vb4 in php7.3

[Cobra SA]

I know that this is not supported, so I'm just hoping to get generous help from vb team


I really want to stick to vb4 because of essential addons which would take insane efforts to rewrite

but php is end of life up to php 7.2

I have hired a dev to upgrade vb core files for php 7.3

so far the dev managed to get the forum running on php 7.3 but before I do some testing I have two questions
1. can I get license troubles for changing vb core files? like have my forum remotely disabled out of nowhere
2. do you believe it would be safer to downgrade to php 7.1 ? because while the site appears to run, there are so many core stuff that could be broken without being immediately apparent. is there really such a gap between php 7.1 and 7.3 that I should worry about it?

[Wayne Luke]

1. No. However, we cannot support software modified in this way. We can answer basic questions on settings and default functionality.

2. You would have to monitor your error log and keep track of deprecations and backwards incompatible changes in the PHP RFCs for each version you update. Since vBulletin 4.X is a large mass of procedural scripts, entries in the error log should point you to the exact line where any issue occurs. Your PHP developer should know how to track these.

[1QuickSI]

A little late to the party but I have been running under PHP 7.4.x for a very long time.

Just as a note PHP 8 conversion has already been done: Run vBulletin 4.2.5 on PHP 8.0 - vBulletin.org Forum
This will also run under PHP 7.4.x