I am just beginning and am not technical. I am hosted at GoDaddy and they say they do not support upgrades? My moodle site is for my business - 50 flash based courses- I need help in upgrading if it is oossible and still want to host with GoDaddy?
Hi Kerry. I have just tweaked the title a bit so others might be able to offer suggestions. I don't know how much material you have on your site already and how many users but if you are just on cheap Godaddy shared hosting there's nothing stopping you moving your stuff to a new host who does support Moodle 2.4 Alternatively I believe Godaddy do a more expensive hosting version where they will support you. I have searched for Godaddy and Moodle 2 here and there are quite a few issues with the shared hosting package that I assume you have. Let's wait and see what others suggest and then we can try to offer more specific help. And it doesn't matter about not being technical - I am not technical either
Good luck Kerry! I'm in the process of doing the same and it is not an easy experience nor fun at all. Moodle has greatly failed in providing an effective and upgrade capability like every other software package out there. If I can ever get completely upgraded I plan on posting the process I went through to get there. Here is what I understand to date and what I'm doing but realize I haven't finished the process yet so there might be some changes:
- I'm on 1.9.5 and trying to get to 2.4
- First issue you will have to address is what hosting provider you want to be with. Godaddy and others are not current on PHP and MySQL so this will greatly limit your upgrade capabilities. I'm with Network Solutions and leaving them due to this limitation and horrible experience. I have another website with Godaddy but quickly found that I couldn't get much higher with them. I've switched to "justhost.com" and they support the later versions so I can ultimately get to the latest version of Moodle.
- I've been told that you have to make an incremental upgrade with Moodle in order to safely get the significant changes of the release applied to your courses.
- You need to use the "backup" feature in Moodle to create a zip file of each class that you can download.
- Then using an FTP product (like FileZilla) you need to copy your "moodledata" directory down to your computer to move to the new course.
- On your hosting provider site, create an empty MySQL database and write down all the credentials.
- Download the version of Moodle you want to upgrade to and unzip it locally. Then FTP that structure to your new hosting provider (hosting services won't let you do this on their site so you have to do all uncompressions locally and then FTP the files which is very slow but there's really no way around that).
- FTP your moodledata directory to the hosting provider.
- Run the install in order to get the configuration created (do a search for the appropriate install version; it would be like this http://docs.moodle.org/24/en/Installing_Moodle). In here you will point to the new MySQL database.
- Log into your Moodle install and create a new course (this is a temporary class holder so don't worry about getting all the info correct as you are going to replace it).
- Once the temp class is created, on left side you should see a "restore" option. Select this and restore your class and use the option to replace the existing class with the restore one. This should bring your new class in.
- Now check out your class; this is where I run into issues. When I went from 1.9.5 to 1.9.19 I had major alignment issues. When I dropped this and did it again going from 1.9.5 to 2.1.10 I found the alignment and everything else looked good but on a lot of my classes (but interestingly not all of the classes) all the images were missing.
- For the missing images I was told to run the Moodle replace.php script to have the URLs changed. I was told that in the database the image URL is hardcoded into the database and therefore is pointing to the old site and I needed to update/replace that with the URL of the new site. I did run it but it didn't appear to make any improvements. This is where I'm currently stuck.
- I've also been told that if you don't go to 1.9.19 and then to 2.0 that you might not get certain changes. Not sure but it's super annoying that you are expected to upgrade to every version to get updates. Like I said I'm super disappointed that Moodle has failed to address this common industry practice of providing a simpe effective upgrade capability. If you search the moodle community you will find so many people having the same issues but no solutions documented.
Believe me, this is not fun. The only reason I'm pursuing the upgrade process is because I've already invested so much time into my class creations that I don't want to have to recreate them with another product from scratch. So far I've invested a lot of time and for the most part gotten no where.
My my Shawn, what wonderful detail. Thank you!
I will keep reading and learning here.
Kerry,
I had a hosted server with GoDaddy. Then, I found that as my database grew in size, and I was wanting better performance, I upgraded to a GoDaddy Virtual Server. I have been running Moodle 2.+ on it for nearly two years, and currently have 2.4.1+ running just fine.
I usually have around 80-100 students spread across four or five courses on my Moodle at any point in time, so this VPS seemed to make sense.
You will find on moodle.org many discussions about GoDaddy and virtual servers. All that I can tell you is that mine is working fine. Managing a virtual server is much more demanding than a hosted server, and GoDaddy will tell you that. Don't expect as much hand-holding. With most virtual servers, the administrator can do what they want about upgrading to various versions of mySQL and PHP. Here is what I currently have: Moodle 2.4+ (Build: 20121230), PHP Version 5.3.15, MySQL 5.1.63, CENTOS 6.2, Apache 2.2.22.
Moving your domain name to any new server can be done.
I recommend that whatever company you choose, that you do the install in parallel with running your current Moodle.
Rick. Thank you! Not being technical, having a very small if any budget and understading really who to trust and how to do this is a challenge- I only have 4 or 5 students I must keep in for now- SO I think I should do the upgrade soon....My 50 courses are in 15 minute modules and are flash based with interactivity and tests so loading may be an issue. I have another domain I can use while all is being done.
Given your situation, you may not be a candidate for a VPS (more money, more technical knowledge). It is true that the GoDaddy hosted server, right now, does not support the mySQL (I believe) requirements to run Moodle 2.4. You will have to look elsewhere.
You might get a variety of suggestions from folks here on moodle.org. I have noticed that one company, TMDHosting.com, appears to have a one-click install for Moodle 2.4 on their low cost shared-hosting plan (I think less than $50 per year).
Good luck.
Hi Shawn,
I've had no issues with upgrading Moodle so far, but it seems that most of your issues are related to the migration from one host to another.
I don't think that it's fair to blame the poor quality of service and software availability of your service provider on Moodle. Moodle has to move with the times, and a number of bugs have been found in older versions of both PHP and MySQL which have meant that it simply isn't feasible to support their use. That's like saying that the last graphic-intensive computer game should work on a 486 66Mhz machine with 128MB RAM.
The process I've used for migrating between hosts has been:
- create a MySQL backup of your database and transfer it to your new host
- restore the MySQL backup into a new database
- copy your moodledata directory from your old host and transfer it to your new host
- ensure that the same copy of your code is also in place
You should only need to run the replace.php script if you have also changed the URL of your system - I doubt that most people would do this just because they're changing hosting provider.
Aside from this, the way that I've performed many Moodle 1.9 to Moodle 2.X upgrades has been far simpler:
- Upgrade from 1.9.5 to 1.9.19
- This helps ensure that you've got everything in place
- Check the list of plugins you have installed
- locate all of the non-core plugins and find their Moodle 2.2 alternatives
- double-check the wiki plugin - if you're still using the old pre-1.9 wiki there's an additional step to run
- uninstall any unused non-core plugins - you can always reinstall them later if you really need them
- if there's any plugins which aren't available in Moodle 2, then you may have to lose those too sadly
- Make a back up of your moodledata directory (you will have done this already if you were moving host)
- Upgrade your moodle installation to version 2.2.7
- Add all of the plugins you found earlier for Moodle 2.2
- Run the upgrade - this can take a very long time.
- Check everything worked fine
- Upgrade to Moodle 2.4.1
- You may need to find updated versions of any non-core plugins again. The API has changed in various places between 2.2.7 and 2.4.1
- Done
I've done this for a number of sites without issue. All data is successfully copied across, including images. There should be no need to run the replace script at all. All user data is copied across too.
I'm sorry you've had such a poor experience,
Andrew
Andrew - the majority of all your points are ones I already listed so honestly you really just re-iterated what I already said. The problems are not hosting server related due to moving, if anything that would be a good thing because everything is a brand new installation. From my research it sounds like you are one of the few who have had a good experience, there are tons and tons of forum posts about the problems with few if any resolutions. If you look at the "upgrading moodle" documentation posts (like "http://docs.moodle.org/19/en/Upgrading") they are saying basically everything I listed and yet there are still issues. There is no "upgrade" link in moodle like people imply in their posts. If you read the moodle documentation it talks about doing just what I suggested - replacing the code base with a new code base and the best approach for this is by creating a new installation. The database backup can be handled two different ways - 1) using the "backup" feature in moodle (which has been my preference and should work otherwise why is it there) or 2) doing a MySQL dump which I think the majority of people would prefer to avoid. The restore.php is required for people moving hosting companies because the URL is different until the DNS is moved and you wouldn't move your DNS until your site is operational, so this does become a requirement for people that are using hosting providers - in Kerry's situation she is most likely going to need to leave Godaddy because she'll never get over version 2.1 of Moodle because Godaddy doesn't support the later versions of PHP and MySQL so this will prevent her from upgrading beyond Moodle 2.1; so replace.php becomes a factor/requirement/step.
Like I mentioned, going from 1.9.5 to 1.9.19 did more damage to my classes than going from 1.9.5 to 2.1.10 (which affected my image links).
My criticism of the moodle upgrade process is because there is no actual "upgrade" feature which should be available for people who are on a system that provides all the core requirements (like PHP and MySQL versions). Customer's shouldn't have to do these major steps of installing a completely new installation, moving directory structures around and doing MySQL dumps to upgrade a class - and this is exactly what the Moodle documentation says to do. Every other mature product on the market takes care of doing this for you behind the scenes during their "upgrade" process.
Your posting is appreciated, unfortunately your points are really the same as what I listed. ;) Since I've followed all the steps that I can find - then the only thing that comes to mind is that people hosting their site with a hosting provider might be running into permission restrictions during the upgrade process & restore process where an "in-house" shop would have full access to their server. Maybe certain files don't have the proper permissions, or maybe certain configuration files are not getting updated properly and/or maybe the database isn't getting all the correct updates. Unfortunately there are no error messages to this affect. The install process you run through to setup the configuration goes smoothly, but the courses are not perfect after the restore process. Maybe its really a "restore" problem.
Hi Shawn,
I'm sorry that you feel that many of my points duplicate yours.
I would really like to point out a few things first though:
- Running the replace script is a really bad idea. We really don't recommend its use unless you really are renaming your site. There are other ways of getting access to your new server before you chabeg your dns and they won't potentially break your site unlike the replace script.
- the backup feature is not really intended for this. Most people use it to create copies of their sites without user data for subsequent year rollover, and distributing their courses to other sites (again without user data). It can of course be used in this Amy but there disadvantages.
I must admit that I'm slightly confused as to what you mean by the lack of upgrade link. The ability to run easier upgrades will be present in Moodle 2.5, which of course won't help you but will of course in the future. I'm not sure of other products which perform complete backups before running an upgrade. Please bear in mind that many Moodle users have terabytes of data and massive databases. Performing such a backup during the upgrade process would not be favoured by many. The purpose of this backup is for the situation where something has gone wrong and the site must be restored to backup.
Best wishes,
Andrew
@Kerry - I don't want to appear as highjacking your post, as this is all related to your original post request and hopefully we'll all benefit as we have the same request/issue.
@Andrew - this is all good stuff. I really want to get this resolved and working and I'm sure Kerry would too.
- replace.php: your comments are interesting as others have greatly encouraged me to run it. Since I'm setting up on another site and obviously don't want to switch the DNS until I know it works so that I don't impact users, then my URLs will definitely be different and this is why other people think my images are not appearing. But what does confuse me on the matter is one of the courses does show images - to me they should all work or all be broken, but not a partial.
- backup: the backup comments are also interesting because lots of people say to do this along with the documentation. This is why this process is so frustrating because people and documentation seem to be conflicting with each other.
@Kerry - There was another gentleman that mentioned the Godaddy scenario. I did research them from the same perspective as you and for their simple shared services that are affordable, you will not be able to upgrade Moodle beyond 2.1. As mentioned before, I did some research and justhost.com was highly rated and they offer the latest versions of PHP and MySQL so you can get to 2.4 and above. I've only just started working with them so I don't have a long history with them yet, but so far I've been happy with their services and support. And they are very affordable. they do offer moodle as a "one-click installation" but it is an older version so you will want to forget that and do the installation manually yourself to get to the latest versions. My classes are all web pages with images and a few videos, but overall pretty basic. I'm not sure if your flash will have any issues. Only one way to find out.
If I have a host load 2.4- Is there a way to find someone EXPERIENCED to actually load my flash courses and a bit of custom work and I can then go in and be taught to tweak? Is there a place to ask appropriately for this?
Hi Kerry - well, first of all, you can get lots of free help here by reading the documentation docs.moodle.org and asking in the forums. You can certainly load your flash courses yourself. I don't know what you mean by " a bit of custom work" If you want to pay someone for support you can do that by asking in the Jobs database here https://moodle.org/mod/data/view.php?d=54
Even the most EXPERIENCED person may not be able to tame Go Daddy! See for yourself: https://moodle.org/mod/forum/search.php?id=5&subject=godaddy.
I completely agree - upgrading moodle installations is a complete farce, every other bit of software out there does everything automatically, yet moodle insists that you do all sorts of techy things that users like myself are simply too scared to do and the forums tend to make me even more afraid of trying, rather than helping. I've had to leave my installations on 1.9 because they go wrong when upgrading to 2.x - and this was after hiring a specialist to ensure that everything went smoothly. My problem now is that I'm left with several partially working 1.9 installations (quiz reports no longer work after what I presume is a software update on my server). Somebody needs to sort this out so that ANYBODY can upgrade their moodle installations. I can't even backup my courses, delete the 1.9 installations then restore my backups into moodle 2.x because somebody decided it would be a good idea to get rid of support for old backups. It's a good job I don't pay for this software!
Kerry
I like the irony of title you've chosen.
One could almost hear the whisper, "I am going to lose it!"
;-(
I like the irony of title you've chosen.
One could almost hear the whisper, "I am going to lose it!"
;-(
I was in the same boat as you with a host called fatcow. I had all sorts of issues because of data inquiry limits, server collation language, and php versions. They too had simple scripts that could install a Moodle 2.3 that would not work on their site. I tried everything to upgrade from 1.9 to 2.3, without success. I moved my site to host gator. The technicians from host gator moved my moodle for me and I was able to upgrade to 2.4. The server is able to handle traffic from 7 blocks of chemistry students without any issues. They have the latest control panel php etc. The plan I have is 4$ per month. Mark