Can CF 2021 and 2016 coexist?

[eualexaffonso]

Hi all,

I'm trying to help a partner with its client regarding CF 2021 coexisting with CF 2016. The client do not want to migrate, but wants to be able to continue to use CF 2016 while start new projects in CF 2021.

The documentation (last updated in April 27, 2021 - see below) says that CF 2018 can coexist with earlier versions, but I couldn't find anything related to the 2021 version.

I'd assume this is possible, but I'd rather check with experts instead of assuming.

I appreciate your help.

Best,

[Dave Watts · Accepted solution]

This is possible, and shouldn't be too difficult. You will probably need to uninstall the CF 2016 web server connector, if you previously chose "all", then reinstall it for only the specific virtual web servers that need it. Then, when it's time to install CF 2021, make sure to connect only the other virtual web servers you didn't select earlier.

There may be some areas of incompatibility, but they should be limited to add-on services, I think. Any other problems could easily be repaired by uninstalling CF 2021.

The real question to me is, is this worth the effort? Now you'll have one machine with a considerably more complicated setup. The simplest option might be to set up a separate physical server or EC2 instance etc to run CF 2021.

Dave Watts, Eidolon LLC 

[eualexaffonso]

Thank you so much, Dave!

[Charlie Arehart · Accepted solution]

I can concur with Dave's pointing out that this is possible.

1) I run multiple versions of cf on every machine I have, able to run them at once (subject to adequate resources) or  turn on/off whatever one I want. I've done it with all cf versions. 

As he notes, the biggest gotcha in doing this is proper web server configuration, using cf's wsconfig tool. 

Another is that you definitely to leave the old version RUNNING when you install the new, as that way the new will choose different values for the several ports cf uses. 

2) As for migration compat issues, there can be many or there may be none. It's totally dependent on your app and it's sensitivity to the changes in both the version you're moving TO and any version(s) you may be skipping over. Fwiw, I did a talk recently on migrating apps to cf2021 from all recent versions. The recording and pdf are available at carehart.org/presentations. 

3) Finally, as for the docs not having been updated, that's a common problem: dozens (if not hundreds) of pages that refer to cf2018 (and even sometimes cf2016 and cf11) were never updated for cf2021. Same with them showing the last update date of Apr 2021: nearly ALL pages do, and it's tragic when they give the false impression you reasonably came to.

Since you work for Adobe, eualexaffonso, it would be awesome if you might be able to nudge anyone from the inside. 🙂 I've raised the observation many times but no one's picked up the baton to make a global sweep of things.

It would take perhaps a few hours for someone to do a.global find to replace (or better remove) the version number, when the reference not truly specific to that version. (That means once CAN'T do a global find AND replace.)

Hope all our thoughts help get you/your partner going. 

[eualexaffonso]

Thank you, Charlie. I will definetely reach out the team and ask them to update the website and documentation.