Central Server Ubuntu 18.04 to 20.04 In-place Upgrade.

Owned by Petteri Kivimäki
Last updated: Jan 30, 2021
3 min read

This document describes the steps required for upgrading Central Server host from Ubuntu 18.04 LTS host to Ubuntu 20.04 LTS.  Please read carefully through the whole document before starting the upgrade process. It is assumed that the reader is familiar with the Ubuntu Linux distribution and has experience of Ubuntu release upgrades and the central server is installed using the installation guide and has a local PostgreSQL database.

Clustered Central Server using PostgreSQL 9.4 and BDR 1.0

PostgreSQL 9.4 with BDR 1.0 is no longer maintained and installation packages for Ubuntu 20.04 are not available. Therefore, upgrading to Ubuntu 20.04 is not supported.
It is recommended to remain on Ubuntu 18.04 if migrating from BDR 1.0 is not possible (see Central Server HA migration instructions).

Preparations

If upgrading a system that uses a hardware security module: Please verify that the HSM is compatible with Ubuntu 20.04 and check the HSM module documentation for upgrade instructions.

  • Review the Ubuntu release notes and upgrade instructions:

  • Update all packages to the latest versions:
    apt update && apt full-upgrade

  • Ensure that the X-Road software version is at least 6.25.0

    • In case of a central server cluster, ensure that all nodes have the same X-Road software version.

  • Recommended: Make sure that you have an up-to-date backup (or a virtual machine snapshot) of the server.

  • Use the admin UI to take a backup of the central server configuration and download it to a safe location.

    • This makes it possible to restore the server configuration if the upgrade fails for some reason.

Upgrading Ubuntu 18.04 to 20.04

Stop the central server and prevent it from starting on boot before continuing to the actual upgrade: 

systemctl stop xroad-jetty xroad-signer
systemctl disable xroad-jetty xroad-signer


  • Install update-manager-core and software-properties-common if not already installed.
  • Make sure the Prompt line in /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades is set to lts (long-term support)
  • Launch the upgrade tool with the command
    sudo do-release-upgrade
  • Follow the on-screen instructions.
  • When the upgrade is finished, reboot when prompted.

Upgrading the X-Road software

Stand-alone Central Server: Upgrade the database

This step applies only to a stand-alone central server.

  • By default, the Ubuntu upgrade process creates empty database instances that should be removed before the old database is upgraded.

  • List the database instances with pg_lsclusters, and drop the extra ones.
    Do not remove the version 10 (main) running on port 5432
    sudo pg_dropcluster --stop <version, e.g. 12> main

  • Upgrade the old database to version 12:
    sudo pg_upgradecluster 10 main

Update the X-Road package repository to point to the Ubuntu 20.04 packages

  • Update the X-Road apt repository (remove old and add new):

    apt-add-repository -r "deb https://artifactory.niis.org/xroad-release-deb bionic-current main"
apt-add-repository "deb https://artifactory.niis.org/xroad-release-deb focal-current main"

    Alternatively, find the repository definition in /etc/apt/sources.list and edit it directly.

Upgrade the packages

sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade

Enable automatic startup and start central server

systemctl enable xroad-jetty xroad-signer
systemctl start xroad-jetty xroad-signer

Verify that the central server services are running and the system is responding

systemctl list-units "xroad-*" "nginx*" "postgresql@*"

UNIT                        LOAD   ACTIVE SUB     DESCRIPTION
nginx.service               loaded active running A high performance web server and a reverse proxy server
postgresql@12-main.service  loaded active running PostgreSQL Cluster 12-main
xroad-base.service          loaded active exited  X-Road initialization
xroad-jetty.service         loaded active running X-Road Jetty server
xroad-signer.service        loaded active running X-Road signer

Stand-alone central server only: Drop old database and obsolete packages

After verifying that the database upgrade was successful, drop the old database and remove obsolete PostgreSQL packages.

sudo pg_dropcluster 10 main
sudo apt purge postgresql-10
sudo apt autoremove

Troubleshooting