Solr Data Management

Solr Core Management

Overview

The Solr Core Management script is a utility developed to simplify and standardize the process of exporting and importing data from Solr cores used by DSpace (such as statistics or audit).

This tool is particularly useful for maintenance, data migration, and backup/restore operations, as it provides a consistent way to handle large Solr indexes without requiring direct Solr administrative access.

In production environments, Solr cores can grow significantly over time. Full exports or imports of these cores can be time-consuming and resource-intensive. To address this, the script includes incremental export capabilities and multi-threaded processing, allowing administrators to manage data more efficiently.

Why This Script Is Used

DSpace installations often rely heavily on Solr for usage statistics, and audit tracking. However, managing Solr cores manually through Solr’s admin interface or API can be problematic, especially when dealing with large indexes or multi-year data retention.

This script was designed to:

• Automate routine Solr maintenance tasks, such as periodic exports for backup or archival.

• Enable partial exports/imports based on time increments (e.g., by week, month, or year), making it possible to handle data in smaller, more manageable chunks.

• Support parallel processing to improve performance during heavy operations or large data amount.

• Standardize import/export formats (CSV or JSON).

In short, this tool allows administrators to safely back up, migrate, or rebuild Solr cores without disrupting DSpace operations or requiring direct low-level Solr commands.

Usage

The script can be executed through the DSpace command-line interface (the script is also available from the UI but requires administrative permission to run the script):

./dspace solr-core-management [options]