Oct 10 2007
WordPress 2.3 Upgrade
I’m very proud of myself! I did my first WordPress upgrade today (to version 2.3) all by myself. I followed all the steps and, except for a minor scare with a wp_table error, it went pretty smoothly.
The main reason I wanted to upgrade was because I’ve been having some conflicts between plugins and perhaps my theme might be an issue too. I thought that having the latest “everything” might help.
Unfortunately, I was mistaken and I had to ditch a couple of plugins as they were evoking “fatal errors” or the white screen of death. It’s scary when you activate a plugin and then can’t even get back in to the plugin page to deactivate it. By the way, if this happens you just delete the offending plugin from your server (providing you can remember which was the last one you activated).
So this blog is unfortunately without subscribe to comments (which is sad, because I really like this feature on blogs that I visit) until it is made compatible with WordPress 2.3. If you want to keep track of comments here, I can recommend the co.mments service. If anyone knows of a similar plugin, please let me know (I hunted around but without luck).
I also had to lose the polls widget, although it’s supposed to be compatible. Damn – just when the guys started to vote too (n.b. my last poll was asking if you were male or female)!
If you use WordPress, have you upgraded yet and did you have any issues?
11 Responses to “WordPress 2.3 Upgrade”
Hi Meg
I suggest you try Poll Daddy as a replacement
I’m not upgrading because my motto is if it ain’t broke don’t fix it and anyway my blogs are very heavily hacked with my own custom PHP and mySQL code so it would take several days to get everything working again
Congrats
I take it you have to do manual upgrades? I used to until I switched hosts last month and am now able to enjoy the so called “one click install” upgrade. I’m yet to upgrade to 2.3 though… a bit worried about how some of the… special modifications I’ve made in places will work with 2.3!
That’s why people do web application deployment in “stages”. Do the upgrade in testing environment first before pushing it to the production!
@Neerav — I agree that if things ain’t broken don’t fix it. However with the state of WordPress sometimes you are just not sure whether the code is broken — “broken” means whether there’s any security issue. For example 2.1 hasn’t been touched for 6 months, and you just don’t know whether any 2.2.x security fixes have been back ported to 2.1, unless you go and check the code yourself.
WordPress team is only committed to fix certain versions, and I think the safest bet is probably upgrading to the latest (although using the latest version also has some issues itself).
Neerav – I’ll have a look at that, thanks.
John – thanks
One click install upgrade sounds good. My web host did do it last time for a reasonable fee, but I felt it was time to stand on my own two feet.
Scott – yeah, I left it a couple of weeks (as opposed to a *LOT* longer last time) – but I had hoped it would fix a couple of hiccups. Funny, it’s great when it’s all working fine, but those tricky little problems can be so time consuming.
I had to do an upgrade of WP to 2.3 on the testing blog I’m working on, and the first time I did it, I read the “non-extended” instructions and wound up FUBARing the whole thing because I didn’t deactivate the plugins before I put the upgrade through.
I then did it according to the full instructions, which does include the bit about plugins, and it all worked like a charm.
It’s kind of strange that your plugins don’t work. I’ve got WP-polls version 2.21 and Subscribe to Comments v. 2.1.1 installed and activated with no issues at all.
It might be just a case of needing to upgrade the plugins to the new versions so that they work..
Sephyroth
I think I will stick with Blogger.
Being a newbie I started with a blogger blog. Is it a big step to transverse to wordpress. I have been to a few sites and problems do arise from time to time in wordpress. The last one was with a comment widget – the author mentioned it broke down. I don’t know what that meant, but I suppose that can happen it any type of blog. Anyway I like your site with its many tips and suggestions. Regards Peter
Sephyroth – I know what you mean about the condensed instructions – they kind of miss a couple of crucial steps! It’s quite possible that the plugins work ok on a default theme or on their own – it’s just that for me there seems to be a conflict either with other plugins or my theme, so it’s a matter of priorities at the end of the day. Snos gave me a couple of tips – so will try those.
Colin – I can understand that!
Peter – it certainly does seem to provide less glitches, but then perhaps not quite a versatile – so at the end of the day it’s a trade off… Thanks for your nice words
WordPress, despite tricky upgrades, is far superior to Blogger IMHO. However I confess I’m probably on 2.0.x… like Neerav I’m worried my “tweaks” won’t make the transition plus I need another 4-5 hours in my day to do it properly.
Still the kids are away for the weekend, and you’ve inspired me Meg so maybe I will go the upgrade… after all I updated my uggboots so I’m feeling brave.
Hi CB
Fingers crossed all goes smoothly – but with your technical ability it should be a breeze.
[…] plugins with WordPress 2.3 before upgrading. For people doing a manual upgrade I suggest reading Meg Tsiamis’ post which has some great discussion going on in the comments. If you are still considering whether to […]