After creating your instance, you may want to migrate your database to an external server.

Prerequisites

Before you start, you will need an external database server running MySQL 8+ or Aurora 3.x+

This server must be accessible from your Deskpro server.

You will also need to create a database on this server for Deskpro to use and a user with GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES for this database.

CREATE USER 'deskpro'@'10.0.0.2' IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
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Backing up your existing helpdesk

Please follow the Backing up your database - mysqldump section of the Manual Backup guide to create an SQL file containing your existing database.

Configuring your new database server

You will need to create a new custom config file called config.custom.php in /opt/deskpro/data/instances/{instance_ID}/services/deskpro/config/, which should override the default settings in the deskpro-config.php file in that directory.

You can reference the deskpro-config.php file for the correct syntax for any changes you require, but that file is automatically maintained by the OPC, so any changes made in there will be overwritten.

As this is a PHP file, you will need to open it with a <?php tag, so the syntax for the file with an external database configuration will be the following:

<?php

$CONFIG['database'] = [
  'host' => '{external mysql server address}',
  'user' => '{username}',
  'password' => '{password}',
  'dbname' => '{database name}',
];
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You will need to replace the sections within {} with details for your new database server.

Restoring your database on your new server

Once you have configured Deskpro to use the new server, you will need to restore the .sql from earlier to the new server. You can do this with the following command:

mysql -h {host} -u{user} -p {database} < ~/{instance_ID}.sql
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In the above command, you will need to replace the following:

• {host} - the IP or hostname of your new database server

• {user} - the mysql user with GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES created for Deskpro to use.

• {database} - the new mysql database which Deskpro will use

• {instance_ID} - the Instance ID of the helpdesk you are importing. This is the file created from the mysqldump, so if you have moved this to a new location make sure the path is correct.

If all of the above is correct, your database backup should now be restoring onto the new server. Once this has been completed, your instance should now be running from the external database server.