STSADM extensions for migration using script

Written by KbNk

Monday, 06 July 2009 20:23

Here are some point I want to share with you I have learned during my last upgrade SPS2MOSS

Stsadm is commandline tool provided with WSS 3.0 actualy it was part of first software from Microsoft - SharePoint Team Services - therefor the STS.
Via the STSADM you are allowed to do almost all operations you are able to do via Sharepoint Central Administrator (SCA) and even more.
The best it you can use scripts to do anoying operational tasks for you.
Unfortunately not everything is included in basic package of stsadm and you cannot use it for everything from begining. But Microsoft finaly understood that not just they have programming skills but also few others on the planet.

You are able to write your own extensions for STSADM as it is "pluginable" now in the version 3.0.
Let say you have to migrate several hundreads of sites from WSS2.0 to WSS 3.0 using gradual approach and you want to migrate several sites per day/night. So you consider using scripts and STSADM, but it won't allow you to migrate just like that, as set of commands for it are not inlcuded for now..
First you need to install and deploy great and MUST set of extensions from Gary Lapointe.

You add it as new solution using stsadm -o addsolution -filename path-to-file.wsp and afterwards deploy it via SCA in page Solution Management
(Central Administration > Operations > Solution Management).
From now on you will have much more commands listed in the stsadm .For all of them check Garys page: http://stsadm.blogspot.com/2007/08/stsadm-commands_09.html
For gradual upgrade side by side use commad -o gl-upgrade2 (http://stsadm.blogspot.com/2007/09/upgrade2.html) Thanks to this one you will be able to scrpt the migration process of your sites.

KbNk;