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As a best practice, Pricefx recommends the following sequence:

1. Upgrading QA Cluster (+ all associated partitions)

2. Perform intensive QA Cluster testing across complete functionality

3. Evaluate the results of upgrade acceptance testing, resolve any issues

4. Upgrade PROD Cluster

5. Perform intensive PROD Cluster testing across complete functionality

6. Identify issues and notify Pricefx Support as needed

Why Should I Upgrade?

Our product is constantly evolving as improvements and advancements in our core product are applied in support of our customer's and industry’s needs. We are constantly listening to our customers to fully understand their pricing environment, learn about their issues, and identify the opportunities they provide for further innovation. Within the product team, these new features are reviewed for impact on customer value, developed along key value drivers, beta tested, revised, and improved, and then finally become part of a major release.

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Shared vs Private Environment. In Pricefx we offer two types of environments, Shared and Private environments where your solution is developed and held. Shared environments will upgrade automatically on the date of release for all Major and Minor releases. For customers in Private instances, then the upgrade is an on-demand process.

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Release Notes. With each Major or Minor release, Pricefx will publish a set of release notes that provide a comprehensive view of the upcoming release. During a customer’s preparation process, It is a good practice to review these notes to have an understanding of the new features being released, and also to comprehend what areas of an existing implementation will be impacted. Having a good understanding of the depth and breadth of the release will assist in your upgrade planning,

Upgrade Components

Before starting our upgrade, we should consider the impact of the following:

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Ensure that the team of selected testers has the necessary time to perform the test cases assigned to them due to the volume of their other work. Without the proper time allocation to fulfill your upgrade test plan in its entirety will inevitably to undiscovered gaps in the upgrade preparation.

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What Are the Steps for a Successful Upgrade?

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-Use proper data selection for testing to ensure we have both positive and negative outcomes, and we are testing for specific scenarios.

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Prioritization of Test Cases

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When Should I Upgrade?

Ideally, your partitions should be up to date in regard to the Pricefx release policy of N-1. Therefore, this means that customers should prepare for upgrades once per year (2 times per year is best) to align with Pricefx’s best practice recommendation to remain at the most only one major release behind.

Regarding the timing of your upgrade, there are two things to keep in mind:

• Each major release will contain a range of upgrades:

  • New Modules or Capabilities that are extensions to our core product that provide completely new features and functions that complement our existing product mix. As an example, review the information on Sales Compensation that was released in Hurricane 9.0.

  • Updates and upgrades to existing core capabilities that extend an existing feature by providing expanded functionality. As an example, review information on Visual Configuration released in Bees Knees 10.0.

  • Patches to the underlying core product that resolves issues impacting our customers and is limited to specific capabilities or features. Generally, these are released as minor upgrades (ie.10.1, 10.2, etc.) with each successive minor release considered more stable with expanded functionality versus any earlier versions.

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How Do I Request an Upgrade?

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• Platform Manager. In Platform Manager, we have created a section where any user with the right user role* can request an upgrade of a specific cluster. You must go to the account tab, click on “Upgrade” and then select the cluster, the version you want to upgrade to, and the date and time you decided. You can also add some comments and contacts you want to notify about this upgrade. As soon as it has been requested, you will get an invite in your calendar to track the upgrade window.

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• Support ticket. In case there is an issue with the previous procedure, you can also navigate to the Support Desk, create a ticket with the category “Cluster upgrade” and add the information required with a desired date and time. If we cannot perform the upgrade in that timeframe, we will come back to you with a new proposed time.

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Upgrade Time Allocation

When upgrading to a Major Release (ie. 9.x to 10.x), you should allocate about 4 hours for the upgrade to complete successfully. You will want to plan ahead for this time window to minimize the impact on your business operations. Minor upgrades and Patches could be as quick as 5 minutes.

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