By johnstonf on

What is the easiest way to upgrade from 6.2 to 6.3?

The upgrade.txt looks too complicated!...

Is it ok to just upload the 6.3 overtop of my existing, and then run
the upgrade.php?

I have quite a few sites, none of them are overly complicated.

⋅ Categories: Drupal 6.x

Comments

BioALIEN’s picture

BioALIEN commented

So long as you make a backup, you should be safe in the event things go wrong.

After the above is done, just upload all the files from Drupal 6.3 over your existing Drupal 6.2 installation except for the "sites" directory.

This should pretty much have you covered. I have not yet reviewed the changes, but having read through the list of changes, I couldn't see anything related to the settings.php file.

Don't forget to run update.php and cron.php after the upgrade process.
---
Dee
iScene Interactive :: iScene.eu

pengi’s picture

pengi commented

I've never upgraded drupal. I have 6.2 and would like to move to 6.3, and hope it's as simple as you've written. I've disabled the a modules I added etc per the writeup.

But how to replace the drupal files? The webhost offers cpanel but I don't see how I can do with cpanels included file manager? The tar creates dir drupal6.3; but I can't rename that to my main drupal installation folder's name; and there is no way to copy all files and folders to a new location, only one at a time. I could try it using a joomla install which has an ok file manager, but it won't copy over existing files.

The upgrade.txt says "6. Remove all old files and directories from the Drupal installation directory." But, they really mean to wipe out all the files and dirs of my current install? That can't be. Else why would they say to put the site into offline mode? Besides every module would need to be reinstalled from scratch.

Pretty confusing, someone who really knows this stuff but can fathom the view of less experienced users should rewrite the instructions.

-Anti-’s picture

-Anti- commented

> The tar creates dir drupal6.3; but I can't rename that to my main drupal installation folder's name

> and there is no way to copy all files and folders to a new location, only one at a time.

Which version of cpanel are you using? Those two statements appear to be contradictory. If your cpanel filemanager can compress/uncompress archives, then it can copy and move multiple files/folders; these features were all added in the same version. You should definitely be able to rename - that feature is seven years old.

Also, doesn't your cpanel/host provide separate ftp access, anyway? If so, why aren't you using it?

> The upgrade.txt says "6. Remove all old files and directories from the Drupal installation directory." But, they really mean to wipe out all the files and dirs of my current install? That can't be. Else why would they say to put the site into offline mode?

0) Take a complete file and database back-up of your site before starting.

1) You're supposed to disable the contributed modules so they don't do anything weird to the database while you're updating. They *won't* need set-up again, as their info and settings are retained in the database.
Likewise, you're in offline mode so the users don't do anything to the database.

2) You take a back-up of your 'sites' directory so you can put it back afterwards.

3) You then *do* delete all the drupal files. If you simply copied new files on-top, what would happen if some files had been moved, removed or renamed? You'd end up accumulating duplicates and dead files. If you want to remain 'lean and clean', it is better to delete than to copy new files into an older installation.

4) Then you upload the new drupal files in the same place.

5) Then you replace your 'sites' directory. This puts your themes, modules and 'core uploads' files back. Note the modules are still disabled.

6) Then you run update.php in case the core has some database updates to do.

7) Then you turn all your modules back on.

8) Run update.php again so that you're modules can make any changes they need to the database.

You're not reading the instructions wrong. You're just understandably a bit nervous. But as long as you do step 0, nothing at all can go wrong - you'll always be able to get back to where you are now (assuming you take the back-ups properly).

pengi’s picture

pengi commented

Thanks for responding, but still don't get it.

Yes I have ftp access and could try that. But it does not allow me to to much that the other options can do, except perhaps overwrite the files in place and enmass, which is not what should be done, since that might leave old files in place. cpanel is a recent ver; one can rename, but I dont' think one can rename a dir to an existing dir name...which would have been required if deleting the entire site was not being removed, as you've indicated it will be.

The missing bit here is the sites folder you mention. I have a sites directory, but there is almost nothing in it. None of my modules or themes are there. So if I do delete all the site files and then restore the sites folder, I'll simply have a virgin 6.3 installation, other than the database updates.

Does anyone realize how much more awkward this is than say a joomla upgrade? At the min, it should be obvious what todo to a user who reads the upgrade instructions...I can't imagine that I've read the instructions a couple times and your nice writeup too and am still baffled.

Another poster here reminded me of another reason I didn't use ftp; I've had issues with file perms when extracted to my xp workstation and then uploaded to linux server. So I originally hesitated to take that route.

-Anti-’s picture

-Anti- commented

> cpanel is a recent ver; one can rename, but I dont think one can rename a dir to an existing dir name...which would have been required if deleting the entire site was not being removed, as you've indicated it will be.

I can't describe every eventuality. Before going on, I need to know:

1)
Your exact cpanel version, and whether you can see tools along the top of the file manager like 'select all', 'extract', 'compress', 'move' and 'copy'. cpanel is preferred because it can extract an archive, whereas FTP cannot.

2)
You can do everything you need via an ftp client except you'd need to extract the archive on your desktop and upload the uncompressed folder - it takes much longer and occasionally some of the files can be corrupted. However, if your cpanel filemanager cannot extract, then you are better to use an ftp client for the upload. If you're going to use an ftp client, it would be useful to know which one you have.

3)
whether you've installed drupal in the public_html folder (ie. the root) or in a subdirectory (ie. public_html/drupal)

4)

> The missing bit here is the sites folder you mention

If you haven't uploaded any themes or add-on modules, then it *will* be empty, except for an extremely important folder called 'default' with an extremely important settings.php file inside. So you *still* need to back it up.

If you *have* uploaded themes and add-on modules, and you didn't upload them to the 'sites/all/ folder, then you've done it 'wrong' ie. you haven't followed 'best practice', which will make upgrading harder. So I need to know if you have uploaded any themes or add-on modules, and if so, where did you put them?

> Does anyone realize how much more awkward this is than say a joomla upgrade?

Including taking back-ups, resintalling additional languages and mirroring a test site from the upgraded site, it literally took me less than 5 minutes to upgrade this morning. That was the first time I'd upgraded. There is nothing difficult about renaming your old drupal folder, uploading a new folder in its place and copying your 'sites' folder into the new folder. Once you done it, you'll laugh at why you thought it was difficult.

Cheers.

pengi’s picture

pengi commented

All themes and modules were put into the main themes and modules dirs. I'll remove and reinstall them in 'all'

11.23.4-STABLE 26138 is cpanel.

Should be simpler with everything where it's supposed to be.

pengi’s picture

pengi commented

Argh. Now I'm getting error "The Drupal installer requires write permissions to ./sites/default during the installation process. If you are unsure how to grant file permissions, please consult the on-line handbook." I've made that folder writable by the entire planet and still get the error.

-Anti-’s picture

-Anti- commented

> All themes and modules were put into the main themes and modules dirs.
> I'll remove and reinstall them in 'all'

You do mean move to all/modules and all/themes, don't you? You need to create these directories yourself.

Realise that if you do that, then you *might* have to set the modules up again.
ie. they might become 'completely uninstalled and reinstalled' if their location changes.
I honestly don't know - it's a chance you'll have to take.

> 11.23.4-STABLE 26138 is cpanel

So doesn't your file manager look like the one in the gif? http://www.pulpo.co.uk/filemanager.gif. It should do. If not, your host hasn't enabled the new version of file manager, and you're using what is called 'legacy file manager' which was replaced a year ago.

> Now I'm getting error "The Drupal installer requires write permissions

What are you running the installer for!?? The installer should not run during upgrade.

> I've made that folder writable by the entire planet and still get the error

You need to chmod 'sites' and 'default' and the settings.php separately to 755.

Since you need an absolute step-by-step walkthrough, please answer all four of my questions and confirm that your cpanel file manager looks like the one I linked to.

pengi’s picture

pengi commented

My cpanel file manager does not look like that; it's the 'same old one'. Hostgator seems to be a bit behind the times.

There were no dirs in all called themes or modules. I had to hand create them.

I think something must be really messed up with my drupal install. It started from fantastico drupal 5.2, and I just used Fantastico to upgrade to 6.2 a week ago. I don't usually use fantastico because it's caused issues in the past, but the site was only for eval of drupal and I took that route. I think since I have so little content in the site I'll start from scratch. I need 6.3 because I want to check out views, apparenly in the 6.x stream, 6.3 is the first that handles them ok.

I greatly appreciate your persistence in trying to help me.

-Anti-’s picture

-Anti- commented

> My cpanel file manager does not look like that; it's the 'same old one'. Hostgator seems to be a bit behind the times.

Well, the new one is 100% better. The best thing is undoubtedly the extract/compress feature - I really don't know how I managed without it (I didn't - every cms upload was a pain in the ass). This is followed closely by the 'multiple-select' and 'select all' features. However, it is possible that a host can instigate the new filemanager, but doesn't enable the compression/extraction feature. If you're going to develop your site remotely, like I do, I would say that this is important enough for back-ups, upgrades and site development that you should find a host who provides a fully-enabled cpanel file manager.

OK, so unfortunately, without the new filemanager (and without command-line shell access) it means that you will need to:

- extract the Drupal 6.3 zip archive into a folder on your desktop.
- Using a Windows ftp client either highlight the files and upload them to your public_html folder OR
- Change the folder name to 'drupal' and upload the folder to your public_html folder.

Be aware that not all ftp clients are created equally. Some corrupt files more than others.
Don't use the ftp client or filemanager in cpanel - a php script simply cannot compare with a windows client.

> It started from fantastico drupal 5.2, and I just used Fantastico to upgrade to 6.2 a week ago.

Everything suddenly becomes crystal clear. Search the forums for 'fantastico'.
You will see that you are far from the only person who has had trouble with this kind of install.

pengi’s picture

pengi commented

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abubin’s picture

abubin commented

I am also new to drupal and have never run the upgrade before. I already downloaded 6.3 and overwrite my existing 6.2 files.

Set to maintenance mode and disabled own themes and modules.

But then I get to this page :

Drupal database update

The version of Drupal you are updating from has been automatically detected. You can select a different version, but you should not need to.

Click Update to start the update process.

> Select Version

When I click on that Select Version, it will show some modules for me to select which one to update. By default there are no modules selected. I selected "System Module" only to the newest 6047. Click update but get this error.

The following queries were executed
system module
Update #6047

    * UPDATE {blocks} SET cache = -1 WHERE module = 'user' AND delta IN ('0', '1')
    * UPDATE {blocks} SET cache = -1 WHERE module = 'system' AND delta = '0'

Anyone have any idea how to upgrade properly?

-Anti-’s picture

-Anti- commented

> When I click on that Select Version, it will show some modules for me to select which one to update. By default there are no modules selected. I selected "System Module" only to the newest 6047. Click update but get this error.

They are not selected by default because they don't need updated.
You should have just left them as they were.

The version of Drupal you are updating from has been automatically detected.
You can select a different version, but you should not need to.

Try again running update.php, but don't select any alternate versions; leave them at 'no updates available'.

Cheers.

ambientdrup’s picture

ambientdrup commented

For what it's worth here's my 2 cents on this process. I just upgraded a Drupal 6.2 site to 6.3 and had no issues. This is a relatively new site I'm running so I did not have a lot of content and/or modules installed and I was using the default Garland theme. Here's what I did:

1) Logged into my Hostmonster account via FTP and uploaded the Drupal 6.3 folders/files (previously extracted to my desktop) directly to my server via FTP to overwrite the 6.2 folders/files that were already there

2) Logged back into my Drupal site and status report reported that everything was no updated and 6.3 was running fine.

3) I did not have to run the update.php script.

4) I did not replace my .htaccess file. I kept the same file I was using in my Drupal 6.2 site.

So this worked. However one question:

Should I still run "update.php" in order to make sure the database integrity is stable? I'm not getting any error messages and status report gives the all clear.

nirvanajyothi’s picture

nirvanajyothi commented

I think you can run Update.php without any problems.After you click 'continue' the modules will be listed with the newer versions(if any) and it will be 'no updates' in your case.And then when you proceed it will show 'updating 0 of 0 updates' and no errors will be shown.

"Give me a place to stand and I shall move the Earth"
-Archimedes

Korak1’s picture

Korak1 commented

I've got to agree with the assertions that it "should" be easier to upgrade the core. Perhaps a batch process to remove unnecessary files and update files requiring updating for a default install with an "Advanced" option to do it the old-fashioned hans on way?

One you are comfortable with the upgrade as it stands, it isn't that big of a deal. That stated, having to take a deep gulp as a new user with the uncertain feeling that you are going to mess everything up shouldn't be required. Especially if you haven't done anything particularly interesting with your install anyway.

Anyway, just casting a voice in support of cleaner core updates. Can't actually deliver the future I see so I am just another member of the "peanut gallery" calling for things without contributing to the solution...