Upgrading to Moodle 1.6

This page needs some more work.

Since the changes for the upgrade from Moodle 1.5.x to Moodle 1.6 not only change the database structure, but also the database content, some considerations are important before you start.

Check the system requirements

Go to http://yourmoodle.edu/admin/environment.php and choose Moodle 1.6 ;-) You'll get a report of your serverspecs meeting or not meeting the specs for Moodle 1.6 and what needs to be done.

Update the Moodle files

Perform a normal upgrade of a moodle installation, especially caution for the backup database part, as always

Database migration

Although not strictly necessarry, it is highly recomended to migrate your database to UTF8 immediately after the upgrade. If you run your site in one language only, select this option to save a lot of time on the migration. Since the migration is a process which causes heavy processor and disk load and can take a long time to perform, you should choose the moment of the upgrade carefully. It might be good practice to do that on a test installation first if you have any.

The migration process places the Moodle installation into maintenance mode so that non-admins cannot login. In order to avoid having to restart the migration process, it is recommended that the value of max_execution_time in the php.ini file be set to 0 so that the process does not timeout. After the migration is completed, the execution time can be set back to your preferred setting. The migration process does save its current state frequently during its execution should it need to be restarted it will begin near to where it finished. However, once started it needs to finish before the installation can be used by others.

Languages

An entirely new interface for languages is designed. After the migration of the database, you can go to the language page in the admin menu and follow the 'Language Import Utility' link. You can select the desired language packs on the right pane and install them directly. Updating the language packs can now easely be done by following the update link.