Convert to new software

[nikepete]

Hello

I'd like to upgrade my forum Invision 3.4.6 to the latest. As I understand it it will cost $150 then $40 every 6 months. Would Invision provide support and troubleshoot during the conversion (including the upgrade to PHP 7) until the new board is up and running ?

 

Thank you

[Randy Calvert]

5 hours ago, nikepete said:

Hello

I'd like to upgrade my forum Invision 3.4.6 to the latest. As I understand it it will cost $150 then $40 every 6 months. Would Invision provide support and troubleshoot during the conversion (including the upgrade to PHP 7) until the new board is up and running ?

 

Thank you

IPS does not provide support for upgrading your servers or making sure you meet the minimum system requirements.  That would be something you need to do.  

You can check to make sure you meet the minimum requirements for IPB 4.x by running the following script:

Once you know you meet the requirements:

• MAKE A FULL BACKUP OF YOUR SITE FILES AND DATABASE
  (I cannot emphasize this enough in case you have problems, you want to be able to roll back!)
• Download a copy of the latest 4.x version from the client center.
• Upload them to your server and override any files that it notes already exist.  
• Access "www.yourdomain.com/admin/upgrade".
• Follow the prompts to walk through the upgrade process.  

The staff will generally try to help as much as possible with conversions, however given that IPB 3.x is 10+ years old...  it can be difficult to support and cannot be guaranteed.  There was someone who went through a recent 3-4 upgrade and the staff were able to fix some mySQL 8 issues for him so that he could complete his upgrade process for example.  They're absolutely willing to help, but just realize there might be challenges/hiccups along the way.  (Thats also why its recommended to have a complete backup available just in case!)

Edited February 6, 2022 by Randy Calvert

[nikepete]

The server upgrade to php 7+ is no problems. My host already provides the script to execute it. Problem is the 3.4.6 currently runs on php 5.5 and switching to 7 makes it unaccessible and causing server error message. Can we handle this ? Please see attached file for the result of server check.

UpgradableOrNot.pdf

Edited February 6, 2022 by nikepete

[Nathan Explosion]

turn the site offline and switch to PHP 7.4 at the time you are  upgrading the software - issue handled.

Edited February 6, 2022 by Nathan Explosion

[Pescao6]

I've done a few upgrades and everything has gone smoothly. When I manually uploaded the new IPS4 files via FTP, the site pretty much broke but I was able to do the upgrade same as doing a new installation. I've also had cases where for some reason I was missing a file during the upgrade, and all I had to do was to re-upload the installation files and re-attempt the upgrade.

I think @Nathan Explosion's suggestion to turning the site offline might also be a good idea so you don't get any users attempting to post new content to the site while you're doing the upgrade.

And as far as I know from switching the PHP version, that's something that you can typically easily change back and forth so if a PHP version doesn't work you can revert it back to the old one. I had that issue when I wanted to use a customization which only worked with up to PHP 7.3 and I switched to PHP 7.4. It was easy to switch back to PHP 7.3 and the site loaded again normally with no problems.

[nikepete]

Thank you all for the valuable suggestions. I will proceed to upgrade to the newest version.

[Marc]

Good luck with the upgrade. I will move this ticket to community support for you un case you require any further assistance there.