I have what seems to be an ancient 1.812.210.57-1 (both sysadmin and the Linux interface report this)- I’m totally surprised!
I see the upgrade paths and the suggestion that I should download the Distro (apparently Centos 6 forces that) and then restore from the latest backup BUT:
How compatible is a backup from 1.812.210.57-1 with 2.210.62 or even 3.211.63-stable ? what’s recommended ? - My goal would be to run the current version so I can keep things up to date from there on - that was always my goal - I’ve not missed a suggested “upgrade”.
I acknowledge there seems to be no automated path from 5x to 6x Centos versions but I need to assess the hassle factor.
When I downloaded the distro (perhaps one year ago or less) I expected this was the latest and assumed I’ll be prompted for all upgrades - did I assume wrong? I was just recently prompted to upgrade to 2.11 (was that Asterisk?) and I don’t quite understand how I’ve gotten this far and am still in 1.812.210.57-1. In any case, this is where I am.
If you say I have to do everything again manually, I would probably throw my hands up in the air and plead to the (insert diety) to guide me whether this is worth it… I’m not running this commercially or anything but I have a clientele that is entirely intolerant of communication disruption - otherwise known as wife/spouse/“significant other” but to be fair, my decision to do IP communications was never knowingly condoned and I’ve been at it for over 10 years now.
I would even buy new hardware if I am to understand I need to migrate manually before destroying a working setup without knowing how I’ll be (at least) back where I started.
Is there a stepped method of installing/restoring/backing up (then repeating) until 3.211.63 I’d appreciate a pointer or two.
FreePBX backups require that you use the same version of FreePBX. For instance if you did a backup on a FreePBX 2.10 system, you should restore it to another 2.10 box.
FreePBX upgrade and FreePBX Distro upgrades are seperate. If your on the distro track of 1.812.210.57-1, this is no way to update to 3.211.63 because there isn’t an upgrade path between major CentOS versions. If you want to upgrade to a new track, you can update FreePBX on your existing box from 2.10 to 2.11 (if thats what the new track is using) and then create a backup. At that point you can either bring up another box on new hardware and do a restore, or move your backup off the existing box, verify it, and reinstall a later version on your existing box and do a FreePBX restore with your new backup.
As for being recently prompted to upgrade to FreePBX 2.11 that is because we recently went release candidate with this version and publish the module for updating your system. Until we did that you would not have been prompted as the release was still in alpha/beta testing.
If you’re doing a transfer from one distro to another or one version to another, even ones that use the same version of FreePBX, take a look at the “Move from AsteriskNOW to FreePBX distro trashes FreePBX” thread in this forum. I’m working on migrating AsteriskNOW 2.0.2 with FreePBX 2.10.1.9 to the FreePBX distro that uses the same version of FreePBX (2.10.1.9) and have been running into issues that are being solved one by one as described in that thread. Just wanted to point out that it ain’t necessarily going to be completely seamless even with identical versions of FreePBX.
Just a thought… of it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! If your system is secure, doing everything you need and desire, keep it.
My working system is the same as yours and I have no plans on upgrading until some great need or improvement happens. However, I have several Atom ITX systems that I play with constantly. To keep myself up to date, and try and remember where everything is, I transfer and enter everything manually.