Upgrade Question for DEV/Mods etc

[jonnyboy22]

Ok so i have lots of personal sites to upgrade plus clients. The clients sites will need comparing in more detail as they use lots of mods and as such will need upgrading the 'proper way', but my ones are pretty basic installs.

Assuming the site;

• is a basic install of 1.3.9h with no extra mods
• has had a FULL Mysql and site backup made
• has an admin area called admin

and am i correct in thinking the following should work fine;

Repeat just in case anyone else is going to do this make a FULL BACKUP OF EVERYTHING! and remember your admin wont be called admin so rename accordingly.

1) Upload all the 'NEW Files ADDED' via FTP
2) Upload all the 'CHANGED Files' via FTP
3) Delete all 'DELETED Files' whilst FTP is open
4) visit your /zc_install/ folder via http and run upgrade (im assuming the DB upgrade will then take effect etc?
5) once complete delete /zc_install/


Can anyone confirm this is correct.



EDIT: filename typo question moved to new thread

[DrByte]

Riddle me this ... why does everyone think it's smart to shortcut the process and skip important steps?
Frankly, it's gonna take you more time to hunt down and replace/update files based on the changelist than it would be to do a proper full site inspection and upgrade as per the formal upgrade instructions. And, doing a full inspection also gives you the SMART opportunity to make sure nothing unexpected is in your files, as well as catching any small things you forgot you'd altered, etc. There's a lot to be said for peace-of-mind by doing things properly.

As for the filename typos, we'll have it looked at, in this thread: http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showthread.php?t=190706

[jonnyboy22]

"Frankly, it's gonna take you more time to hunt down and replace/update files based on the changelist than it would be to do a proper full site inspection and upgrade as per the formal upgrade instructions."

Thanks for the reply but It only took me 20 mins to download the zip and delete all the non new/altered files leaving me with the new/added files.

The reason i was asking is its for my personal sites and should anything go wrong i have a 1 click backup/restore feature set up so i can restore easily.

"Riddle me this ... why does everyone think it's smart to shortcut the process and skip important steps?"

What important steps have i missed? all new files are uploaded correctly, all altered files would be correct and database would be upgraded? Since all sites templates are in their own folders etc they would remain uneffected.

Id appreciate your knowledge on this since you know significantly more than me regards zencart, only thing i forgot to add was check template files, overrides, sideboxes etc for any that had same file altered in default_template etc.

Would the above not work?

[DrByte]

You can do whatever you like, of course.

We refrain from encouraging ANY shortcuts because most people think they can just blindly replace a few files and expect everything to work, even though they've not taken any care to ensure that their site's integrity is fully intact and that all code changes are properly updated in all the files. ... and then they come back here asking us to tell them why things aren't working, and then we're into needless discussions back and forth about whether one upgrade method is better than another. Like this one.

Which of the official upgrade steps have you skipped, and why?
If you have a solid understanding of EXACTLY WHY you're skipping a particular step, AND you know EXACTLY HOW to recover from all problems that happen by skipping those steps both now and in the future when related problems might expose themselves at an inconvenient time, and you're prepared to fix those issues using your own expertise, then feel free to skip any step you like.

[DrByte]

Zen Cart v1.x is NOT yet ready for any safe "1-click" upgrade approach, which you appear to be advocating. That's dangerous territory.

It seems that you're indirectly asking me to tell you how to shortcut your client upgrades. DO NOT TAKE SHORTCUTS.
And if you choose to take shortcuts anyway, be sure to tell your clients that you're taking shortcuts and will be fully responsible for any and all problems and future support issues that occur as a result. They have a right to know what you've done and why.

[jonnyboy22]

That's not remotely what I'm saying and i dont appreciate that being suggested for obvious reasons. For all my clients sites I download a copy, download a original version, download new version, compare download to origional in win merge etc, make notes etc etc and then do usuall FTP upgrade procedure, if their paying they get what they pay for simply.

With my sites on the other hand (which are seasonal and don't need to be online after a certain time) I was just going to try a quicker procedure. They only have a few modified files in custom template folder so their is very little to compare.

I'm sorry if I've annoyed you but I was just asking for guidance as to if the above would work?

I've cloned one of my 1.3.9h sites which has only 4 edited template files. I've downloaded and uploaded all new filed and modified files from 1.5, deleted all deleted files, visited zc_install and ran the mydql upgrade. Then deleted the install folder.
This seems to be working fine.

Now I know this actuall takes longer than usuall way but what I'm asking nicely is, is the end result not the same???

I'm not implying everyone does this but For me with 6 sites this procedure would be significantly quicker since I know exactly which files I've modded on each site.

[DrByte]

If the end result is exactly the same, then of course you can do that.

One thing people seem to ignore is the importance of doing a periodic review of ALL files on the live server, to be certain that nothing has been altered/added ... either because you forgot about it or because your hosting account has been hacked and you didn't know about it. Thus, a full review of all the files on the live site as part of the upgrade process is an important value-added benefit of following the outlined steps.
But, if you're already doing that sort of review regularly, then either you can skip it because you're certain things are fine, or use this as an opportunity to do a very quick re-review of things. It only takes a couple minutes for the added peace-of-mind.

[jonnyboy22]

If the end result is exactly the same, then of course you can do that.

That's what I'm asking your opinion as an admin/someone who knows the code inside out. From what I can tell and understand the end result is the same.

If i create a 1.3.9h fresh install no mods or Template overrides, then follow the above procedure, it would work but would it be exact same result as a fresh 1.5 install ? As far as I can see it should be unless I'm missing something?

[jonnyboy22]

Actually guess I can answer my own question with win merge on that one!

[DrByte]

... and so now we've come full circle. Doing a full comparison of all files is exactly what the normal upgrade process involves.

So nothing has been accomplished here other than creating more search-engine results for people who think they're smart by shortcutting the process, and will read your first post and ignore the warnings because they're bent on doing it their way anyhow.

Yes I'm frustrated by this, because I'm the one who has to help them later when their stores are busted because they chose a shortcut.