Upgrading Opencast from 6.x to 7.x

This guide describes how to upgrade Opencast 6.x to 7.x. In case you need information about how to upgrade older versions of Opencast, please refer to the old release notes.

How to Upgrade

  1. Stop your current Opencast instance
  2. Replace Opencast 6.x with 7.x
  3. Back-up Opencast files and database (optional)
  4. Upgrade the database
  5. Upgrade the ActiveMQ configuration
  6. Review the configuration changes and adjust your configuration accordingly
  7. Migrate the scheduled events
  8. Optionally update the player links
  9. Rebuild the Elastic Search indexes

Database Migration

As part of performance optimizations, some tables were modified. This requires a database schema update. Also, one table is no longer needed and can be dropped. As with all database migrations, we strongly recommend to create a database backup before attempting the upgrade.

You can find the database upgrade script in docs/upgrade/6_to_7/. This script is suitable for both, MariaDB and MySQL.

ActiveMQ Migration

So far, this is not required

Removal of Deprecated Access Control Ruleset

Opencast 7 finally removes the long-since deprecated security/xacml flavor for access control lists. This had not been used since before Opencast 1.2 (we could not track down its exact deprecation date due to its age). Additionally, all rule-sets which had been modified since had also been automnatically been updated to security/xacml+series which serves as replacement for the old flavor.

In case Opencast still encounters such a rule set, it will now be ignored and access will be denied by default. A simple update of the permissions would fix this if that is required.

Due to the extreme unlikeliness of anyone encountering this problem, there is no automatic migration. In case you run a system migrated from a pre-1.2 Matterhorn, you can make sure that there are no old rule-sets left using the following SQL queries:

-- Check OAI-PMH publications:
select * from oc_oaipmh_elements where flavor = 'security/xacml';
-- Check engage publications:
select * from oc_search where mediapackage_xml like '%"security/xacml"%';
-- Check asset manager:
select * from oc_assets_snapshot where mediapackage_xml like '%"security/xacml"%';

Configuration Changes

  • etc/org.opencastproject.scheduler.impl.SchedulerServiceImpl.cfg no longer needs the transaction_cleanup_offset option.
  • etc/org.opencastproject.scheduler.impl.SchedulerServiceImpl.cfg has a new option maintenance which temporarily disables the scheduler if set to true.

Scheduler Migration

The way the Scheduler stores its data was changed in Opencast 7 to improve performance when checking for conflicts.

The necessary database schema changes are part of the upgrade script in docs/upgrade/6_to_7/.

To actually migrate the data, set the maintenance configuration option of etc/org.opencastproject.scheduler.impl.SchedulerServiceImpl.cfg to true and start opencast. The migration will start automatically. Wait until the migration is complete. Once complete, the opencast log will contain a line saying Finished migrating scheduled events. Check if there were any errors during the migration. If not, stop opencast and change maintenance back to false to put the scheduler back into its normal mode of operation.

You should avoid running Opencast 7 without migrating the scheduled events first. Otherwise, your capture agents may fetch an empty calendar.

This step is optional

Opencast 7 comes with the capability of dynamically switching the configured player without requiring the republication of all published material by providing the dynamic target https://example.opencast.org/play/<id>. This new target will be used for all new engage publications.

But old publications still reference the players directly in the admin interface and the external API. This does not pose any immediate problem unless you actually want to switch players in which case you would need to republish the material once to update the publication links.

Alternatively, you can rewrite the old links all at once without re-publication using the following method:

  1. Find the archive directory and run the following command (replacing <playerlink>):

    sed -i 's_<playerlink>_/play/_g' .../archive/*/*/*/manifest.xml

    For Theodul, Paella and the Engage player the specific commands would be:

    sed -i 's_/engage/theodul/ui/core.html?id=_/play/_g' .../archive/*/*/*/manifest.xml
sed -i 's_/paella/ui/watch.html?id=_/play/_g' .../archive/*/*/*/manifest.xml
sed -i 's_/engage/ui/watch.html?id=_/play/_g' .../archive/*/*/*/manifest.xml

  2. Run the following SQL commands on your opencast database (replacing <playerlink>):

    UPDATE oc_assets_snapshot
  SET mediapackage_xml =
  REPLACE(mediapackage_xml, '<playerlink>', '/play/')
  WHERE INSTR(mediapackage_xml, '<playerlink>') > 0;

    For Theodul, Paella and the Engage player the specific commands would be:

    UPDATE oc_assets_snapshot
  SET mediapackage_xml =
  REPLACE(mediapackage_xml, '/engage/theodul/ui/core.html?id=', '/play/')
  WHERE INSTR(mediapackage_xml, '/engage/theodul/ui/core.html?id=') > 0;
UPDATE oc_assets_snapshot
  SET mediapackage_xml =
  REPLACE(mediapackage_xml, '/paella/ui/watch.html?id=', '/play/')
  WHERE INSTR(mediapackage_xml, '/paella/ui/watch.html?id=') > 0;
UPDATE oc_assets_snapshot
  SET mediapackage_xml =
  REPLACE(mediapackage_xml, '/engage/ui/watch.html?id=', '/play/')
  WHERE INSTR(mediapackage_xml, '/engage/ui/watch.html?id=') > 0;

Please ensure to execute these steps before rebuilding the index.

Rebuild the Elastic Search Indexes

Due to MH-13396, the configuration of the Elastic Search indexes of both the Admin UI and the External API have changed.

Therefore, those indexes both need to be rebuilt.