ok after moving our crm test instance to a new destination (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952934/en-us), the next goal to reach was the update of this instance… not software, data…
our crm in the productiv environment is really used a lot… so to test (and develop) the actuall productiv data would be a big bonus… so we needed to copy the productiv database to the test environment. sounds easy… but it isnt…
so… first of all copying the database was easy… backup the data on the productiv sql server, restore it on the test sql server… voila… ok normally this works… but in crm we need to set the installation to the new database, with the same name, with actually no difference… but ok… and its easy, because a tool (Deployment Manager) on the test server can handle this… but because its the same name, crm thinks, it works already… and actually there is no refresh button in the deployment Manager… so just load a fake organisation… then load the correct organisation again… voila… but wait… its an actuall copy… so all absolute links are still pointing into the productiv environment (eg. isv.config) and funnyly relative links might be swiched by the crm to absolute… so crap…
ok currently we will do it manualy the updade, when we need it… if there is a way to automate the hole thing… contact me…