Silly question about upgrade / convert / import

[Ocean West]

years ago i migrated my from from another product so I never had the privilege of starting from scratch I had to setup the board and then use a converter to IMPORT old database to new database which if memory serves the converter is basically a logical mapping engine form one database to another that actually copies data from one location to another, and perhaps moves files from one location to another ( cleaning up along the way)

However all the IPS upgrade have always been a process that updates the existing database updating or altering the schema as needed ( i think)

Would it not be better for such a major upgraded for one method of upgrade / import convert?  where instead of modifying any exiting database have the upgrade process be more of an IMPORT where you first setup a fresh forum & db create a root user account for this site then run an upgrade providing all the url's paths and database access to the other site and then move all data over - converting and cleaning up stuff as needed. and ignoring some old defaults and assuming new defaults - omitting themes in lieu of the newer version?

i mean you still have to build and create converters so that you can attract people who are leaving their platform for IPS - is IPS 3.4.7 and 4.0 are probably structurally enough different then any other competing product. So why not just build one conversion process?

Just a curious...

 

I'll attempt beta 6 tomorrow.

 

[Ahmad E.]

It would take away the ability to upgrade 3rd party applications and result in a loss of data.

[Ocean West]

for a big upgrade like this its a level playing field, most will have to disable existing / uninstall or wait to install a new version days or weeks after release. But the process could determine tables that are not "native" and move these tables wholesale to the new db - ( files and external content may need to be manually moved ) but since exiting data is separate and not overwritten original data can be manually moved) for traditional vRevs the existing delta updates would suffice.