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Moving to Azure from the BB Hosted Environment

Stacey Brake

We are are interested in moving to the Azure hosting environment. We are currently hosted out of their Boston data center as we have Raiser's Edge NXT. I'm looking for feedback from those that have made this change and/or are currently using Azure. I primarily utilize database view as I manage the data, gift entry, etc. while other staff use both NXT and database views. Any problems or changes that you experienced? Any and all feedback is welcome. Thank you all in advance!

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Dan Snyder

Hi, Stacey Brake‍ we moved from Boston to Azure last January. It is much easier for users in the sense that there is only one login since you will access database view from within NXT (webview). As the person who got all the password reset requests for the staff who only go into database view occasionally, those requests have been completely eliminated since they all use the Sign in with Google feature. Overall it has been great and was painless.

Stacey Brake

Thank you very much Dan! I really appreciate it!

Crystal Bruce

Discussion moved to RENXT Community forums. Thanks!

Karen Diener

Some of my RE clients are on Azure and others are not. In terms of functionality, there is really no difference at all that I've found.

That being said, none of them have a lot of outside integrations or even integrations with other Blackbaud products like FE. That may be a factor, so hopefully someone in that situation can share some info.

Karen

Stacey Brake

Thanks Karen! Very helpful...we don't have any outside integrations either so this will probably be easier than I'm thinking it will be.

JoAnn Strommen

Any feedback from users who were moved to Azure this week? Any issues, tips on things to ready for post-move that were not mentioned?

We are scheduled to move next week. Have gone through all the info supplied but we're closed Friday and Monday due to Easter holiday so it will be here before we know. We have not heard anything from BB other than initial email about selecting the date. Don't want to be blindsided if there's more info sent late.

We use RE and FE and several plug-ins that were not listed as compatibility issues. I'm a little concerned about getting everyone back in the system the next day and troubleshooting I might have to do as I and some others are not in office.

Stacey Brake

We moved over a few months ago. No problems for us but we only use RE. Make sure to clear out your "Hosted Files" folder beforehand though. Anything left in that folder will be deleted during the migration process and can't be restored.

Couple of things I learned while attending Blackbaud's NXT security webinars the last couple of weeks:

1. Blackbaud cannot restore our data from a back-up in the Azure environment. They do back-ups but cannot use them to restore the data. If anyone else has more information or if I am misremembering, please jump in! I reached out to our Account Executive about this but was told they did not have additional information and I was directed to the technical team via Chat Support. (I posted to the Bbaud community before our migration too and a couple people mentioned something about doing back-ups in Azure locally. I checked with someone at Blackbaud but was told that they do back-ups so I didn't pursue any further. I didn't realize at the time why it was being mentioned; now I know.)

2. If you haven't done so already, it's a good idea to train your users on setting up and using 2-step authentication via their user profiles on the web view side. It's another layer of security which Blackbaud is really pushing right now.

The only other thing is becoming familiar with how security works in database view and web view. We are database view users in my department and only use the web view on occasion. Understanding how both views need to be set-up (as well as how they work together) helped a lot.

That was really it for us. I haven't noticed anything wonky or weird. The plus is each user has only one login to remember; no more resetting of passwords because they forgot one or the other. The negative is the back-up and restore situation. I need to contact the technical team and come up with an alternative. Good luck!

JoAnn Strommen

Thanks Stacey Brake‍.

I've given everyone 2 notices about hosted files and will send final one tomorrow. I've also been attending the security webinar and found information quite valuable.

The backups have not been an issue for us but I will double-check with the other admin to see if they have had to back-up. I set up my 2-step authorization and have been debating to have staff team do theirs quickly now before the transition or make it part of the 'new' environment. Most of our users are strictly web view users. Only a few of us live in the db world.

So current Blackbaud.com passwords are maintained in the transition?

Were you down for part of day or all day?

Did you feel need to shut off donation page during transition? We process thru BBMS and are assuming donations can't be processed into RE during the transition window.

Stacey Brake

Hi JoAnn - We do our online donations through another vendor, not Blackbaud (too expensive for us) so that was never an issue. I would check with the Azure migration group to verify if you need to turn off your BBMS service/donation pages.

Yes, your current Blackbaud.com passwords remain and do not need to be created again.

Our transition happened in the early morning hours and was completed by 8:00am. We were not down at all but I remember not being notified that the transition was completed so I had to contact the Azure group to verify it was finished and that we could log in. Our transition was easy as there wasn't much for me to do to prep.

Hope this helps!

Stacey

JoAnn Strommen

We'll they started our transition to Azure 11.5 hours ago, 11 a.m. At 3:30 we got an email that it was taking longer than expected. At 6 p.m. we got email that RE NXT and FE NXT transition was completed but not BBNC. It's now 10:30 p.m. heading into the weekend and we have no website / event registrations functioning.

We asked about how it would affect website/donation pages several weeks ago. We're given link to a beautiful BB green screen shot of a page saying site was down for maintenance/come back later type of thing. Well that's not the case. Our foundation website is being redirected to our alumni website, there's no notice why, IT staff can't get to foundation website to see why it's redirected. Registration links from outside pages and alum site load as "Server Error in '/" Application - Runtime Error pages. I'm honestly more than a little frustrated. We are mid phone-a-thon and won't be able to accept credit card payments this weekend if it's not resolved. We are registering for 5 events: 1 for grads, 2 reunions, 1 state conference and 1 international symposium. Not looking forward to Monday.

May be most transitions go smoothly, but be aware that's not always the case and plan accordingly.

JoAnn Strommen

At 7:32 a.m. Monday got an unsigned email "I sincerely apologize for the prolonged BBNC downtime, your BBNC integration is now complete." with instructions to update BBNC plug-in. Have completed that now but event registration links are still down. Waiting to hear why and how to fix that.

The process started Friday morning. If you're transitioning be aware that using BBNC can be down for quite some time. This has affected our phone-a-thon and event registrations. So frustrating and of course there is really nothing we can do about it.

Stacey Brake

So sorry to hear it didn't go as well as you had planned. I hope everything gets rectified today.

JoAnn Strommen

We finally have almost everything functioning - we think. Still have tasks like remapping every single queue report file. Accountant has one queue with 140 project reports - glad that one's not mine.

Am guessing we'll be fielding questions from constituents for a while about inability to access website - need to clear cache. Item for next eNews.

JoAnn Strommen

Today I encountered another issue from transition to Azure. So FYI.

If you use AddressAccelerator you need to update location Tools > User Options > File Locations. On the AddressAccelertor Data File line enter: c:\\AddressValidation

Error message I got when using it said I was using PostalSaver and KB article referenced is for Canada and gave me very lengthy process to fix my "Canadian AA". I feel sorry for anyone looking at that.

Chat with support found correct info is in KB 40608.

JoAnn Strommen

Any others who've made the transition to Azure finding that everything is really slow to open/process/export? I thought it was just me as I'm not the most patient person but at staff meeting this week our finance director, office mgr, researcher and athletic dept admin all brought up that things are slow.

Thought I'd ask here first to see if anyone knew any tweaks that can be made prior to seeing if support had suggestions.

Karen Diener

I have definitely found Azure to be much more slow than Blackbaud's other data centers. I am a consultant and have clients with both setups, so feel that I can fairly easily rule out other causes like their internet service, integrations, any particular problem that hosting center is having, etc.

It primarily seems to be during initial startup and saving exports / query results / etc. Once the system is up and running it usually isn't too different, but it is definitely noticeable.

Karen

Traci Holinger

We are experiencing the same issue. We migrated to the Azure environment in February and noticed a decrease in performance speed as well. We have just started research with other Blackbaud users and those schools who migrated a while ago are experiencing fast speed. I have also looked at our own infrastructure and felt we could rule it out as well.

Traci Holinger

JoAnn - we migrated in February and are experiencing performance issues in RE & FE NXT.

JoAnn Strommen

Thanks Karen Diener‍ and Traci Holinger‍.

I know in many ways it's a small amount of time but cumulatively the wait time for things to process is huge. And if affects overall productivity.

I encourage anyone who discovers any tweaks to speed things up to post.

Keith Wilson

Karen Diener:

I have definitely found Azure to be much more slow than Blackbaud's other data centers. I am a consultant and have clients with both setups, so feel that I can fairly easily rule out other causes like their internet service, integrations, any particular problem that hosting center is having, etc.

It primarily seems to be during initial startup and saving exports / query results / etc. Once the system is up and running it usually isn't too different, but it is definitely noticeable.

Karen

I just wanted to chime in and state we have NOT moved to Azure and performance has been dreadfully slow over the past month or so! Our entire team has been complaining about how long it takes for a record to open, or a query to run. It's awful!

Karen Diener

Keith Wilson:
I just wanted to chime in and state we have NOT moved to Azure and performance has been dreadfully slow over the past month or so! Our entire team has been complaining about how long it takes for a record to open, or a query to run. It's awful!

Oh I've definitely seen that too! Even when I had all BB hosted clients, some client's environments were faster than others, even if they were all on the same data center. It feels very unsolvable too - so many potential issues on any given day.

Karen

Ann Fleming

@Stacey Brake Hi there! I am migrating in May and am wondering about your comment (#1) on backups. Did I read your comment correctly to assume that BB does backups but cannot restore any of our data if there is an issue? I have seen a mention or two in other places about needing to pay for nightly backups and am curious if this is another thing I need to think about for budgeting. @Crystal Bruce is there any other information on this?

Stacey Brake

@Ann Fleming
Hi Ann - I'm not sure if this is a new comment but wanted to reply. I just chatted with Chat Support and what I had been told a while back was incorrect. As long as you are hosted (and Azure is just a different server, so you will still be hosted by Blackbaud), they take care of the back-ups. Here is a Knowledgebase article about it that Support gave me: KB Article 40591

Hope this helps and good luck!

Ann Fleming

@Stacey Brake Thank you for taking the time to get back to me! I really appreciate your help!

Crystal Bruce

@Ann Fleming:
@Stacey Brake Hi there! I am migrating in May and am wondering about your comment (#1) on backups. Did I read your comment correctly to assume that BB does backups but cannot restore any of our data if there is an issue? I have seen a mention or two in other places about needing to pay for nightly backups and am curious if this is another thing I need to think about for budgeting. @Crystal Bruce is there any other information on this?

I don't have any information, myself, but I can reach out to the team to see if they can provide insight and would also recommend checking with your CSA or account rep!