What is the difference between Instance cloning and Instance restore?

[superkvi]

Recently our both the non-production instances (Dev and Teat) were upgraded to Paris Patch 1 Hot Fix 5. Later I realized that Production instance cloning was not done before the non-production instance upgrade. I raised a case with ServiceNow technical support and was asked to request Instance Restore. 

What problems may I face due to this (no cloning) during the production upgrade? Or What will be the effects of this on the Production upgrade?

Thank you!

[sachin_namjoshi]

Cloning before upgrade is best practice.

But, if your custom is not allowing to clone, then direct upgrade is the only option.

Regards,

Sachin

[amurana2]

Thank you for your comment.  

[amurana2]

Hi, Sachin, 

Based on the comments, via cloning a PE (production environment) to NPEs, you move the prod data and configuration/customizations into the NPEs.  Do you keep the prod data in the NPEs or do you delete the prod data after the version upgrade is complete?  

Is there anyway we can clone a PE to NPEs without moving the prod data into the NPEs (just only configuration/customizations)?  

If not, what is the best practice to sync up between a PE and NPEs without moving the prod data?  Thank you.  

Note:  As a security perspective, it is recommended that prod data should not be kept in the NPEs.  

[amurana2]

Hi, Sachin, 

What do you think about my comment?  

[Jaspal Singh]

Hi,

Reason you were asked to do a restore was becuase upgrade generally invloves changes in underlying schema or addition of new.

So, cloning from a lower version to higher version may have implications & some conflicts which may possibly break things & thus you were asked to do a restore instead of clone.

Cloning is ideal in cases when you have upgrade so up to date functionalities that are in PRD can be validated when upgrade happens & in case of issues if any can be fixed. In your case, yes better wouldbe to do a restore then clone & then get the upgrade applied.