IMPORTANT: Migrating from ESM to Orchid Fusion VMS can be an involved IT process, and complex ESM environments may require more migration steps than are described in this guide.  Customers migrating from ESM to Orchid Fusion VMS are strongly encouraged to Submit a Ticket with IPConfigure Tech Support should they have any concerns or questions before beginning this process.

Purpose

This document will show the steps necessary to migrate existing, production environment hardware from IPConfigure’s legacy VMS - Enterprise Surveillance Manager (ESM) - to IPConfigure’s new VMS - Orchid.  This document is for Windows environments only, if the end-user is looking to convert to Linux, additional hardware will be required and will need to run in parallel with the Windows Server running ESM. ESM does not support any other Operating System but supported Windows versions.

Prerequisites

This document assumes the following conditions, exclusions, and assumptions;

• The hardware that will be leveraged for this migration has the CPU, disk space, and RAM requirements necessary to run both ESM and Orchid in parallel.  
• In order to make the necessary changes in ESM, and in order to install Orchid, Administrator access will be a requirement.
• All network cameras that will be configured during this migration process are online and accessible. 
• The workstation or server that is accessing and running the related ESM reports on it has Adobe Reader installed and is able to print to a network or locally connected printer.

Exclusions

This document will only show the migration steps as it relates to local authentication at the local user level.  Any environment centered around Active Directory, Azure, Google Auth, or any other authentication mechanism may require additional discovery, setup, configuration, and troubleshooting steps and techniques.

Per camera and ESM related database settings cannot be migrated into the Orchid system.

This documentation expects that the customer’s VMS environment consists of a single ESM Management and Archive Server hardware platform and not dedicated hardware (or VM’s) for each the Management Server and any Archive Servers that can exist in a given environment.

ESM to Orchid Migration Step by Step Guidelines

ESM Data Pull

1. The first step to take is to log into your /admin portion of your ESM environment and run a Camera Status report so that all information is able to be verified during the Orchid discovery, setup, and configuration process.
2. Once you have successfully logged into the /admin portion of the ESM interface, you should default to the “Reporting” > “Dashboard” page.
3. Click on the “Reporting” Tab as shown below:
   
   
4. Choose the “ESM - Camera Status” report in the Report drop-down menu, the default Start Date and End will be fine.
   
   
5. Click on  to execute the report. 
6. The report should complete relatively quickly and return information on all cameras configured on the system, this may be over multiple pages.  We want to export this report to PDF and print it out for the configuration of cameras in the Orchid VMS.
7. Click on the down arrow at the end of the “Select a format” option and choose “Acrobat (PDF) file” as shown below.
   
   
8. Click on   to export the report to a PDF version.  Once this report opens in Adobe Reader, print a copy out on the network or locally connected printer.

ESM Empty Schedule Creation

Now that we have our Camera Status report ready we want to create an empty schedule and assign that schedule to all cameras within the ESM environment.  This empty schedule will keep the cameras available in the ESM UI and allow for playback of existing ESM video recordings. This empty schedule will also prevent any new ESM data from being recording.  Based on the delete routines used by the ESM configuration, ESM will slowly delete video data by age until all relative ESM data is removed.

1. Return to the ESM Management Admin interface.  Down the left hand side, click on “Settings”, and you should see “Schedules” listed under there.
   
2. Right click on  and the left click on .
3. Name the new Schedule “ESM to Orchid” as shown below and click on .
   
   
4. You should now see “ESM to Orchid” schedule listed under the   section in the Admin interface.  You may need to refresh the browser instance in order to see it.
5. Click on the Schedule once to bring up the schedule content.
6. In the top right corner of the schedule, click on “Timeline” as shown below.
   
   
7. There should be no schedules listed under any of the dates shown for this “ESM to Orchid” schedule.
   
   

ESM Empty Schedule Assignment

Now that we have our empty schedule for all ESM configured cameras, we need to apply this Schedule to all cameras in the ESM environment.  Depending on the version of ESM being used and the Camera models being leveraged, it is possible this per camera configuration change exists in two different places for our purposes.

There are two types of camera configurations in ESM - ONVIF and Legacy.  Each configuration’s steps to update the schedule will be shown below.

1. Return to the ESM Management Admin interface.  Down the left hand side, click on “Devices” and drill down through the “Global Devices” hierarchy until you get to the impacted ESM server.  For these purposes, work will be done under the “300 E. Main St.” Archive server. All cameras will be displayed once clicking on the “+” to the left of the Archive Server name.
   
   
2. After clicking on a camera, the properties page will refresh on the screen to the right of the Device tree.
3. If you see the following, jump to the “Legacy Camera Schedule change:” section below, otherwise proceed to the “ONVIF Camera Schedule change:” section below.
   
   
4. ONVIF Camera Schedule change: When selecting an ONVIF camera properties page, proceed to the “Streams” section of the properties page once it has refreshed and displayed.
   
   
5. On the above, click on the  to access the Schedule information.
6. Change the Schedule to the “ESM to Orchid” schedule we created earlier.
   
   
7. Once applied, click on   to apply the change.
8. Proceed to the next camera in the tree and make the change as needed based on the camera configuration type (ONVIF or Legacy).
9. Legacy Camera Schedule change: When selecting a Legacy camera properties page, click on the “Scheduling” tab of the properties page once it has refreshed and displayed.
   
   
10. At the top of the page, change the Recording Schedule to the “ESM to Orchid” schedule we created earlier.
    
    
11. Click the   button on the top right section of the properties page to save the change.
12. Proceed to the next camera in the tree and make the change as needed based on the camera configuration type (ONVIF or Legacy).

Pre-Orchid VMS Installation Considerations

Before proceeding with the installation of the Orchid Core or Fusion VMS platform on the existing Windows server there are a few factors to consider;

1. If the camera environment consists of HIKVision or Axis cameras, it is possible that each camera will require the setup of a dedicated ONVIF user profile prior to successful configuration in Orchid, please reference the Orchid Core VMS Knowledge Base for more information.
   
   HIKVision setup: https://support.ipconfigure.com/hc/en-us/articles/360007458451-Enabling-ONVIF-on-HIKVision-Cameras
   
   Axis setup: https://support.ipconfigure.com/hc/en-us/articles/360003525471-Configure-ONVIF-User-On-Axis-Cameras
   
   
2. Make sure to have the latest version of Orchid Core and Orchid Fusion downloaded from their respective links, IPConfigure always recommends installing the latest version of each Orchid platform for all installs. To download local versions of Orchid Core and Fusion, please use the following links. 
   
   Orchid Core VMS: https://www.ipconfigure.com/products/orchid#download
   Orchid Fusion VMS: https://www.ipconfigure.com/products/fusion#download
   
   Generally speaking, most users will install Orchid Core VMS on all of their previous ESM Archive servers, and Orchid Fusion VMS on their previous ESM Management server.  Note that Orchid Fusion VMS and Orchid Core VMS require separate HTTP ports, so if your previous ESM Management server also functioned as an ESM Archive server, you will install both Orchid Core VMS and Orchid Fusion VMS on that server.
   
   
3. Orchid Core VMS and Orchid Fusion VMS will need to be configured to use different HTTP and RTSP ports that don’t conflict with the current ports in use by ESM on the Windows Server via the IIS configuration currently in place.  This is done in the orchid_server.properties file and fusion.properties file, respectively. See the following Knowledge Base on how to accomplish this after the Orchid VMS installation process has been completed.
   
   How to Change a Port After Installation: https://support.ipconfigure.com/hc/en-us/articles/203346935-How-to-Change-Port-after-Installation
   
   As an example, if you migrate a combined ESM Management/Archive Server, your port configuration might become:
   
   ESM/IIS: Port 80
   Orchid Fusion VMS: Port 8080
   Orchid Core VMS: Port 8081

Orchid VMS Installation for Windows

This document will only reference the Orchid VMS installation guides, as they are updated based on version releases.  This is the most effective and up to date guidelines for installation, configuration, and administration.

Orchid Core VMS Documentation:  https://support.ipconfigure.com/hc/en-us/articles/213064963-Orchid-Core-VMS-Documentation

• See the “Orchid Core VMS Installation Guide” link for how to install Orchid Core for any supported Operating System, including Windows.  At the time of this document, the Installation Guide is for Orchid Core 2.4.0.

Orchid Fusion VMS Documentation:  https://support.ipconfigure.com/hc/en-us/articles/115004172606-Orchid-Fusion-VMS-Documentation

• See the “Orchid Fusion VMS Installation Guide” link for how to install Orchid Fusion for any supported Operating System, including Windows.  At the time of this document, the Installation Guide is for Orchid Fusion 2.6.2.

The discovery and configuration of cameras in Orchid Core at this point will be the same process as a clean Orchid Core installation and setup.  After Orchid Core VMS has been installed on all existing ESM Archive servers and Orchid Fusion VMS has been installed on the ESM Management server, link all of the Orchid Core VMS servers to Orchid Fusion VMS, following the Orchid Fusion VMS Administrator Guide from the documentation link above. 

As cameras are discovered, configured, and added to each Orchid Core VMS server, mark them as setup on the PDF report we created and printed out in the first part of this document.  This will allow for an additional layer of quality control during the migration process.

Follow the guidelines listed above and available on the IPConfigure Knowledge Base.  Additional information on best practices, along with IPConfigure Support assistance and training can be found via the below resources.

IPConfigure Support

We strongly recommend that your team perform these migrations during IPConfigure Technical Support Hours to optimize IPConfigure’s support capabilities and internal resources.  If possible, please reach out to the Support team prior to this migration to let us know when the migration will be completed. This will allow us to verify resources for that time frame and be certain to have the proper resources on standby to help assist with any technical issues that might arise.  To reach our Support team, use one of the following options:

• IPConfigure’s Support line: 855-440-1077 (or direct at 757-520-0587)
• IPConfigure’s online Support Portal

IPConfigure Training Portal

Training is completely online, self-paced and free of charge. Take the following steps to begin: 

• All IPConfigure's training is available online at http://training.ipconfigure.com/
• You and your team can sign up via the SIGN IN link in the upper right corner of the page
• Click on create a new account to proceed.  
• Contact IPConfigure technical support for complementary access to Administrator training content.

Final Checklist and Items to consider

1. During the initial setup of the Orchid VMS on a Windows Server, there may only be a small percentage of overall disk space available for Orchid to record data to.  As ESM continues it delete routine, additional space will become available for the Orchid VMS to leverage. It may be necessary to update this data retention volume setting in Orchid multiple times in order to obtain the needed days of retention desired by the customer.  
   
   Please reference the section titled “Changing the Orchid Core VMS Archives Retention Percentage” in the Orchid Core VMS Installation Guide link shown below.
   
   https://support.ipconfigure.com/hc/en-us/articles/213064963-Orchid-Core-VMS-Documentation
   
   
2. Once ESM no longer has any more video data to process through the delete routine, it is safe to uninstall ESM from the Add/Remove Programs portion of the Windows Server.