Migrate website from PHP 5.3 to 5.5

[peteschulte]

Hello Guys and Gals,

The website

http://www.kevinschafer.com

was created in PHP version 5.3. I didn't create it, but over the years I've been Kevin's go-to guy for HTML page revisions,PHP-My Admin tasks, a new JavaScript window, etc.

Recently the PHP interpreter on the server was upgraded to 5.5. The ISP staff wrote to Kevin and he asked me whether I would have time and skills for the job. Well, there are dozens of PHP files and I'm working 9:00-5:00. I could spare maybe 4 hours a week for a few weeks, but I need to estimate how many hours would we be looking at? What would I need to do?

Could one of you tell me what is entailed in such an upgrade? Can I find a list of necessary changes? Here's what the ISP staff wrote to Kevin.

"The problem appears to be due to incompatibility between your software and PHP 5.5. Today, we changed the default PHP interpreter from 5.3 to 5.5. PHP 5.3 is well beyond its end-of-life. We checked your site's files, and it does not appear that the software that you are using was developed recently. This explains the compatibility issues with the current PHP branch.

"To make your site work again, we changed this line of your .htaccess file:
AddHandler application/x-httpd-php .html .htm
to read:
AddHandler application/x-httpd-php53 .html .htm
"This configures the account to use the PHP 5.3 parser. However, we strongly suggest that you update your software version, if you are using a third-party product. If the code was developed for you by someone else, you may need to contact them for assistance with this matter.
"At some point in the future, we will remove PHP 5.3 from our servers. Then your site will stop working, unless you update it as advised."

There is some information provided in the Support section of the web host, which I'll read now. It's better to talk with folks like you. Okay, thanks for any help!

Peter

Pete S

 

[southbeach]

Not sure what exactly is the problem since no errors, sample code or anything that would provide specifics.

That being said, the depth of your problem may very well be related to how much obsolete or poorly written code you have. From experience, programmers are creatures of habit and if one or more scripts are broken, same may be true to others since programmer likely repeated coding style throughout the site.

There is the question if the code was written in a procedural format or what I call "batch file style script".

In summary, hard to really suggest how much work or trouble you are looking at. I have worked on sites that on the surface are working but flooding the log with errors and warnings due to poor syntax.

Good luck!


--
SouthBeach

http://www.fp2php.com

The good thing about not knowing is the opportunity to learn - Yours truly, 2008.

 

[gandalf458]

There's a migration guide at

http://php.net/migration55

for upgrading 5.4 to 5.5 and another for upgrading 5.3 to 5.4. These may help you find what to look for.

I'm not a number, I'm a free man

 

[vacunita]

The complexity and time is going to depend entirely on what issues exactly the site was having.

A well written piece of code on 5.3 would work with close to no modification on 5.5.

We would need to know what errors if any it was throwing with 5.5.


----------------------------------
Phil AKA Vacunita
----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

Web & Tech

 

[peteschulte]

South Beach, that's a good question. I need to backtrack with Kevin and learn what the error was before they restored the old interpreter. Thank you!

Gandalf458, thank you for the migration guides' locations. That is essential information.

Phil AKA Vacunita, I was hoping to hear that about "a well-written piece of code." I think that it is. Years ago I was able to talk with the programmer and the site has been trouble free for a long time. Your observation about Ignorance has me laughing out loud. Thanks!

Happy holidays to all. I'll be back with more about the previous problem.

Pete S