Upgrading to 3.6 (mod and hack risk?)

[pokerie]

Hi,
I'm looking to upgrade to 3.6 from 3.5.4 and I was just wondering is there a big risk in doing so considering I have mods and hacks on my site at present? You can see my forum here: http://www.poker.ie/community/

If we were to upgrade, are there any potential problems that could arise by doing so. Is the upgrade likely to be incompatible with the hacks and will the style templates need to be completely redone?

Please note we're also using VBA CMPS too:)

Any feedback would be appreciated!

[Guest190829]

Hi,
I'm looking to upgrade to 3.6 from 3.5.4 and I was just wondering is there a big risk in doing so considering I have mods and hacks on my site at present? You can see my forum here: http://www.poker.ie/community/

If we were to upgrade, are there any potential problems that could arise by doing so. Is the upgrade likely to be incompatible with the hacks and will the style templates need to be completely redone?

Please note we're also using VBA CMPS too:)

Any feedback would be appreciated!

It all depends on the Modifications you have installed. It is very probably that there would be some additional work required during your upgrade. (Upgrading the style, modifications, and making sure everything is in order.)

[pokerie]

Thanks for the feedback. I'm not exactly sure what mods we have installed, my designer/developer has taken care of all of that. Is there any way you can tell from looking at the site? I know there was some editing done for the header integration, the front page latest post box and the magazine.

From looking at the site, do you reckon the upgrade will have drastic effects and how long do you reckon it may take to fix these?

EDIT:
Off the top of my head the mods installed are the 'vbadvanced cmps', 'deluxe vb login' and 'fps external'.

Will the template files that I spent weeks customising all be completely wiped back to the default boring blue style when I upgrade, or is vbulletin clever enough to pull them through with the update?

Are the new features really worth the hassle?

Thanks,

The designer/developer.

[Guest190829]

Thanks for the feedback. I'm not exactly sure what mods we have installed, my designer/developer has taken care of all of that. Is there any way you can tell from looking at the site? I know there was some editing done for the header integration, the front page latest post box and the magazine.

From looking at the site, do you reckon the upgrade will have drastic effects and how long do you reckon it may take to fix these?


EDIT:
Off the top of my head the mods installed are the 'vbadvanced cmps', 'deluxe vb login' and 'fps external'.

Will the template files that I spent weeks customising all be completely wiped back to the default boring blue style when I upgrade, or is vbulletin clever enough to pull them through with the update?

Are the new features really worth the hassle?

Thanks,

The designer/developer.

vBulletin will not 'wipe out' your customize templates. It will notify you which ones will have to be updated, and you can work around the changes. Depending on the complexity of the style, updating templates can be very tedious.

You can always do the upgrade on a Dev Board first....

[CodeRed]

You can always do the upgrade on a Dev Board first....

how would one go about doing this?

side note: also i heard somewhere that there was a program or script available that can run a comparision between your current VB version and the new 3.6 in order to show what may or may not work.

any idea if something like that exists?

thanks

[pokerie]

Thanks for the replies.

I'd also like to know if there is such a thing as the above metioned too?

We did customise VB quite a bit and my developer said it would probably take a few days work to upgrade to 3.6 so if there is something that could help the process that would be great!

[pokerie]

Any further information regarding this? :)

[TPOCJames]

I'm also curious to, so here's a bump. :)

[da420]

I uninstalled everything but the gallery, arcade, and vBRadio, because when I installed on my dev board without uninstalling, I royally messed up it.

I suggest uninstalling everything. It only takes a few to reinstall it. That way you get the latest versions of the hacks as well. :)

[TPOCJames]

Well here's my list of ones I have installed. Which would you recommend I uninstall? I don't have anything too hardcore.

Automatic Welcome
Move to Recycle Bin
Prevent Doubleposts
QuoteIt!
Reported post creates new thread
Restrict Styles to Usergroup
Sticky Titles in Bold
vB Staff Titles

[da420]

Dunno, don't have any of those hacks. I would just say to uninstall them all. That's what I would do. Maybe someone can tell you otherwise?

[peterska2]

@ TPOCJames:

Reported Post Creates New Thread is a default 3.6 feature.
Automatic Welcome - is that thread or PM? PM is now default in 3.6
You shouldn't have any problems with those though.

Ones that I know mess up your upgrade rather spectacularly are some RSS Feeds modifications, and some warning modifications, so if you have these, the must be completely removed before upgrading.

[pokerie]

The complication with our forum is that we have customised loads of things. If you look at it here: www.poker.ie/community you will see custom settings straight away, the main colour is win, it is shrunk to fit the rest of the site, there is a latest post section on that page, there is a magazine section with images to be displayed on that page underneath the latest post section. Then when you go into a post, we have taken away things like the posting rules box, the navigation drop down menu down the bottom and all kinds of things. It's exactly the way we want it now and it would be quite a pain to have to set it all up again. Also we have youtube BB codes, our own smilies and other tings too.

Will all this be effected with the upgrade as well as our hacks?

[TPOCJames]

Thanks Peter! I'm using the PM. I was pretty sure they were all ok, but I wasn't sure.

Sorry for hijacking your thread poke, wish I could help. Maybe posting a list of your mods could help, like I just did. :)

EDIT: Thanks for the help by the way, successfully upgraded. :)