upgrade put off long enough

[stitchnkitty]

I have launched my site about a year ago and have successfully included some addons without any difficulty and on the first go around (yea!)
I have read as much as I can on the upgrade and it is totally daunting! Much of the procedure I do not understand and i am totally frightened and have put it off since 'a' came out.
Blue host has gotten me out of trouble more than once on other issues and they will upgrade automatically but I will loose all my custom settings. Everything it took 6 months to get the way I sorta want it.
I want to add the wishlist addon and dont want to make more work for my self than need be so I need to upgrade first - I have read the tutorials and a bit of the threads and get stuck on the first step !!! Things like were do I put the demo and how do I access it?
Is there a tutorial for us zenners that are afraid of breaking our site! I have been putting it off long enough!
TIA

www.stitchnframeonline.com

[kobra]

they will upgrade automatically

NEVER!! NEVER!! NEVER!! Use an auto upgrade script...

https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/i...hp?article=108

[stitchnkitty]

I have been working on this most of the day and the 3 easy step are not so easy !!!!
If I am getting this right we have to compare the zencart that has not been modified to what we have modified and then upload the new cart and remodify it to look like what we have origially? There is ALOT of room for error here if I am getting this right!

I am at the Winmerge and have not gottem winmerge to work yet. So maybe I am panicking too soon !

But I have the general concept correct?
I have to then reattach my databases? and check all my mods and add ons?

TY

[stitchnkitty]

kinda got winmerge to give me a list of those files that are different.
There are LOTS of then and I need to upload = I am totally confused
Any suggestions?

[kobra]

kinda got winmerge to give me a list of those files that are different.
There are LOTS of then and I need to upload

If you have followed the override system the only ones that you need to check if they are on the change log are those

[stitchnkitty]

Ok is this right?

I need to do a fresh instal of the newest version of the zc. Attach it to my current DB during install instead of a demo DB.
Then to the new site start to tweek it with all the changes I have made including all the addons and ship modules.

If I have my images in the images/mediun folder can I just upload this entire folder? Or will there be changes in this folder that I will need to upload all 500 jpgs independently?

Also how will I know which files have been changed thru the entire 3000 files that I have listed seeing that I am quite the newbie and dont know what is a false indication or not?
TIA

[kobra]

Ok is this right?

I need to do a fresh instal of the newest version of the zc. Attach it to my current DB during install instead of a demo DB.
Then to the new site start to tweek it with all the changes I have made including all the addons and ship modules.

Ack!!!

No follow the tutorial and create a new database

Unzip a copy of the new version of Zen Cart™, upload it to your webserver into a "demo" folder, and install the new version into a separate database,

[stitchnkitty]

just when I started to get confident that I was understanding the concepts of this program! It is clear that this still eludes me!

You can not imagine how many times I have read this tutorial!

The concept of the database is also elusive - The database is a table that contains the important information of the products of each site? Yes?
When you say that you are installing the zencart into the database as opposed to attaching the database to the zencart?

So really no site may have more than one database and a database can not be shared by more than 1 site.

In the middle of the night I am trying to figure out how to spend time upgrading and still feed in product. Instead of not updating the site with product. I figure this upgrade will probably take minmun of a week of fussing.

TIA

[Ukulele]

Same problem here, not very helpfull (I wish people would understand that they had to start somewhere and to remember how they felt the first time they tried to update)
If its just updating the scrips in each folder, then cant you just upload all the files that have changed and delete the ones that have been removed?
I dont understand all the duplicate data base, use as a demo, upload to demo. This may be easy once you know, but most zen cart users are not qualified zen programers, we just need a product that works, which zen is great.
But when it says easy to update, I just dont know.

[kobra]

I dont understand all the duplicate data base, use as a demo, upload to demo.

The main intent of all of this is most have an operating shop
Doing the upgrade on a second install allows one to insure that all things are correct and functioning as expected without affecting their operating shop.

You can do this to your operating shop at your own risk of being down until you get all things squared

Your option - - but the recommended way is suggested