Updated: Thursday, 05 August 2021 at 07:47AM
Author: Eric Vasbinder
Thank you for your interest in moving into the Viewpoint Cloud. The timeline for uplifting a Vista installation into Viewpoint's cloud, known as a "Transformation", can vary greatly depending on the complexity of the installation on-premise. For example, a simple, Vista-only installation on-premise can be transformed into our cloud quite rapidly, whereas an installation with multiple third party integrations to other solutions (e.g. GC Pay, MSI Data, Paperless's pVault, etc.) can take significantly longer.
On average, we see go-live times from 2-6 weeks depending on the complexity of the customer as mentioned above.
For a better idea of the timeline for your unique situation, please reach out to your Viewpoint sales rep, or after committing to move to our cloud, our transformations project manager can assist with scheduling your go-live more precisely.
Your success is paramount, and we can use your help to prioritize your cloud go-live as effectively as possible. Some items to consider that may have a positive impact on our ability to slot your go-live into an earlier wave and to help ensure a successful transformation include:
Keep things simple: Eliminating all non-critical third party integrations from the go-live process. For example, delaying the implementation of an integration to a third party financial reporting system can save several days of coordination time with third party vendors, customer staff, and Viewpoint personnel. If you can wait for at least 2-3 weeks after go-live, great!
Another good example is document management solutions: customers using "pure" Vista Document Management can more easily be transformed into the cloud than customers using a complex third party solution for documents.
Know where your data lives: Ensuring your database backups are readily available for both records and attachments.
A Fast Connection: Ensuring your Internet upload speeds are boosted to as high as possible to enable rapid data transfer. Many ISPs will have "burst" capabilties available to assist during periods of anticipated heavy upload demand. Try to target at least 300Mbps Upload. FIOS and other fiber providers can upgrade your connectivity to at least 1Gbps.
Go Mid-Week: Consider a mid-week go-live (there are almost always open slots mid-week).
Although this does require 1-2 days of work week downtime, this will likely enable your go-live to happen sooner than if we needed to find a weekend slot.
Know where your other VP1 solutions live: Ensuring you have database backups available for Keystyle / HFF if you are using these tools on-premise already.
Upgrading to the Current Version of Vista On-Premise: By upgrading to the current version of Vista on-premise, we can reduce the complexity of testing the cloud transformation, as the versions of the Vista rich client will be the same for on-premise and the cloud.
NOTE: If you cannot upgrade to the latest Vista version, that is OK. Viewpoint can perform the upgrade for you. HOWEVER, in this case, testing of the cloud will require that you set aside a separate computer or a Virtual machine to install the newer version of Vista's client.
Compatible VPN: Ensuring your VPN device is compatible with Microsoft Azure is a huge help as it avoids a number of technical setup and troubleshooting steps. Here is the link to the supported devices for VPNs into Microsoft Azure: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/vpn-gateway/vpn-gateway-about-vpn-devices#devicetable