[FQuest Announce] PHP4 to PHP5 Upgrades November 2008

[Bob]

Attention Site Owners Whose Sites Are Still Running PHP4

Your site will be upgraded to PHP5 on Nov. 8, 2008

Upgrades to PHP5 have been made available by request since January 2007 and End of Life of PHP4 has been planned and announced for some time now.

• To See The Version of PHP For Your Hosting Package
  Visit the Server Info section of your CNC and look at the PHP Module Version. If you see the following, it will indicate that you are still on PHP4 and this notice will pertain to you:
  PHP Module Version: 4.4.4

Upgrade Date: Saturday Nov 8, 2008
Upgrade Window: 10:00 PM ET - 2:00 AM ET
Estimated Downtime: 5 minutes per apache

If your hosting package is on PHP4 and you run PHP scripts, please review the following and prepare for any compatibility issues now so that next month's PHP upgrade will run smoothly for your site.

• Changes Between PHP4 and PHP5
  As PHP5 has been around since 2003 and the PHP development team discontinued their official support for PHP4 on 12/31/2007, many applications are already designed to work with PHP5.
  
  The biggest change with this update is that register_globals is set to OFF as a default for security reasons. A method of testing if this will be an issue for your site is provided in the following post by the sysAdmin:
  http://www.aota.net/forums/showthrea...836#post154836
  
  Some additional potential compatibility issues regarding the PHP upgrade have been discussed here:
  http://www.aota.net/forums/showthread.php?t=23259
  
  If needed for reference, the configuration settings for PHP5 can be viewed at the phpinfo() link below:
  http://www.QuestStats.net/phpinfo.php
  
  If you are unsure whether the above issues will affect you, please contact your webmaster and/or the support departments for the scripts you run to inquire about PHP5 compatibility.

For those sites that experience problems with the upgrade to PHP5, a temporary PHP4 engine can be made available until the end of January 2009. Please contact Service@FutureQuest.net after November 8, 2008 if you require this service. If at all possible, we urge Site Owners to transition to PHP5 at this time.

The FutureQuest Team

[kitchin]

I think the date() warning is fixed.

[hobbes]

WooHoo, PHP6 here we come!

[Juan G]

Originally Posted by hobbes

WooHoo, PHP6 here we come!

And MySQL 6... er... 5?

(I think MySQL 4 is default and 5 optional now at FQ).

[frankc]

Are there any apps the change is known to break?

[adixon]

Originally Posted by frankc

Are there any apps the change is known to break?

It breaks osCommerce 2.2, and the bad news is that 3.0 with php5 support is still in alpha. There is a contribution that patches 2.2 to turn register globals off (see below), but the bad news is that the contribution doesn't apply to all of the MODs applied to the code over many years. :-(

For further info:
http://www.oscommerce.com/community/contributions,2097
http://forums.oscommerce.com/index.php?showtopic=252247[
http://forums.oscommerce.com/lofiver...93343-250.html

I second disconnecting the broadband and hiding under the bed!

[phppete]

Well, this is fun isn't it, I have lots of sites to convert in less than a month when I already have 3 months work to complete in 3 weeks. There will be lots of broken sites on FQ soon, remind me on Nov 8th to disconnect my broadband and hide under the bed!

[Juan G]

Originally Posted by Bob

For those sites that experience problems with the upgrade to PHP5, a temporary PHP4 engine can be made available until the end of January 2009. Please contact Service@FutureQuest.net after November 8, 2008 if you require this service. If at all possible, we urge Site Owners to transition to PHP5 at this time.

That's a good solution, in the case that configuring or reinstalling an old app doesn't make it PHP5 compatible and requires more detailed tweaking.

Also, a test site on our local PC or Mac (WAMP, or MAMP, or similar), with PHP5, Apache, etc., can help prevent any problem.

[frankc]

The only apps I'm concerned about would be ikonboard 3.12a and good ol' EFM.

[DogAndPony]

Yeah... well... I'm with Pete. I'm really slammed between now and Nov. 8. I only have a few of sites running substantial PHP (substantially modded), but since I'm a PHP hack (not hacker), this could be painful. Might have to find a PHP scripter and shell out some cash -- which I can't spare in These Times™.

Oy.