Keeping local environments in sync with your Cloud environments

We recently announced that we are improving the scalability of SQL databases in DXP Cloud Services, this new architecture also enhances our overall security for SQL databases where we are aiming to harden technical controls to maintain confidentiality and integrity of our customers data. This change had an unintended consequence though – it disallows developers from connecting local development environments directly to SQL databases in DXP Cloud Services. We strongly advise against this practice, while the ease of use and flexibility is great, manually managing and storing connection strings and credentials for service users greatly increases the risk of these credentials falling into the wrong hands, allowing potential attackers to access or modify data.

To avoid these risks, our new architecture disallows direct connections from third-party sources to SQL Servers running in DXP Cloud Services. Instead, you should use the paasportal or the API to export your databases and content to use in your local development environments, which are more secure and reliable methods.

How to export content

Via the paasportal

1. Navigate to https://paasportal.episerver.net and select the project you wish to export a database from
2. Navigate to the Troubleshoot tab
3. In the ‘Export Database’ section, select the environment you wish to export the database from, and how long the paasportal should retain this copy.
4. Once the export is done, click the database file to download it as .bacpac. These files can then be used to import your database to a local SQL server, or an Azure SQL Server.

Via API with Powershell

1. Navigate to https://paasportal.episerver.net and generate credentials as described here https://docs.developers.optimizely.com/digital-experience-platform/docs/authentication.
2. Authenticate woth Connect-EpiCloud, Connect-EpiCloud -ClientKey <ClientKey> -ClientSecret <ClientSecret> -ProjectId <ProjectId>
3. Start a database export with Start-EpiDatabaseExport, for example Start-EpiDatabaseExport -Environment Integration -DatabaseName epicms -Wait
4. Fetch the download link for the .bacpac with Get-EpiDatabaseExport

Via the API you can also download BLOBs from the storage account, where Get-EpiStorageContainer allows you to list all storage containers and GetEpiStorageContainerSasLink creates a SAS URI that can be used to download BLOBs. For example,

 Get-EpiStorageContainerSasLink -ProjectId "2372b396-6fd2-40ca-a955-57871fc497c9" `

  -Environment "Integration" `

  -StorageContainer "mysitemedia" `

  -RetentionHours 2