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    • Should I upgrade?

    Posted by marvo

    I'm running Tiki 1.8 and was wondering about whether it is worth my while upgrading to 1.9. I'm pretty much a dork when it comes to this stuff so treat me accordingly 😂

    Anyway, I want to create a set of pages that only two specific usergroups of six have access to. While I can create pages and manually set permissions for each individual page just for this usergroup this is going to be really laborious as I have over a hundred pages I need to make and I'd have to set read, write, comment etc perms each time. I heard that 1.9 has the function of being able to assign permissions to categories. I wondered if I should upgrade to 1.9 first so I can then create these pages, assign them all to a category and then assign perms to them all to one usergroup. PResto!

    Is this the right way to go about this? Is there a less time-consuming way to do this in 1.8? Do I need to upgrade to 1.9? Is 1.9 stable enough for a doofus like me to manage?

    Reads: 1782
    Posted by Xavier de Pedro

    > Is this the right way to go about this?

    Yes.

    > Is there a less time-consuming way to do this in 1.8?
    Nop. (none that I know of; if anybody knew, and give feedback through forums, they would say here... 😊

    > Do I need to upgrade to 1.9?
    Definitely, (welcome to 1.9.x 😊 (much better)

    > Is 1.9 stable enough for a doofus like me to manage?
    Yes,so it was for other non-computer scientists to upgrade... It's more safe (and higher % that there are not unpleasant surprises) if you have sheel access to your server, and execute the upgrade script with the -force flag (-f). I.e.:

    Copy to clipboard
    mysql -f -uuser -p databasename < upgradescript.sql


    But for simpler 1.8.x tikis, I beg you don't have any trobule upgrading from tiki-install.php interface...

    Good luck! 😉

    xavi


    Posted by marvo

    Thankx xavi... keep watching this thread. I'm going to try the upgrade later this week and if I do have problems, I'll post them here!

    I'm not sure what "shell access" is but I do have PHPMyAdmin and MySQL access. I may just go for the install.php interface as it is more user-friendly.

    Hopefully, you won't hear from me again! 😉


    Posted by marvo

    Okay, I may not make any friends here. 🙀

    I've been using tiki for over a year and I find the info on this site to be needlessly complicated. It's as if it is written by people who know too much and do not realise that there are plenty of people using tiki who would like the whole thing to be simpler.

    I want to upgrade to 1.9.x but I simply don't understand what I have to do. I've pasted the upgrade instructions below and added my queries where relevant. Can anyone answer this in language that is straightforward? I appreciate that I'm out of my depth here. But I'm willing to learn some simple elements of MySQL etc. I just need to be taught in plainer language than the faqs or docs on this site provide. 😎

    Upgrading from Version 1.8


    1. Clear templates and module cache in Admin -> System Admin
    2. Backup your existing database (use the command mysqldumpexternal link or use phpMyAdminexternal link)
    3. Download the 1.9.x package from our SourceForge Project Areaexternal link
    4. Uncompress the 1.9.x package

    5. Upgrade your database (see below)

    See below for my questions about this step.

    6. Copy over the contents of the 1.9.x tiki dir to your exisiting tiki web root (eg /var/www/html/tiki)

    * Linux users can use: cp -R tiki/* /var/www/html/tiki/

    * Windows users equiv: xcopy tiki\* c:\inetpub\wwwroot\tiki\ /e

    Okay, copy OVER? That means overwrite? or add to a different directory? It seems to me if I overwrite I'll delete what I've got there right?

    7. Run setup.sh again to verify the correct permissions are set

    Now this is an example of a vague instruction. What is setup.sh? When did I run it before in this process? What permissions do you mean (CHMOD?)? How will I know they are verified?

    8. Remove the contents of templates_c, the temp and modules/cache directories


    You should now be running a 1.9.x site.

    Notes:

    * Do not delete the 1.8.x directory and uncompress tiki 1.9.x over. You may loose sic images uploaded in wiki or custom avatars or some other content. If you want to have a clean install (no old files) then make a backup of the 1.8.x installation directory before you do that.


    Oh okay... but if I had followed the steps above literally, this is what I WOULD already have done. This info should be up above surely.

    * You can use the secdb database files to check your installation directory for old/modified files. See AdminSecurity

    I'm not even going to touch this one... I didn't understand hardly a word of the page it linked to.

    Upgrading the database
    Upgrade scripts are located in the "db" subdirectory and are run with this mysql command:
    mysql -f -u dbuser -p tikidb < tiki_1.8to1.9.sql

    where "dbuser" is the name of a mysql user with sufficient privs in the tiki db to modify that table structures and data rows (probably root), and "tikidb" is the name of your tiki database. The -p is only needed if you have a password on the database (which is highly recommended). The -f is required to force all the updates to occur.

    Why does it tell me where the scripts are? Do I need to know this or just run the scripts? When I run the scripts in PHPMyAdmin, I'm pressuming that I need to be in the SQL tab of my tiki database and enter this info in the window headed "Run SQL query/queries on database". Is this correct?


    Posted by cgc0202

    Hi Marvo,

    If you have not done your installation yet, here's my own experience.

    I have just started using Tikiwiki myself late last year, so I am more a newbie than you are. Also, I do not have much background in programming and scripting — making me even in a worse shape possibly than you are.

    But, I was lucky enough to start with the 1.9 series.

    I am beginning to realize how powerful the permission systems of the 1.9x series is. The more important reason why you should move to the 1.9 series is that if you followed the developments, there are security issues and bugs that are addressed by the 1.91, and more with 1.92. They are coming up with 1.93 soon, but I would not try it myself until I have read enough about how more experienced people here encounter when they use it.

    adodb.inc.php

    If you are going to use either 1.91 or 1.92, be aware of the error in an adodb.inc.php file found in the lib directoryQuestion. For some reason, that bug was found in the early series of 1.9x but this adodb.inc.php errorQuestion has not been corrected even in the 1.92 series.

    Be sure to read the thread by Chris to correct the adodb.inc.php file errorQuestion. Otherwise you will get a gazillion error messages when you do a fresh install or upgrade.

    [I have read so many of those threads in the forum, since I started, with many veterans responding with the same solution — over and over again — to the same mistake. I thought it would have save a lot of grief for everyone that after the error was detected as a bug, it would have been corrected in any version of the programs that are offered for downloads.]

    Chris did a convoluted method of solving the problem, maybe there is a reason for that, I am not sure yet. What I did was simply to change the actual culprit that Chris discovered to correct the adodb.inc.php file errorQuestion.

    • function &FetchRow() -> function FetchRow()


    All I did was change that, and offcourse change the permissions for the "setup.sh" and the fresh start installation worked for me without a hitch — after installing it for a number of times, it takes me now at most about 5 min to install a new Tikiwiki 1.92 — once I filll up the info (database name, username, password) in the browser-based installation window.

    [But, Chris is the one with more expertise, so there must be a prudent reason for going the various steps that he did. I discussed my own experience in that thread also.]

    Anyway, you may also usethe browser-based installation to upgrade — it is just a simple one-stroke click after you have entered the basic info. [I have not used the upgrade function, myself, so I am not sure how it would work — see more final notes on this below.]


    Permissions

    I decided to use other programs — calendar, photogallery, links directory, etc. — instead of using the one inside the Tikiwiki because they are more advanced in their feature for the functions that those special programs were created for.

    However, when it comes to permissions, the Tikiwiki 1.91 and the 1.9.2 series that I have used so far were the most sophisticated (than the other programs I am currently using) and may be tailored specifically for what you may need.

    I am not sure how the permissions worked with the 1.8 series, but with the 1.9x series, if you did your assignment of creating the special groups that you mentioned, and carefully assigned specific permissions for each group, then include the people you want to do that group, what you wish to do may be done properly. For example, assign the following permissions:

    • page to be read only by members of the group
    • edit to be done only by members of the group
    • etc.
    • etc.


    If you are the "head author", I would suggest that you keep these permissions only for yourself

    • remove page
    • delete history


    This requires that you create yourself a special group, with those unique permissions, although it would be unnecessary if you are already the Admin, and you assign the aforementioned permissions only to Admin.

    The above would prevent anyone from the group from accidentally deleting all copies of the documents. I learned that from experience the hard way when one of my relatives accidentally wrote over everything on a page.

    Template Page

    Then, you need to create a content template page for the work that you want to do. This could be an empty page, but you have to assign the permissions indicated above to this page, in relation to the group.

    You might still do some final permissions per page, because there are still sfuff that is not perfectly fine-tuned with the permissions system of tikiwiki but it is a lot more sophisticated than some other programs I have seen.

    The above works best for me when using the "Wiki" page.

    cgc0202

    N.B.

    By the way, if you are really not as much into the nuances of upgrades and all that — as you state the documentation is vast but not quite friendly for people like us with not much programming/scripting experience, I would suggest strongly that you just do a "separate install" using the browser-based installation window once you click on the

    tiki-install.php

    I can do that now in less that 5min. The bulk of the work actually would be after the installation — the formatting and setting up the groups and then permissions, etc.

    Personally, I prefer a fresh install (because it is so easy) than upgrade.

    Looking at the upgrade procedure you outlined, I would suggest that you use the procedure on the "second page" of the browser-based installation window" also. Just one more added click, after you have entered your database name, username and password.