Magento Upgrade Relief

I had been actively avoiding upgrading a client’s Magento installation since the latest release 1.2 was announced a few weeks ago.  One of the biggest knocks against this platform is that the development team didn’t take standardizing function names very seriously. As a result, upgrades tended to be extremely painful for anyone who made the mistake of attempting to customize their own installation. Themes tended to break and template customizations would get overwritten depending on the extent of the changes. Obviously, this can happen with any “upgrade”. But, you would be hard-pressed to find any developer or site manager who would disagree with the sentiment that something is wrong with the upgrade process when themes break. 

It’s generally wise to wait for a couple bug releases prior to updating to a new version of any software platform. And, always always make sure you back up site files and databases prior to committing. In fact, Varien’s disclaimer states never to perform any upgrade of Magento on a live installation.  Obviously, I agree, but it goes without saying not everyone will have access to a backup server for testing purposes.  Our installation isn’t yet live, so after backing up all the files and the DB ... I closed my eyes, crossed my fingers, and clicked “install”.

I peeled an eye open expecting to see something akin to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina onscreen ... and nothing. Nothing serious anyway.  Testing revealed that the Country drop-down in Checkout was no longer populating with countries, but that is a minor issue.  Varien seems to have heeded the call.

You will still find the developer’s “customize at your own risk” warning at the top of every template, but I am happy to report upgrading to Magento 1.2.2 was simple and painless.  Whew.

Hope your experience is as easy.