[Solved] How to migrate existing 1.4.7.3 webshop to new 1.5.4.1

[JohnADK]

I have been running Prestshop for a couple of years and overall am quite satisfied with the product. However, in the early days before I knew enough about how everything works, I managed to make a number of changes to modules, css files, etc. and though I've managed to upgrade to 1.4.7.3, I finally decided it would be useful to start with a clean, new installation and get rid of all the "old stuff".

I downloaded 1.5.4.1, installed it quite easily. I developed my own version of the default theme and I'm quite happy with the result and setup.

However, when I try to upgrade (using 1-click autoupgrade) I have finally managed (after several attempts) to reach 1.5.4.1 with my shop. But there seems to still be several undesirable elements that still follow along, and several things don't match what I created in the new, clean install. For example, now I cannot change the page logo, where it remains saved. There seems to be a new cache I can't find, or something else.

What I'd really love to do is migrate my existing products, customers and order history to the new, clean install, so that I eliminate all of the strange inconsistencies that follow with me during the upgrade process.

Is this possible? If yes, can someone point me in the direction of how to achieve this? I have read and searched this forum, Googled on internet, but not found a suitable solution. Is this task only available via paid assistance?

Thanks in advance.

Edited September 23, 2013 by JohnADK (see edit history)

[benjamin utterback]

Hello, I think your desired way may be best (clean install and import old data). How many products and customers/orders do you have?

[JohnADK]

Hi Benjamin,

 

Thanks for your reply.

I have 136 customers,

7 product categories with 36 products in all, each having size and color attributes. Some products appear in several categories, but no category contains all products, not even Home.

293 orders.

 

My challenge has been to understand which tables I need to migrate and which ones to avoid migrating. So far, my attempts have identified some of the related tables (like groups), but I get lost in all the connections, knowing which are needed to migrate. I have tried using Prestashop (without success) and using phpAdmin (again without success).

 

Does this give you enough information to assist me further?

[JohnADK]

Oh, and one more thing. What about the CMS pages I have made? Can these also be migrated over?

[benjamin utterback]

I checked with the service Cart2Cart and they estimate $49 dollars to migrate your products, customers and orders.

 

Regarding CMS pages, are they only text content? In that case it wouldn't be hard to make new ones.

 

Aside from paid assistance. Have you tried to upgrade using the manual method? It is now deprecated but it may help, http://doc.prestashop.com/display/PS15/Manual+update

[JohnADK]

I ended up migrating manually, which took a lot of time, but then I learned a lot more about how PrestaShop hangs together. I'm now running on 1.5.4.1. I really like the new features and possibilties (though I still have small irritations).

[Joe Retail]

I am in exactly the same position as you were before your clean install.  I am about to do the same.  Do you have any tips before I jump in and do it.  (Will backup of course)

 

Thanks

 

I ended up migrating manually, which took a lot of time, but then I learned a lot more about how PrestaShop hangs together. I'm now running on 1.5.4.1. I really like the new features and possibilties (though I still have small irritations).

[benjamin utterback]

Hello! Here are some backup tips, http://www.prestashop.com/blog/en/how-to-manually-back-up-mysql-database-and-prestashop-files/

 

and here are some upgrade tips, http://www.prestashop.com/forums/topic/271060-upgrade-tips/

[JohnADK]

Hi Joe,

 

If you only want customer records and products over, its not too bad. I wanted to also preserve my order history (both carts and orders) so that made it quite challenging. There are a lot of interlinked/dependent tables, so it is easy to overlook a table that should be included.

 

I only managed it myself due to a basic understanding of SQL and DB structure/ functioning, otherwise, I would have been lost. My experience is that you cannot rely on the built-in PrestaShop CSV import function, and there is no PrestaShop export function in 1.4.x. So you have to use phpAdmin (or equivalent DB tool).

 

With Customers you need to especially be aware of your ps_groups tables and with Products you also have Category tables to be aware of. There are a number of Forum posts regarding category tables. The links Benjamin provided are useful. The other main challenge with products are the image files. PS 1.5.4.1 uses a completely new folder structure for storing images and I ended up building this up and moving images manually. I think I read somewhere that there is actually a migration function available now-a-days. The thumbnail generator though worked wonders once that was in place.

 

If I should ever be in this situation again, I will pay for Cart2Cart to perform the migration. On the other hand, I learned a lot about how PrestaShop is screwed together by doing it myself. But it took a long time and included a considerable amount of frustration. Make sure you use a new/separate site, if you want to keep your current site active during this process.

 

As this was (hopefully) a once-only exercise, I have not documented, nor remember everything I did or learned. But hopefully these few remarks will assist.

 

If your current shop is not large and you don't care about preserving order history, I think that just starting over from scratch might actually be a faster/better approach than trying to migrate. The new import capacity in PS 1.5.X is better and if you can generate Excel files for your customers and products, you can import them using PS functionality. That might actually be a better path to follow... just a thought.

 

Good luck.