Question Installing 32bit OpenEdge 11.1 in a 64bit Win Server

[kentponce]

Hi All,

This is my first time to write a post in this forum, hope someone can help me or share some knowledge / experience.

As mentioned above, is it okay to install 32 bit progress in 64 bit win server?
Any concern or things that we need to consider?

Thanks in advance guys.

Kind Regards,
Kent Ponce

 

[RealHeavyDude]

You can do that without any issue as long as it is covered by the product availability guide. You should have a look here https://community.progress.com/comm...ifecycle-and-platform-availability-guide.aspx for details.

You need to be aware though that it is not wise to run a database with the 32Bit server process on a 64 Bit operating system as you will be limited to roughly 2GB memory.

Heavy Regards, RealHeavyDude.

 

[Cringer]

You should be fine to do this, but as RHD implies, you shouldn't, if it is for the purpose of serving databases.

 

[Rob Fitzpatrick]

is it okay to install 32 bit progress in 64 bit win server?

"Okay" can mean a lot of things, including:

• it is technically possible
• there are no compatibility issues
• there are no known bugs
• your application will run well
• you won't have severe performance or configuration constraints
• it's supported by Progress
  
• it's a best practice
• etc.

Obviously, we can't say "yes" to all of the above. A more detailed and carefully-worded question would yield a more meaningful answer.

But you should also consider the fact that you are contemplating a new install of an OpenEdge release that entered retired status a year and a half ago. Retired doesn't mean unsupported, but it does mean no more new features and no more service packs, so you pretty much have to live with the bugs, vulnerabilities, and limitations in the product. And support for retired products is provided only on a best-effort basis. So if you open a case with TS, it's possible the fix will be "you should upgrade".

 

[Rob Fitzpatrick]

And, by the way, welcome to ProgressTalk.

 

[TomBascom]

You should also apply the Linux patch to that machine before you call it a "server"

 

[kentponce]

Thank you for all the replies. Help us a lot to understand things that we need to consider.

To give a brief overview to you guys, we are using progress many years already, legacy system is sitting on Progress 9.1b.
We purchased OE 11.1 few years back to migrate the system but due to some reason and constraints migration is put on hold and drag to date.

We only have 32 bit licensed that is the reason why we are forced to install it to 64 bit win server.
Time is also a concern, need to up this by two weeks time.

Any suggestion from you guys are very much appreciated.

A million thanks,
Kent

 

[Cringer]

Well if you are migrating to a new server then install Progress on it and try it. See how you get on. The situation is definitely not ideal. IMO you should be running 64bit Progress for your server due to the performance benefits, but that may not be a concern for you.

 

[mollyfud]

Hi Kent,
Check out this article from the Progress Knowledge base that has a fairly complete list of Windows OSes and what releases of OpenEdge can run as 32bit on them:
http://bit.ly/1LCsY16

Basically you should be fine as long as your OpenEdge release is supported on Windows OS you are using and being OpenEdge 11.1, you should be pretty right with all but the absolute newest releases.

Hope this helps.
Molly

 

[TomBascom]

As far as licenses go it should be a pain free, no-cost transaction to swap 32 bit 11.1 for 64 bit 11.5.

 

[LarryD]

Tom is correct. We just did that for a customer about 3 weeks ago who went from 32 bit to 64 bit Linux at no cost.

 

[Rob Fitzpatrick]

You know your application and we know nothing about it. It is CHUI? Is it GUI? Batch? AppServer? A mix? Does the code make external references, e.g. to functions in 32-bit DLLs or 32-bit OCX controls? Do they ever run server-side, or always on a separate machine? The answers to these questions should guide you to a decision about a potential move to 64-bit.

Moving to 64-bit doesn't have to involve all of your product licenses. For reasons already mentioned, you should ideally run your database on 64-bit RDBMS. If all of your clients are remote (they connect with -S) then your client licenses (Client Networking, AppServer, etc.) can remain on 32-bit and you don't have to worry about compatibility. And as Tom and Larry said, trade-ins for both platform changes (e.g. 32-bit to 64-bit) and version upgrades (e.g. 11.1 to 11.5) are free as long as you're on a current maintenance contract.

But if you have any self-service clients, moving the database to 64-bit means either moving those clients to 64-bit as well (and considering the potential gotchas above) or leaving them at 32-bit and changing how they connect: TCP instead of shared memory.