Test case document:
- Use the Lotus Notes and SharePoint analysis as an input for documentation.
- Prepare test case document for each Lotus Note database (If required).
- Get sign-off on migration specification document.
- Test data for migration - work with business user/application owner for sample data.
By creating views in Lotus Notes Application (Preferable)
List of documents to be migrated out of available data.

3. Assembly

Based on analysis phase first development step will be to provisioning SharePoint site and it’s components like:

Provisioning SharePoint Site

Use the Migration Specification Design document as input for provisioning SharePoint site and its elements:
- Create site collection based on the template requirements.
- Provision lists and site columns (if required).
- Create any workflow if required.
- If required perform customization for ASPX pages, Timer Jobs, Web parts, Event Receivers etc.
- Install and configure any reusable components.
  
  Note: Where ever possible use power shell script for provisioning SharePoint elements.
Prepare Migration Jobs:

Next step would be to prepare migration job for migration using third party tools like Quest.
Filter Lotus note Application Data for Sample Migration:

For migrating sample data for System integration testing (SIT) and user acceptance testing (UAT), first would be to filter the required data from Lotus Note application.
Run migration jobs for sample data:

For system integration testing and user acceptance testing purpose identified sample data will be used.
Perform system integration testing:
- Once developer verifies the data and functionality handover the migrated SharePoint site to testing team.
- Execute test cases.
- Fix the issues identified by testing team
Perform User Acceptance Testing:
- Once testing team completes testing export complete site collection.
- Do import on another site collection.
- Deploy required custom solutions.
- Fix the issues identified by business user.
- Get UAT sign-off for production deployment.

4. Migration

Based on field mapping between Lotus Notes & SharePoint attributes data migrated to SharePoint portal.

Pre Migration Activity
- Turn off all the workflows & email feature.
- Check if Lotus Notes ACL permissions need to be migrated.
- Ensure that Lotus Notes roles are mapped correctly.
- Specify the Lotus Notes lock down date for Data.
Full Migration
- Perform user migration on the production.
- Perform full data migration.
- Monitor the migration jobs till it gets completed.
Post migration activity
- Verify that permissions are migrated correctly for few sample users.
- For each list migrated, compare the # of items against the # of documents in the Lotus Notes migration view.
- For each list migrated, ensure that item-level permissions are migrated [if required].
- For each list migrated, double-check if any column is completely empty of data or has "incorrect" data.
- Enable necessary features & workflows.
- Enable custom components such as Email Templates, Archival etc.
Released to Production
- Involve business users to perform the smoke testing of the application.
- Once sign-off received, release application into production.
- Post go-live production support.

5. Sign-off

Once application setup into production environment and data migration activity is over, perform smoke testing and get verified from business users and request them to sign-off.