Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by David Cooper -
Number of replies: 6

Hi all

I've been hunting but haven't tracked down a step-by-step guide to moving our Moodle site (www.rhscourses.com) from one ISP host to another one. I'm guessing here, but I presume I need to export then import the mySQL database, copy the whole Moodle folder to the new host and then somehow link the mySQL database to the folder. But how?

Anyone got some instructions / things to look for?

Thanks

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In reply to David Cooper

Re: Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by Richard Enison -

DC,

  1. I think the reason you haven't found a step-by-step guide for transferring from one server to another is that the exact steps to take depend on the environment you have in each server, such as what operating system does it use; what, if any, utility does it have for maintaining a virtual server, such as CPanel or Webmin; what ftp or other software it has for uploading/downloading/transferring files and folders; etc. Only the broad outline can be given to apply to all environments.
  2. Speaking of outlines, there was one major step you left out of yours: transferring the Moodle data folder (and its sub-folders, direct and indirect); in fact, that is the only folder tree that needs to be transferred, since the Moodle tree will be set up automatically if you just re-install Moodle on the new server, i.e., download and unzip the archive file from moodle.org and copy the old config.php file from the old server. In addition, there are several minor steps that need to be taken care of, such as making sure all the file and folder permissions on the target server are okay, and replacing references to the old IPs and folder addresses with references to the new ones on the new server. This involves editing config.php, and running admin/replace.php. The latter process can be simplified if you are able to use the same folder structure on the new server as on the old.

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful without more data on your systems.

RLE

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In reply to Richard Enison

Re: Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by David Cooper -

Cheers!

At the moment, I have 1.7 running. Suppose I just do a clean install of 1.8 and then export my courses/users etc out of the old and into the new. Do you think that would that work?

Regards

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In reply to David Cooper

Re: Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by Richard Enison -

DC,

Yes, with a few provisos:

  1. Again, I still think you will need to transfer the moodledata files. At least that's what Howard Miller says in http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=71813#p321470, and he is much more of a Moodle expert than I.
  2. Make sure the moodledata folder permissions are right.
  3. Run admin/replace.php to change obsolete links to point to the new server (& folder pathnames if they are different; hopefully you can keep the old names, as I mentioned in a previous post).
  4. Hopefully, your 1.7 db is Unicode (UTF-8). If not, you will need to upgrade. The HM post referenced in paragraph #1 above contains a link to the Moodle doc page on that.

I hope I didn't leave anything out. If so, I'm sure another Moodler will point it out. Hopefully before the end of the century! smile

RLE

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In reply to Richard Enison

Re: Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by David Cooper -

mmmmm

Why would I need the Moodle data folders from my current install? A fresh version of Moodle + import all courses / users would do the trick, surely?

regards

Dave

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In reply to David Cooper

Re: Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by Steve Hyndman -

If you export/import your courses, then you won't need to move your moodledata folder. The only thing you will miss is the data for the home course (course #1) unless you export/import that one as well, then you should have everything. You also will not (should not) need to change any links with the exception of links you manually entered in things like html blocks, labels, webpages, etc.

Of course, you may experience any number of other problems trying to move to 1.8, but at least you shouldn't have problems in these two areas. Good luck.

Steve

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In reply to Steve Hyndman

Re: Step by step guide to moving Moodle to a new ISP needed???

by Richard Enison -

SH (& DC),

I was not aware of that. shy I guess I was thinking in terms of what I would think would be the simpler procedure of just copying (call it export/import or backup/restore if you wish) the database and the moodledata folder; just those two items, rather than having to deal with separately exporting and importing each individual course, plus the user table, and I don't know what else. As a non-Moodle-expert, I was going by what I had read in forum posts (regarding moodledata, as well as admin/replace.php) like the one I referenced in my previous post in this thread; but not only that, I have found many references to moodledata in the docs that suggest it contains data not in the database, because a full site backup requires both to be backed up. One example is this page: http://docs.moodle.org/en/Windows_installation

Granted that page is for Windows systems only, but surely the division of labor, so to speak, between the database and moodledata folder is not system-dependent!

So for the benefit of all newbies reading this thread (including me), are you saying that exporting all the courses covers all the data in moodledata? Because, frankly, I don't know what data is in there. I have seen references in the docs to language packs, modules, uploaded files, maintenance.html, javascript files, and I don't know what else being in moodledata, most of which are fixed files that presumably are downloaded (or uploaded) from somewhere or moved there from the moodle folder during installation; not exactly data. This will help me avoid misleading any more forum posters in the future.

RLE

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