Randy Calvert

Backups are done outside of the IPS software. It’s something that your hosting provider should most likely be assisting you with if you’re not sure. 

This involves making a copy of all of the data in your web folder and also doing an export of your database. 

As a best practice, your host would automate this process and do it on a daily basis in the event of a major issue. 

Your problem looks to be related to the auto welcome hook you have installed. Disable it for not. You might need to disable all 3rd party resources and re-enable them one by one to see which ones cause you problem. 

Work with the resource author for any updates. 

IPS does not identify human vs bot, so unfortunately I don't think you can do it for just bots.  You can however turn signatures off for guests...  since most bots should be guests, this might work for you.  
ACP > Members > Member Settings > Profiles > Profile Settings 

 

To check what version you're running, click on the "Support" link in the upper right of your ACP.  
It should tell you what version you're running such as:

If you want to check to see if your site is able to run the IPB software, you can use the compatibility checker:
But in a nutshell one of the major requirements is PHP 8.0 or 8.1.  7.4 technically works right now, but PHP 7.x support ends in November and as a result in the November release, IPS will be removing support for it.  So I would just stick with 8.0.x or 8.1.x.  Full details can be seen when you run that script.  

When you convert from one software program to another, it will typically just COPY the data from the old one to the new one.  This is intentional because if the conversion goes wrong or if there are unexpected problems, you would be very upset if your original data was destroyed as part of the process.  
Another option short term if you don't know if it's used is to rename the database to something else.  If nothing breaks, then delete it.  But if something does break, it is typically faster to rename the database back to the original value instead of doing a restore.

Just turn off archiving.  It will bring it back for you.

When you turn it off, you'll see:

Choose to restore topics that don't match the new archive settings.  
Remember...  this does not happen real-time, so it may take a few days to do.  It's done in small batches in the background.  

Does this happen if you switch to a default theme?  

There is no option to can't disable it.  Your choice is upgrade or continue dismissing it.  

Your ACP will only show resources that are compatible with your version of IPB (such as 4.7).  The IPB website cannot automatically filter to those results. 

Either enter a dummy address or turn off address as a requirement.
ACP - Commerce - Payments - Settings - Checkout
Uncheck “Paying other charges”.   You might also need “Purchasing non-physical products”.  
You can turn it back on after you generate your invoice if you want. 

It’s a known issue for those that have a large number of 3rd party resources or if a resource has a large number of libraries. 

It’s going to be fixed in a future release from what was said previously. 

Instead of copying code, revert the template back to default. You’ll need to most likely redo any code changes to the calendar/event app code since it got a hefty forklift in this release. 

The upgrader connects to remoteservices.invisionpower.com.  There is no set number of IP addresses as the site is fronted by CloudFront which as IPs that change potentially for each request.
For example, I just tried looking up the site via a DIG and got:
;; ANSWER SECTION:
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 60 IN A 108.138.64.78
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 60 IN A 108.138.64.121
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 60 IN A 108.138.64.49
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 60 IN A 108.138.64.57
From another computer:
;; ANSWER SECTION:
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 17 IN A 13.32.208.15
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 17 IN A 13.32.208.96
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 17 IN A 13.32.208.107
remoteservices.invisionpower.com. 17 IN A 13.32.208.25
Your best bet is to whitelist all of Cloudfront's IP ranges as it's impossible to give a fixed IP set.  
As a short term fix, ping the site right before you do your update and use the IP in your firewall.  But remember, it can change literally at anytime.  

You CAN'T calculate the true cost as it depends on a bunch of factors that you won't know until after the fact.  However a BALLPARK ESTIMATE...
If you take the smallest instance (t3.small.search), and have it running all month...  the base cost is going to be roughly $52 per month.  (That includes two instances... a data instance and a master instance.)  The minimum disk size is 10GB, so that's another $1.22 a month.  
The above does not take into account bandwidth between your server and AWS which would all be billable traffic.  That would be roughly $0.09 per GB.  It's not possible to estimate how much you would use as it depends on if you use it to show data on every page or just search results...  how many users you have per day/month....  etc.  
You could also just install it on an EC2 instance yourself and manage it.  Then it's the cost of the instance and bandwidth which is obviously going to be lower.

This application is flagged as being compatible only with IPB 4.4.  As a result, it won't show in the Marketplace ACP.  It only shows resources that are flagged as compatible with the major version you're running (4.7 hopefully).
You need to contact the author for assistance as they're the only ones that can ensure their application works with the current versions of IPB and set the flag that notes it as compatible with the current versions.  

ACP > System > Settings > Login & Registration
Choose "edit" for your login method.  
 

ACP > Members > Groups 
Pick your member group and choose the "Edit" option.
Choose the Social tab.

This can happen if you have one plugin with a ton of libraries as well. For example, I was able to ALWAYS duplicate this happening when the AWS SES plugin is installed. 

This was noted by devs in my reported case and the team was looking to improve this in a later release. 

I assume you're running on the latest version of IPB software?  Have you confirmed your PHP 8 installation meets all of the system requirements?  
Make sure to run it while you're actually on PHP 8 to make sure you see any modules that might be missing.  
And in terms of disabling everything, I assume you checked for Applications AND Plugins?  That you also switched back to a default theme?  

You can look in the globalTemplate, however I expect you'll actually be editing somewhere else.
{template="logo" app="core" group="global" params=""}
If you notice where the logo is displayed, it's loading another template called "logo".  So you might need to do your editing/customization there within your theme.  

Correct. Your site will remain functional however there will not be access to technical support until you’re running the latest version and you may miss critical security updates. 

Try turning those off...  because they may be causing problems.  Also don't just look for the ad to be displaying.  Actually right click and view source.  Look at the code to make sure it's injecting to the right group.  
Google does not always decide to return ads for every site on every request.  The only way to confirm it's actually "working" is to check for the code.  If the code is there, then it's a Google problem of them deciding not to show the ad.  

Don't use the Text widget.  It is meant for literally only text....  meaning no styling or links, etc.  
Instead use the WYSIWYG editor.  It will give you the same editor that you use when making posts, which by default includes the ability to create links.  

Have you looked at your member group permissions to say what each group can do in each forum?  
ACP > Members > Groups.  Click on the Permissions button (the lock icon) for each group.
 

Yes. If a one use block is removed, it can be readded again.  It would return as showing in the block manager.