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I am migrating live sites from OLD_SERVER to NEW_SERVER. I have root access to NEW_SERVER but I only have WHM access on OLD_SERVER. I know that to minimize downtime, I can reduce the TTL on each of the accounts, then repoint each of them to the new server.

The problem is that I used vanity nameservers with OLD_SERVER i.e. ns1.example.com and ns2.example.com - which point to the nameservers of the old web host. I want to retain use of these ns1 and ns2 names, but now they will point to new IP addresses on the new server. example.com is also one of the accounts that is being migrated.

How do you advice I proceed? The sites are live and I want to prevent / minimize downtime. Should I migrate ONLY the example.com account first, or how should I best proceed?

The current web host is particularly notorious for being unsupportive, and this is one reason I am leaving. Further, DNS propagations on their platform seems to generally take a long time.

Jenny D
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Cogicero
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1 Answers1

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The first thing you need to do is to decide how and where you want to host DNS moving forward. Once you have decided on that I suggest you migrate DNS first and migrate web hosting afterwards. See it as two completely independent migrations.

Migrating DNS:

  • Download the zone file from your old hosting.
  • Update the zone file, pointing the A and AAAA records for ns1.example.com and ns2.example.com to the new DNS servers.
  • Upload the updated zone file to the new DNS hosting.
  • Verify that it is working on the new DNS hosting.
  • Update the glue records through your registrar.

Migrating web hosting:

  • Long enough in advance reduce TTL of the relevant DNS records to ease the transition.
  • If the site has any user modifiable content turn your site into read only mode.
  • Copy all the content from old hosting to new hosting.
  • Bring up the new hosting in read only mode.
  • Verify that the new web hosting is working as expected.
  • Switch new hosting to read write mode.
  • Update DNS records.
Jenny D
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kasperd
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