QC Best Practices - using Production data in a Test environment

Subscription Database

If you intend on using Production data in a test environment, you can restore a backup of Production to a test environment, but do not copy the Subscription database outside of Production – always create a new Subscription database.

The Subscription database stores environmental references that are created by the services for the specified environment. This means that Production services will create references within the Production Subscription database that only apply to the Production environment. If you copy this database to a test environment then that test environment will now be pointing resources to your Production database and could cause unintended data changes while working within the test environment.

Web-Service configuration links

After restoring a copy of the Production QC_Core database into a test environment the first step should be to update the Database Manager Web-Config links, also located in the system_config_value table. These will still be pointing to Production servers upon restore, it is important to update or remove this information to prevent the Test environment from applying data changes to the Production database.

Coverage Incentive's use of the Saga Database

If Coverage Incentive is actively utilized it is important to retain the qc_saga database when migrating to new environments. The Coverage Incentive services store critical data within the qc_saga database that is used for historical comparisons. If this data is lost, Coverage Incentive might not calculate correctly.