IP.Board v3.3.4 Upgrade to IP v4.x

[Phil A]

Hi.

I am currently in the process of trying to migrate a legacy version of IP.Board v3.3.4 to 4.x.

I have followed the instructions and managed to create a test installation on localhost and am serving it over an nginx webserver on PHP 8.1. The problem I am having is that the database I am migrating from seems not to work with the new IP 4 software.

I have a MySQL instance running on a box with the previous database there.

When I go through the installation process it even detects it as an existing IP Boards database. However on completing the setup, I find that in the database the application has just created a load of new empty tables and the legacy ones are not being picked up by the installation.

The existing db has all tables prefixed with "ibf_" however because it detects the installation I'm not able to specify this as part of the setup.

Has anyone successfully performed a migration using one of these older DBs?

I know that this upgrade is not supported by Invision themselves, but any help on this would be gratefully received.

Please let me know if anything is more info is needed or you require further clarification.

Thanks,

Rich

[teraßyte]

It sounds like you're making a fresh 4.x install. However, to upgrade you only need to upload the new 4.x files over the old 3.x ones and then go to /admin/upgrade to start the upgrade process.

 

IPS Guide link:

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by teraßyte

[Phil A]

Yes, I am trying a fresh install. Ideally I would like to just install the 4.x fresh using the legacy database as otherwise I will need to install an old version of IP boards and then upgrade that way, which seems laborious as I think it would mean reverting to an older version of PHP as the original forum is now offline.

It seems that the 4.x installer is aware of the IP Boards 3.x database so I thought the conversion would work. Is it more nuanced than that? The installation itself goes through fine.

I have looked at a few of the tables and much as most of the content is the same, I can see some have been renamed, would it be possible to just remap the existing ones?

[Jim M]

Before we begin, please note that 3.x is no longer supported. That goes with 3.x upgrades as well. If you run into issues, we recommend working with a third party provider to perform your upgrade.

In regards to what you're stating here, you would need to perform an upgrade, there is no way around it. While having a working 3.x installation is ideal to perform an upgrade, that is getting increasingly difficult due to the technology gap. With that said, you just need the database and attachments to move forward with the upgrade from 3.x to latest of 4. You would simply move those items over to your new server along with your conf_global.php file (don't forget to update for your new server) and then go to /admin/upgrade .

 

1 hour ago, Phil A said:

I have looked at a few of the tables and much as most of the content is the same, I can see some have been renamed, would it be possible to just remap the existing ones?

It is not possible. The upgrader handles a lot of different schema and data changes required. It isn't simply renaming.

[Phil A]

Hi Jim

Thank you for taking the time to reply.

6 hours ago, Jim M said:

With that said, you just need the database and attachments to move forward with the upgrade from 3.x to latest of 4. You would simply move those items over to your new server along with your conf_global.php file (don't forget to update for your new server) and then go to /admin/upgrade .

I am not completely clear here. Do I need an actual working version of a 3.x installation, or are you saying that provided I have the exported DB, the attachments and the conf_global.php I can just create a fresh 4.x server on the latest version and go to my_server/admin/upgrade to kick it off?

If it's the former, does that mean I'd need to get my 3.x installation up an running on an older version of PHP that is supported for my instance?

[Marc]

Provided you have everything, you shouldnt really need to get it up and running. You should be able to so the former there.

[Phil A]

I'm getting this error when I try to access localhost/admin/upgrade:

 

When I go to localhost/admin/ I see the following:

 

Where rdb is the name of my database.

[Phil A]

Is this something that anyone can help with?

[Marc]

If you are having issues, it may be best to employ someone to do this migration on your behalf. There are quite a few people out there offering this service in the providers area, if thats something you are interested in

https://invisioncommunity.com/third-party/providers/