Enable SwitchOnRebuild feature in Sitecore 10 SearchStax / Solr Cloud - Sitecore Managed Cloud AppServices

Recently I had a chance to enable SwitchOnRebuild feature in Sitecore 10 environment. This environment is on Sitecore Managed Cloud. So we do not have access to the SearchStax environment but we we will get the API Key and username and password as part of environment provision ticket from Sitecore.

In the Sitecore managed cloud environment, SwitchOnRebuild Solr Index feature is not enabled in our instance. This article will help you to setup the feature. These steps can be followed for any solr cloud setup whether it is in SearchStax or On-Prem solr cloud solution. 

1. Get Solr Admin Username and Password
   Make sure you have Solr Admin username and password. You can refer the original environment provision ticket from Sitecore.
    
2. Get the config sets name from the existing Solr Collection
   Login to Solr admin, go to master, web and core collections. You will get the config sets names. 
   
   In my case, master and web collection have sitecoreconfigset-master-web and core collection has sitecoreconfigset.
   
   
   
   

   
   
3. Create Solr collections and aliases
   We need to create rebuild collections for master, web and core collections. Along with that, we need to create Aliases. 
   
   

   Collection Name	Rebuild Collection Name	Main Alias Name	Rebuild Alias Name
   sitecore_web_index	sitecore_web_index_rebuild	sitecore_web_indexMainAlias points to sitecore_web_index	sitecore_web_index_rebuild points to sitecore_web_index_rebuild
   sitecore_master_index	sitecore_master_index_rebuild	sitecore_master_indexMainAlias points to sitecore_master_index	sitecore_master_index_rebuild points to sitecore_master_index_rebuild
   sitecore_core_index	sitecore_core_index_rebuild	sitecore_core_indexMainAlias points to sitecore_core_index	sitecore_core_index_rebuild points to sitecore_core_index_rebuild

   
   Below CURL requests will help you to create the collections and as well as aliases. You can execute these requests in the same browser where Solr Admin is logged in.  
   

   # Create Collections
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATE&name=sitecore_web_index_rebuild&numShards=1&replicationFactor=3&maxShardsPerNode=1&collection.configName=sitecoreconfigset-master-web
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATE&name=sitecore_master_index_rebuild&numShards=1&replicationFactor=3&maxShardsPerNode=1&collection.configName=sitecoreconfigset-master-web
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATE&name=sitecore_core_index_rebuild&numShards=1&replicationFactor=3&maxShardsPerNode=1&collection.configName=sitecoreconfigset
   
   # Create Aliases
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATEALIAS&name=sitecore_web_indexMainAlias&collections=sitecore_web_index
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATEALIAS&name=sitecore_web_indexRebuildAlias&collections=sitecore_web_index_rebuild
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATEALIAS&name=sitecore_master_indexMainAlias&collections=sitecore_master_index
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATEALIAS&name=sitecore_master_indexRebuildAlias&collections=sitecore_master_index_rebuild
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATEALIAS&name=sitecore_core_indexMainAlias&collections=sitecore_core_index
   https://abc-xyzsearchstax.com/solr/admin/collections?action=CREATEALIAS&name=sitecore_core_indexRebuildAlias&collections=sitecore_core_index_rebuild

   
   
4. Add SolrCloud in Connection String and Enable SwitchOnRebuild config in Sitecore
   Step 1: Update the solr.search connection string to have ;solrCloud=true at the end. In our managed cloud instance, this was enabled already. 
   
   Step 2: Copy and rename the example Sitecore patch file (\App_Config\Include\Examples\Sitecore.ContentSearch.SolrCloud.SwitchOnRebuild.config.example) in Include folder. 
   
   The feature is enabled now. You can now rebuild the indexes and the subsequent index rebuild will not bring down the Site Search feature from your site. 
   
   
5. Add MainAlias as the Collection name in CD
   Many folks may forget this. In order for the CD environment to use the mainAlias as the primary collection, we need to patch the core param in Sitecore.ContentSearch.Solr.Index.Master.config to use mainAlias. <param desc="core">$(id)MainAlias</param>. 

 Reference: 

• https://www.searchstax.com/blog/sitecore-switchonrebuild-and-searchstax-solrcloud/
• https://doc.sitecore.com/xp/en/developers/102/platform-administration-and-architecture/switch-solr-indexes.html