Is there a recommended thread/ tutorial for upgrading?

Hi Folk,
I am pretty keen on upgrading a 138a install to current over the next day. There are 51 pages of threads here and most I have read so far seem to be people having issues or expecting issues and some people trying to help.

I really want to keep using zencart but am a little surprised with the upgrade procedure when compared to say wordpress (also complex).

Anyway I have downloaded and created directories with:

1. new version
2. my old version
3. clean old version.

I have taken a look with some diff software and there are differences but am not looking forward to merging every file by hand. However I guess that is the way ...

Has anyone here written a tutorial showing what to do?

Or is there a really good thread that is useful for a someone new to zencart to make this happen?

There is something about the tutorial on zen-cart.com that is confusing. Not sure what it is but I am finding it very difficult to follow (a little ambiguous perhaps). I am going to keep muddling my way through it, but I EXPECT problems and that is a huge worry for me.

What is a typical price for commercial help with upgrading a zencart site?

thanks shaun

Another way to look at it is this: An "upgrade" is essentially a rebuilding of your site.
The tutorial, https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/index.php?article=98 and the link on that page with the detailed steps, outlines the recommended way to do it so that you rebuild your site in a temporary location, resolving all potential problems before you ever touch your actual live site. This gives you time to sort out whatever needs sorting "just in case", and allows you to keep taking sales while you're preparing the upgrade. It also helps take some of the pressure off and makes it less urgent to do it all in one fell swoop.
The recommendations of comparing your site against the original code for the old version is to simply help you quickly identify what customizations you need to make to put those same capabilities into your new site. It simply speeds the process and creates a sort of checklist of things for you to re-do on your new site.

Then, after you've got it all built in the temporary location, you put your live store down for maintenance, quickly redo the upgrade there, and then bring it online ... meaning your actual live store's downtime could be as short as 5-10 minutes depending on complexities etc.

So, follow the guide, and while there may be some learning involved and remembering of things you did awhile back, it's all time well spent.

Shaun, it's not that bad..........if you follow the instructions that you will find in the "docs" folder of your newly downloaded version of Zen-Cart. Just follow everything closely, and you shouldn't have too many, if any, problems. You're more likely to have problems with modules not working and needed to be upgraded, as you are to have problems with the upgrade of Zen-Cart.

Just about everywhere you look, the going rate to upgrade from 1.3.8 to 1.3.9h is around $300 and up.

Oh.........DrByte beat me.................

Thanks folk,

Pretty sure I have my head around this now. Will put step 3 into place tomorrow and see where I end up.

thanks again

shaun