[FIN] Server Upgrades

Posted 3 years, 4 months ago (Edited 3 years, 3 months ago) by admin

Hi; this is a heads up that I'll be processing some server upgrades & software updates over the next week or two.

If everything goes well, this will be an invisible update and should not result in any changes to site functionality. Just in case, I'll be keeping this thread updated with status & progress updates.

If you run into anything strange behaviour, please let me know by filing a ticket. Thanks for your patience!

Techical details for anyone interested:     

  • We're currently running on Laravel 5.5 which is about 3 years old; it's working fine, but I'd like to upgrade to Laravel 8.0 for better package support. This will also require a PHP upgrade.
  • There are seven steps to the upgrade (Laravel 5.5 -> 5.6, Laravel 5.6 -> 5.7, Laravel 5.7 -> 5.8, Laravel 5.8 -> 6.0, Laravel 6.0 -> 7.0, PHP 7.2.6 -> 7.3, Laravel 7.0 -> 8.0), followed by a bunch of package updates. I'll be processing them one by one so I can iron out bugs as they pop up and to make it easier to roll back if we run into problems.
admin

First update's been processed -- sorry if you experienced a site blip, it looks like it incurred 1-2 minutes of downtime while the packages updated. 

I'll be looking into restructuring site infrastructure a little to avoid downtime during package updates; will be fiddling with this a little more tomorrow.

admin

Second and third updates have been processed; we're now on Laravel 5.8. 

As usual, please file a ticket at the HelpDesk with any unusual behaviour you notice. 

admin

We're on Laravel 6.2 now which should be the last update for today; you may notice you were logged out by the upgrade -- apologies for the inconvenience.

I'll just be spending the rest of the day monitoring for bugs, so as usual please let me know if you notice anything strange. Thanks for your patience!

admin

Now back up to Laravel 7   

Thanks for your patience everyone, the PHP and Laravel 8 upgrades will likely be this weekend.

admin

Update on this; I've run into some issues with the last upgrades that will prevent them from being installed without extended downtime. Since the upgrades aren't vital I've opted to shelve them for whenever we next do a server migration (to avoid the downtime) -- in the meanwhile I'll be marking this set of upgrades as complete.

Thanks all for your patience!