Upgrading from 3.8.9 - PLEASE HELP

[bareweb]

I'm trying to update to vBulletin 5.6.1 all the way from vBulletin 3.8.9.

I read through the entire upgrade documentation and have a couple questions.

1. Should I overwrite the 3.8.9 files with the 5.6.1 files in the existing forum folder or not?

The documentation has the following warning which doesn't completely make sense (says to delete all previous vBulletin files then says to maintain some directories?):

Warning:
Upgrading from vBulletin 3.8.11 or vBulletin 4.2.5

If you are upgrading from a legacy version of vBulletin, it is required that you put the vBulletin 5 files in a new directory. to delete all previous vBulletin files from the server before uploading the vBulletin 5 Connect files. Special care should be used to maintain the directories with user uploaded content like avatars and attachments. The directory structure and file layout in vBulletin 5 has changed dramatically and this will make sure there are no conflicts between files.

So I upload the v5 files to a new directory separate from the v3 files then run the upgrade script from the v5 folder? What if I want to keep the directory name (/forum) the same as it was before?

2. Not mentioned in the documentation but mentioned in your forums by Wayne Luke:

Upgrading from Older Versions of vBulletin
For the best upgrade scenarios, we recommend that you first upgrade to vBulletin 4.2.5 and then follow the steps above.

Do I need to do this or can I go straight from 3.8.9 to 5.6.1?

Please help. Really hoping I can make a smooth transition. Thanks!

[Wayne Luke]

1) You should delete the 3.8.9 files completely. Ideally, vBulletin 5 will be installed in a new directory to make sure there is no cross-contamination of files. This is discusses in the vb5readme.html file and all the upgrade documentation that we have provided. You can rename your vBulletin 3.8.9 folder to something like "/forum-backup" and name the vBulletin 5 folder as "/forum".

2) A better experience is created if you upgrade to 4.2.5 and create a database backup. After this, upgrading to 5.6.1 should be seamless. However, it isn't required. Note that neither 3.8.9 or 4.2.5 will run under the 5.6.1 minimum required PHP version of 7.2.0. So at this time, you might simply want to skip this.

[bareweb]

Thanks for the reply! I’m pushing forward with upgrading to 4.2.5 first since I still have php 5.6.0 on my server. It is taking a long time on 4.0.3 step 7. Assuming it may be doing something to the post tables which are pretty big?

After I get 4.2.5 installed (fingers crossed) I’ll update to php 7.4 and then try to upgrade to 5.6.1 as you describe in your sticky.

Is it normal for some of these steps to take significant time? Like 20+ minutes?

[Wayne Luke]

Yes. There are significant database changes in major versions and these can take time to process.

[bareweb]

It got stuck several times and I was able to get past the hangs by refreshing the page and restarting the upgrade. It always picked up where it left off. I now have 4.2.5 installed and am in the process of upgrading my database server so I can move to 5.6.1 next. Will update back if I run into problems. Thanks for the help!

[bareweb]

Making progress but appear to be stuck at the following step. It runs for several minutes with queries like you see below. Eventually, clicking Query Status reports that there are no processes running but yet it doesn't advance to the next step. When I refresh the page it starts over with step 3.

Please advise.

Upgrading to 5.6.1
Status: Processing 5.5.4 Alpha 4, Step 3 of 9


------ Query Status ------
Time Elapsed: 00:00:27, State: Copy to tmp table, Query: ALTER TABLE vb3_node MODIFY ipaddress VARCHAR(45) NOT NULL DEFAULT ''

[Wayne Luke]

The Node table can be a very large table. It contains the metadata (title, description, dates, last update, published status, etc...) for every piece of content in your database. This step can't be done in batches. It is modifying the structure of the table itself. It should just be allowed to run. Do not refresh the page. How fast the change is made depends on your specific MySQL installation and configuration.

To improve performance of the upgrade, you can run the 5.X upgrades from the command line from within the /core/install directory. $ php upgrade.php

[bareweb]

Thanks again for your help! It seems to be doing things for a while as I can push the Query Status button and it shows me the queries being run some of which take 5 minutes at a time, but eventually it just says no processes found. I wait several minutes and click the status button again and it continues to say no processes found. How long should I wait? It just seems to be taking an unusual amount of time based on the time other steps have taken.

Can I switch to the command line upgrade script mid-upgrade? Will it know where I am in the process?

[bareweb]

Trying it from the command line now and it seems to pick up where the web left off. Fingers crossed it will get past step 3.

UPDATE: Command line is working! I should have started with the command line version!

[Wayne Luke]

One of the problems with the Web upgrader revolves around server timeouts. These are added to prevent overuse of resources. Typically, the same timeouts are more lax on the command line due to extra authentication. This is why it is working better on the command line.

When the upgrader performs a step, it writes completion to a log within the database. This allows you to restart where left off on any step.

[bareweb]

I have a working 5.6.1 forum! Unfortunately signatures are not showing up after the v5 upgrade. They were there after moving to v4. I found that they are all still in the database as blobs in the sigpic table. I read all the forum posts and made sure they are set to show inline and turned on in the user profile. When I search a user that I know had a signature in the admincp, the signature doesn't even show up there. How do I get the signatures in the sigpic table to reattach to the users and their profiles?

[Wayne Luke]

There is a weird and obscure setting that was added by the product designers. Make sure it is set to Yes.

Settings -> Options -> Topic Display Options -> Post Signature Inline

Otherwise, it will show an icon in the user info column that people can mouse over or click to see the signatures. I think it is a fountain pen head or something like that.

[bareweb]

There is a weird and obscure setting that was added by the product designers. Make sure it is set to Yes.

Settings -> Options -> Topic Display Options -> Post Signature Inline

Otherwise, it will show an icon in the user info column that people can mouse over or click to see the signatures. I think it is a fountain pen head or something like that.

That setting is already set to Yes. I think signature pics were stored in the sigpic table and included in a user's signature by using the following BB code: [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]

Is there a way to get all of the signatures to work in v5? Like I mentioned, it was working after upgrading to v4.2.5 but doesn't work now.

Thanks again for your help!

[Wayne Luke]

Signature Pictures are not migrated during upgrades from vBulletin 3 or 4. The user can edit their signature to re-add them on the Account tab of the User Settings page.

There is a bug report to migrate these but it hasn't been resolved yet.

[bareweb]

Signature Pictures are not migrated during upgrades from vBulletin 3 or 4. The user can edit their signature to re-add them on the Account tab of the User Settings page.

There is a bug report to migrate these but it hasn't been resolved yet.

Ok got it. Thanks again for all your help! I'm up and running.