CiviCRM upgrade oddities: Joomla wierdness

If you’re not running CiviCRM under Joomla, you can skip this email.

But if you are, you should be aware of an oddity in CiviCRM upgrades that happens specifically under Joomla:

Sometimes the upgrade should have removed some old files, but it does not. This can lead to serious problems:

• An upgrade that can’t complete, requiring you to revert to backups.

• Unpredictable errors such as “file not found” and “Call to undefined method”.

Why is this an upgrade oddity?

The fix for this involves some tasks that non-technical site admins would probably want to avoid, such as one of these:

• Uninstalling and reinstalling CiviCRM. If done correctly, this won’t cause any loss of CiviCRM data, but will require a complete re-doing of your CiviCRM-related user permisisons in Joomla. Yuck.

• Manually identifying (er, how?) the files that should not exist, an then manually deleting them from your server. Double yuck.

Does this problem happen on every upgrade?

No, sometimes you’ll get lucky. But sometimes you won’t. And you won’t know until it happens.

It happens enough that it’s mentioned in the CiviCRM “Upgrade in Joomla” Documention:

… files from previous releases that are no longer required are not removed. Generally this is not a problem but it can cause failures. If this happens you can either … [essentially, the solutions I’ve mentioned above].

Is there an easy way around this?

Not really. You won’t know about it until it happens, and even then the solution is not always obvious. The “Upgrade in Joomla” docs encourage you to “Check on StackExhange or Chat to see if others are reporting the same problem,” which I think no-one would describe as “an easy way around this.”

What if this happens during your upgrade?

If you’re not a developer (and don’t want to become one), your best bet is to revert to your pre-upgrade backup and call in some professional help. An experienced CiviCRM expert can help you get it sorted out pretty easily, but it’s not a battle you’ll want to take on alone.

It’s something to keep in mind.

If your upgrade goes well, and your immediate post-upgrade testing goes well, then you can be reasonably confident that you’ve avoided this problem.

But if it does come up, be glad you have a designated in-house CiviCRM expert and a connection with an outside expert who can help you sort it out. (You do have both of those, right?)

All the best,
A.