[SPT/CWIS] CWIS 1.4.1 Released

[Edward Almasy]

On Jun 1, 2007, at 8:53 AM, Sonya Norris wrote:
> I'm the site administrator for http://www.mel.org, a site that runs  
> on CWIS. We've invested in php enhancements and a revamped  
> interface that incorporates a variety of resources besides Web site  
> links. In considering an upgrade, I wanted to ask how much of our  
> customized interface and php work would we lose, if any?  What  
> files are involved in the upgrade?

    Good question.  When upgrading a CWIS or
    SPT installation, there are effectively three
    groups of files:

      1) The PHP files that are distributed
        with SPT/CWIS.  Any modifications to
        these will be overwritten by an
        upgrade.  (We try to provide extensive
        opportunities for custom PHP code in the
        HTML files for exactly this reason.)

      2) The HTML/CSS files that are distributed
        with SPT/CWIS (that may also contain
        PHP code).  If these have been modified,
        the modified versions will be saved to
        the same file name with the upgrade
        version number appended.

      3) All other files, including any HTML or
        CSS files in user interface directories
        created by the site creator or admin
        (e.g. "SPTUI--MyInterface").  These will
        not be touched in any way by an upgrade.

    So unless you've modified the PHP files that
    are actually distributed with SPT/CWIS (as
    opposed to adding additional code via the hooks
    and/or in the HTML files), nothing should be lost.

    If you've made a lot of modifications via hooks
    or PHP code in the HTML files, it's more likely
    that there may be some of your code that will
    require tweaking to work as expected after an
    upgrade.  We try as much as possible to preserve
    backward compatibility and avoid this, but when
    new functionality is added some minor changes to
    structure and calling interfaces are inevitable.

    Particularly for a very public site like yours,
    I would recommend creating a running test copy
    of your site and performing the upgrade on that
    first, to determine what if any functionality
    might be affected and what tweaks might be needed.

    Ed


---
    Edward Almasy                             ealmasy at scout.wisc.edu
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