Migrating content from an on-premise or AMS AEM instance to AEM as a Cloud Service (AEMaaCS) requires a well-defined strategy. This guide outlines the best practices and steps involved in content migration using the Adobe Content Transfer Tool (CTT).

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AEM as a Cloud Service Fitment

Before migrating content, it is essential to assess the source AEM instance for compatibility with AEMaaCS.

Pre-Migration Assessment:

  • Perform offline compaction, data store garbage collection, and data consistency checks.
  • Gather source AEM repository statistics:
  • Segment store size
  • Index store size
  • Number of assets
  • Number of pages
  • Number of users & groups
  • Verify if the following features are enabled and required in AEMaaCS:
  • Smart tagging
  • Similarity search
  • Full-text search in Word/PDF documents
  • Collect the Best Practices Analyzer (BPA) report.
  • Import the BPA report into Cloud Acceleration Manager (CAM).
  • Review recommendations to ensure AEMaaCS can handle the required storage and performance needs.
  • Create an Adobe support ticket for any clarifications before proceeding with migration.

Proof of Migration

The proof of migration phase involves testing a small subset of content before a full-scale migration.

Steps:

  1. Request a production clone
  • Clone an author and a publish node (one of each in case of a cluster).
  • Maintain the same network zone.
  • Clone users, groups, and content.

2. Migrate a subset of content

  • Select a sample that represents all content types.
  • Include all users & groups if user mapping is required.
  • Limit migration to 25% of total content or 1TB, whichever is smaller

3. Execute a full and top-up migration to AEMaaCS non-production.

4. Resolve any issues:

  • Disk space constraints on the source AEM instance.
  • Connectivity issues between source AEM and AEMaaCS.
  • Ingestion-related errors.

5. Record migration time:

  • Track how much content is migrated per week.
  • Extrapolate migration time to plan for full migration.

Initial Migration

After successful testing, proceed with the full initial migration.

Steps:

  • Initiate migration using a staged approach:
  • Author → Author
  • Publish → Publish
  • Note: AEMaaCS author will be scaled down during ingestion, but AEMaaCS publish remains up.
  • Validate ingested content in both AEMaaCS Author & Publish.

Instruct content authors:

  • Avoid modifying or moving content on both source & target during ingestion.
  • New content additions/edits are allowed, but existing content should not be moved.
  • Track migration time to estimate future top-up migrations.
  • Create a migration planner to document each step.

Incremental Top-Ups

After initial migration, incremental top-ups ensure all newly added content is transferred.

Best Practices:

  • Gather content updates weekly, biweekly, or monthly.
  • Plan top-ups to avoid exceeding 48 hours of content extraction + ingestion.
  • Ensure top-ups do not fall into weekends.
  • Estimate and backtrack top-up migrations based on the go-live timeline.

Guidelines & Best Practices for CTT

To ensure a successful content migration:

  1. Run revision cleanup & data consistency checks on the source repository before migration.
  2. Use Wipe Mode during ingestion:
  • Wipe mode deletes the existing repository in AEMaaCS before ingestion.
  • This method is faster than applying changes on top of existing content.
  1. Ensure proper project structure in AEMaaCS to prevent rendering issues.
  2. Verify available disk space in crx-quickstart:

Required disk space formula:

  • Data store size + (Node store size * 1.5)
  • Example: If the segment store size is 20GB, then required free disk space = 94GB.
  1. Maintain a single migration set for consistent content transfer.
  2. Limit migration sets to 10 per project in Cloud Acceleration Manager.
  • If more than 10 sets are needed, create a second project (requires additional governance)

3. Do not modify CTT's installation directory (crx-quickstart/cloud-migration).

  • Altering this path can cause extraction issues.

CTT Tool: Migration from Local to Cloud

Installing and Configuring CTT:

  • Download the latest CTT Tool from Adobe Experience League.
  • Install it on your local AEM instance.
  • Generate an extraction key from Cloud Manager.
  • Provide the extraction key in CTT UI to fetch the project name and migration set name.
  • Add content paths to migrate (e.g., /content/sitea).
  • Optionally, upload a CSV file with multiple paths.
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Restricted Paths:

The following paths cannot be migrated using CTT:

  • /apps
  • /libs
  • /home
  • /etc (some /etc paths are allowed)

Steps to Obtain an Extraction Key:

  1. Login to Cloud Manager
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2.Create a Migration Set

3. Copy the Extraction Key

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4. Use the Key in CTT to Start Extraction

CTT Migration Process: Extraction & Ingestion

  1. Extraction:
  • Retrieves content from the source AEM instance.
  • Prepares content for migration.
  1. Ingestion:
  • Transfers extracted content from cloud storage to AEMaaCS target instance.

For detailed Adobe documentation, visit: Adobe Experience League — CTT Guide

Following this structured approach ensures a smooth and error-free migration to AEM as a Cloud Service, maintaining content integrity and minimizing downtime.

Conclusion

Migrating to AEMaaCS is a crucial step towards modernizing your AEM environment. By leveraging Adobe's Content Transfer Tool, performing thorough assessments, and following best practices, you can ensure a seamless transition.

If you have any questions or experiences related to AEM migration, feel free to share them in the comments