How to completely export and import PRBs and PTASKs?

[Daniel Messer]

The "Problem Management Migration Utility" guides us through the process to activate the new "problem state model". Alas the instructions are not really helpful. The instruction I am failing to comply is:

Backup existing problem records: If you have existing problem records, take a backup before you delete them from the system. (Same with Problem Tasks)

I wasn't successful googling for the ultimate solution. The only thing I stumbled upon is that I could export a list of Problems in XML (https://sn-instance/problem_list.do?XML). But of course this is without any work notes etc. The other thing would be restoring the whole instance if something fails. Obviously that's no real answer to the question.

So: How can I backup existing problem records? What did the author point at when he/she wrote this instruction? What am I missing?

Thanks for your help!

[Daniel Messer · Accepted solution]

I created a case. The solution is the following:

"I checked internally and confirmed that you have to export the related lists individually.

Journal Entries[sys_journal_field] records hold the content of Journal Fields such as Additional Comments and Worknotes. However the corresponding Audit[sys_audit] records are used to determine the date/time that an Additional Comment or Worknote was created, as well as who created it. Without these Audit records the Comments/Worknotes will not show up in the correct order in the UI, or with the correct usernames who wrote them.
As well as that, the first time these Journal Field records are viewed in the UI the system creates History Set[sys_history_set]/History Line[sys_history_line] records, which are from then on used by the UI instead of the Audit[sys_audit] records.
This means that to export and import Journal Fields such as Additional Comments and Worknotes there's a particular process that needs to be followed.

Instructions
 1. Export Problem, Problem tasks etc, from the source instance as XML, import to the target instance. DO NOT open any of the newly imported Incidents/Change Requests etc in the UI on the target instance yet
 2. Export the sys_journal_field records (as XML) for the Task-derived records exported in step 1 and import them into the instance
 3. Export Audit[sys_audit] records from the source where sys_audit.documentkey matches the sys_id's of the records exported/imported in step 1
 4. If you have viewed any of the records imported in step 1 in the UI of the target instance since the import: Delete the History Set[sys_history_set]/History Line[sys_history_line] records for those records. This can be done through the UI by opening the sys_history_set table
NOTE: This step 4 is necessary because what the Activity Formatter (the UI element which shows Additional Comments and Worknotes on the form) uses to display Comments/Worknotes is the data in the History Set/Line tables if it's available. If there's nothing in History Set/Line for a record then the first time you open the record in the UI, the History Set/Line data is generated from what's in Audit[sys_audit]. This is what you want if you've just imported the relevant Audit[sys_audit] records from the source instance - you'd want the History Set/Line data to be generated based on that

Note that when cloning instances audit data is excluded by default so if you're testing on a clone of prod you need to ensure that audit data was included when the clone was requested."

I did not test/used the procedure as it is not really user-friendly. Or at least I'm not comfortable doing it. I will install the new problem management best practices and hope for the best.