Installing seperatly and then merging?

[extreme101]

Hello all,
This is basically what i am wanting to do,

I have a forum which is ruining 3.68, it has many mods, themes etc.
I want to upgrade to 3.7

Can i create a new folder/subdomain/host account etc,
install a fresh vb3.7 on this new account/database
mod, setup, configure 3.7 how i like it, (even wait until stable)
and then merge the old 3.68 (posts/thread/users) with the new 3.7 forum.

Can anyone point me in the right direction for this?

[mlx]

On vBulletin 3.6.8 you can use Impex to import another vBulletin forum, or pretty much merge two vBulletin forums.

Not sure if Impex is working on vBulletin 3.7.0 yet. I'm pretty sure that it will be available shortly after 3.7.0 is final though.

However please note that I seriously doubt that this is a good idea.

I mean you can still setup an internal vBulletin 3.7.0 test forum with your existing license. Or even better, copy your existing database and perform a test upgrade on that 2nd test database.

Merging two forums, even if both were vBulletins, is quite some work. Once the pretty much automated Impex import is finished you might still need to manually merge users and usergroups, etc. ...

I would prefer upgrading the live forum as soon as you are happy with your internal vBulletin 3.7.0 setup any time.

[jswiss]

Hi everyone

can somebody explain how to set up a 'TEST' forum on a live url? That is, i don't want to wipe my existing forum while i test 3.7b3, but would just like to test, then if everything's cool, move the 'test' forum to the actual (existing) url?

any thoughts, hints appreciated

happy new year too!

[Steve Machol]

You can't. You need to install the test forum to a separate directory - 'testvb'.

[jswiss]

You can't. You need to install the test forum to a separate directory - 'testvb'.

thanks steve...

then, after i setup and test in 'testvb' dir, is there going to be a huge hassle moving everything from the 'testvb' dir over to the root dir (which will be just the actual url, ie: / )

that is, will there be a lot of time spent changing A LOT of paths from 'testvb' to ''?

many thanks!

[Steve Machol]

I guess I'm confused by what exactly you are hoping to accomplish. Please explain.

[jswiss]

I guess I'm confused by what exactly you are hoping to accomplish. Please explain.

what i mean is: if i set up a test board under dir: 'testbv' and then everything is working ok under that dir: 'testvb' is it easy to then transfer everything over to a live board (dir)?

does that make sense?

1st: test... then 2nd: transfer the test over with a minimum of path changes and stuff...

sorry for being dim-witted... too long without caffeine

[Steve Machol]

No, I would not do that. You should simply upgrade the live board.

[extreme101]

ive decided im going to create a duplicate of my current board, upgrade that to 3.7 (as a test)
if all is fine.
Upgrade the live one.

[jswiss]

No, I would not do that. You should simply upgrade the live board.

ok... thanks steve for the prompt replies! i will give it a go, report back and... hope for the best! :)