Update underlying OS - best practice question.

[BrzI Channel]

Hi folks,

I need to update the underlying Ubuntu Server OS on my AtoM instance.

These events usually create no issues but I was wondering if anybody had any negative experiences that they may want to share. Running 2.6.4 on Ubuntu 18.

Thanks

[Brandon Uhlman]

If you're sticking with AtoM 2.6.4, the biggest problem will be that Ubuntu 20.04 includes PHP 7.4, and 2.6.4 requires PHP 7.2 -- so you might want to plan an AtoM upgrade from 2.6.4 to 2.7.1 at the same time (like we are).

Alternatively (we have *not* done this), Ondřej Surý (one of the main PHP maintainers for Debian and Ubuntu) personally maintains PPAs for numerous versions of PHP for currently supported Ubuntu releases (including PHP 7.2 on Focal). See

In terms of general approach, our three AtoM instances (public facing and basically static, what we call the 'development' environment where staff do record maintenance, and a staging environment for testing new workflows and patching) run on virtual machines. Our update approach varies: sometimes we'll spin up a fresh virtual machine with a new Ubuntu install, do a fresh AtoM install, and restore a database backup following the project instructions. Sometimes we'll capture a backup snapshot, and do the OS upgrade in place. Both approaches have worked well for us -- the only times we have ever had to fall back to a backup snapshot where because of our own malfeasance (we upgraded to a pre-release version of AtoM with some show-stopper bugs for us, or we made a truly dumb mistake during the upgrade process (like deleting a required folder on the server).

Good luck!

Brandon

[BrzI Channel]

Thanks Brandon.