I just learned recently, like a lot of other Joomla site builders seem to be learning lately, that there will not be an official migration script built into Joomla v1.6. Needless to say, many people who base their web development business on Joomla are not happy.
I discovered the news about a lack of a migration script from v1.5 to v1.6 in the official Joomla forum.
According to the individuals posting in that thread, the reason for not including a migration script is that v1.6 changes so many things in the core it would simply not be practical. Furthermore, because there is also no third-party plugin compatibility between v1.5 and v1.6 (something that was possible in the v1.0 to v1.5 upgrade path via the legacy mode plugin) it was deemed to be pointless to even try to build a migration script.
When was all this decided? Apparently, it was decided on Nov. 16, 2010 during a Production Working Group meeting. Here are the minutes from that meeting: Joomla Production Working Group meeting minutes.
One can see from the meeting minutes that there is a plan for a migration script for v1.6 to v1.7, but fat lot of good that does the millions of v1.5 users.
But all is not lost, there is a third-party developer creating a j1.5 to j1.6 migration component called jUpgrade. It's still going through some teething pains, which is to be expected since even Joomla v1.6 isn't final yet, but it should be ready to go when 1.6 is stable. Here's a link: jUpgrade at the Joomla Extension Directory.
On a personal note, I do agree with many on the Joomla.org forum discussing this topic that maybe the devs should have called this latest version of Joomla version 2.0 since it is such a radical departure from version 1.5. At least that way we'd understand that it was a completely new beast and wouldn't be so disappointed about the lack of an official migration script.
But, just as nature abhors a vacuum, so too does the Joomla sphere abhor the lack of a migration script. I think that jUpgrade will fill the void rather nicely ... at least, I hope it does :)
Tweet