Upgrading¶

Check minimum requirements¶

Please refer to the Minimum requirements page to make sure that your system meets all the requirements. This is especially important if you are going to be upgrading from an older version of ICA-AtoM (1.1 - 1.3.1 or later), as there will be some new dependencies that we will install as part of the upgrade process.

Read the release notes¶

This is the opportunity to find out what has been changed in the new release, and if there are new features, enhancements and bug fixes that may be of interest to you and your organization.

You can always find the full release notes on the AtoM wiki, here:

• https://wiki.accesstomemory.org/Releases/Release_announcements

These often include additional details that can help you understand the purpose of the release and how best to install it.

Make sure the dependencies are updated¶

Since the 2.5 version, AtoM uses Elasticsearch 5.x. If you’re upgrading from an earlier version, please make sure to upgrade your Elasticsearch installation. You don’t need to backup your index data as it will be recreated from the database later in the upgrade.

You will also need to upgrade to Java 8 if the system is using a previous version, as this is a requirement for Elasticsearch 5.x.

Since the 2.6 version, AtoM requires MySQL 8.0. Bellow we’ll explain the steps needed to move and upgrade the AtoM database to properly work with that version.

Install the latest version of AtoM¶

Follow the instructions available in our documentation on Installation - our most comprehensive installation notes are included in the Linux section, with additional information for different operating systems and server configurations.

Copy your old data¶

At this point, you should have an 2.7 functional installation using a fresh database. Now we are going to copy the contents of the old uploads and downloads directories, as well as the database:

1. rsync is a robust directory sync solution that we can use to copy the contents of your old uploads directory to the new one, even when both directories are in the same machine. Using the command-line, enter the following command:

$ rsync -av /var/www/icaatom_old/uploads/ /usr/share/nginx/atom/uploads/

Where icaatom_old is the name of your old installation. The path included for the new installation in this example (/usr/share/nginx/atom) is the path we recommend in our installation documentation.

Alternatively, you can just use cp:

$ cp -r /var/www/icaatom_old/uploads/ /usr/share/nginx/atom/uploads/

We’re going to want to do the same with the downloads directory as well - this is where reports, cached xml, and downloads created by the job scheduler (such as clipboard exports) are kept.

$ rsync -av /var/www/icaatom_old/downloads/ /usr/share/nginx/atom/downloads/

rm -f /usr/share/nginx/atom/downloads/jobs/*

2. Dump the contents of your old database to a temporary file, change the database name if needed:

$ mysqldump -u username -p atom > /tmp/atom_db.sql

3. If you’re upgrading from 2.5.x or lower to 2.6.x or higher make sure your data is on utf8mb3 or utf8 (the default if you followed the installation documentation) and that you are using MySQL 8.0 as that’s a requirement since AtoM 2.6. During the upgrade task, your data will be transformed to the utf8mb4 charset and the utf8mb4_0900_ai_ci collation.
4. Re-create the database with the new charset and collation:

$ mysql -u username -p -e "DROP DATABASE IF EXISTS atom;"
$ mysql -u username -p -e "CREATE DATABASE atom CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_0900_ai_ci;"

5. Now, load the contents into the new database:

$ mysql -u username -p atom < /tmp/atom_db.sql

Run the upgrade task¶

This is perhaps the most critical step in the upgrade process. If you encounter any errors, please consult our User Forum, or if you don’t find a solution, feel free to post a question there yourself. We will also be trying to add to our FAQ as we receive feedback, to help users troubleshoot any upgrading issues encountered.

First, change the current directory:

$ cd /usr/share/nginx/atom

Now, run the upgrade-sql task:

$ php -d memory_limit=-1 symfony tools:upgrade-sql

Restore configuration changes¶

If you made any change to the old AtoM instace configuration files, like setting a custom session timeout or a Google Analitycs API key, make sure to bring those changes to the new instance if you want to keep them.

Migrate translations¶

Regenerate the digital object reference and thumbnail images (optional)¶

If you are upgrading from version 1.3.1 or earlier, you may want to regenerate the digital object reference and thumbnail images. The thumbnail size was smaller in 1.x, so those images will often appear fuzzy in the redesigned digital object browse. A directory naming convention has also been added to make the location of the master digital object more secure.

First, make sure you have not changed the directory (/usr/share/nginx/atom).

Now, run the regen-derivatives task:

php symfony digitalobject:regen-derivatives

For more information on this task and its available options, see: Regenerating derivatives.

Rebuild search index and clear cache¶

To make all these changes take effect, you will need to re-index the files you’ve imported into your database, and clear the application cache.

First, rebuild the search index:

php -d memory_limit=-1 symfony search:populate

For more information and options on this task, see: Populate search index.

Then, clear your cache to remove any out-of-date data from the application:

$ php symfony cc

See Clear cache for more detailed instructions.

Check the services configuration¶

It’s not usual, but sometimes we introduce changes in the related services configuration, like PHP-FPM, MySQL or the AtoM worker, to improve the behaviour and performance of the application. Check the installation documentation for your operating system to find those changes.

Restart services¶

To ensure everything works correctly, you must restart your services after upgrading, including PHP-FPM, Memcached (if you’re using it as cache engine), and the atom-workers managed by the job scheduler.

To restart PHP-FPM:

sudo systemctl restart php7.4-fpm

Optionally, to restart Memcached:

sudo systemctl restart memcached

To restart the atom-workers:

sudo systemctl restart atom-worker  # Restarts the workers
sudo systemctl status atom-worker   # Obtains current status

Set site base URL¶

One final step is to set your site’s base URL. This URL is used in XML exports to formulate absolute URLs referring to resources.

To set the site base URL:

1. Click on the Admin menu in the main menu located in the header bar and select Settings.
2. Click on or scroll down to Site information. Enter your site’s base URL into the site base URL field. If your domain is “townarchives.org”, for example, your base URL would normally be “http://townarchives.org”.

Upgrading with a custom theme plugin¶

If you have developed a custom theme plugin for your application (for more information, see Create a custom theme), you may need to perform an additional step following an upgrade to ensure that all pages are styled correctly.

$ npm install
$ npm run build

cd ~/atom
npm install
npm run build

@import "../../arDominionPlugin/css/less/jobs.less"

Recompiling after making modifications¶

After making any necessary updates to your custom theme, you should rebuild the CSS for the custom theme plugin, using the make command. Here is an example of rebuilding the CSS for the ArchivesCanada theme - you can swap in the name of your plugin:

make -C plugins/arArchivesCanadaPlugin

You will also want to clear the application cache, and restart PHP-FPM.

To clear the application cache:

php symfony cc

For more information, see: Clear cache.

To restart PHP-FPM:

sudo systemctl restart php7.4-fpm

If you are using Memcached with AtoM, you may also want to restart it:

sudo systemctl restart memcached

Start using the software!¶

Congratulations! If you are reading this, it means that you have upgraded your data successfully. Now please check that everything is working fine.

Back to top