Installing and upgrading help

Is 'service provider' a Moodle Partner or quasi-Moodle Partner?

IF so, would think they might have a solution/method(s).

If not ... a quickie ...

New Server - stand up a fresh git installed 3.6.highest version of Moodle.  No teachers ... only unique admin level users that don't exist in current server.

Install moosh on it.

Current server ... each teacher desiring to keep, resets courses removing students ... that includes their work, files uploaded, grades, events, etc.

A list of those course ID's created.

From command line on current server use cli backup.php script to loop through those reset courses and save them to a designated directory (not in moodledata/filedir).  That designated directory is temporarily set with symlink so it's accessible via web.

Using command line create a listing of all backup files contained there in.

On new server ... create a file system repo called 'restores'.

From 'restores' use wget which gets each course backup to the 'restores' repo.

On new server,  use moosh to run through a a listing of courses to be restored to a category.

If all goes well, on new server, teacher has same creds, logs into new, and their transferred courses are ready for further updating/editing + assigning studnets (you probably have already some method of doing that via Student Info System so teachers may not need to do a thing).

Sounds involved but better than GUI and doing one at a time.  In the past, did exactly as described above ... 'moved' 4000+ courses to new server in a little over 8 hours ... adjusting scripts used on either server (plus a pot or two of coffee ... late night job).

'SoS', Ken

In remembering your former posting topics, seems a lot of time was spent 'tweaking' DB settings.   So a key here is 'configurations', maybe?

When moving to a different provider are sounds like you're not getting a minimal OS install and you build, but they have already 'built' for you ... web service, DB server and MySQL/MariaDB already loaded and server waiting your moodle backups?

You can copy the my.cnf file to new server, but, been my experience, perhaps best *not* to just drop it in and expect everything ot work .... unless ... new digs are *exactly* the same - and that happens how often? (almost none).  Same goes for web server and config files for it.

Do locate your cert files and do copy them to new server if keeping same FQDN and CA.

A old server running MySQL and new server running MariaDB (supposed to be a 'drop in replacement') some lines meant for MySQL actually don't work with MariaDB and some new ones might be needed.   

Besides ... perfect time to upgrade the DB version ... if MySQL also perfect time to use MySQL's own repo's.

Found that 5.7 of that flavor's defaults have changed and some of the config settings for older versions no longer needed.

Large DB ... what's size of sql dump?   While not an exact does clue one in on possible (nohup) command additions and config tweaks.

Could reduce size before migrating .sql dump to new DB server by truncating the largest table ... mdl_logstore_standard_log ... the 'who done it' table.

Would install MySQL Tuner from the get go and run it + save output ... probably the first opportunity you've had to have a 'baseline' for config before exploring tweaks to config (which may/may not be helpful in new environment).

And another 2 cents ... provider in the 'cloud'.  Now there are some additional considerations ... for dedicated DB server config ... what host can access, reduced surface for attacks, should it use encrypted transport?  Is cloud provider known for 'noisy neighbors'?

Oh, yeah ... docs do mention rsysnc ... good option for moodledata.   Just make sure you do a dry run first. ;)

'SoS', Ken