Each quarter EMC Isilon produces a technical newsletter called the Uptime Bulletin. This newsletter provides product tips and announcements. You can access our first issue of the EMC Isilon Uptime Bulletin (PDF) on the EMC Online Support site (login required).

The first issue includes the following Isilon OneFS tip about upgrading.

Reboot your cluster before an upgrade

Before upgrading to the latest version of OneFS, it helps to be prepared. Assessing compatibility, gathering cluster information, and following best practices during the pre-upgrade window will ensure that the upgrade process goes smoothly.

One of the pre-upgrade steps that EMC Isilon recommends is to reboot your clusters. A reboot ensures a clean state for the upgrade process, and it usually takes fewer than fifteen minutes for simultaneous reboots (where all the nodes in a cluster are restarted at the same time). This recommendation is particularly applicable to clusters that have run a long time without a cluster-wide reboot event.

A cluster reboot can help you to:

• Identify failing hardware
• Ensure that cluster configurations, such as share and export configurations, are saved and persist through a reboot
• Distinguish among problems that might occur either during the reboot process or during the upgrade process

Overall, a pre-upgrade reboot can make it easier for EMC Customer Services to diagnose and resolve any upgrade-related issues quickly. In an ideal upgrade window, you should also test client services after a reboot and before the upgrade. This gives you the opportunity to validate the upgrade verification tests.

For more information about the OneFS upgrade process

Visit the EMC Online Support site to access the following PDF guides (login required), which help you prepare for the upgrade process for OneFS 6.5–7.0:

• OneFS 6.5.5 Upgrade Readiness Checklist
• OneFS 7.0.1 Upgrade Readiness Checklist
• OneFS 7.0.2 Upgrade Guide

If you have questions about the upgrade process, please visit the Contact EMC Technical Support site (login required) for contact information.