Successful customizations, very much ruined after updates...
 

This post is mostly directed at FunkyDunk:

In order to see what sort of process I would be working with, I recently installed a lesser version of xcart, then made customizations to it. Next, I upgraded (3.2.6 to 3.3.4) to examine the effects on my customizations. The cart still functioned, but my customizations were drastically altered.

So, as I've checked out the customization work you've done (I believe it was your site I looked at anyway), I'm wondering what your procedure(s) (in some detail) are for upgrading your customized versions of xcart with the least amount of effort and errors?

Thanks, Vince.

Whcih customisations ??

In summary, my upgrade procedures are pretty simple really.

Just follow the normal upgrade procedure making notes about the files that will be changing - These can be spotted by the diff files. - and checking this against those that have been modified.

When going through the upgrade it will try and make the upgrades itself but any fails will be notified in the failure log.

If these are critical to the operation or look and feel of the site then the latest 'fresh' versions of those files are looked at to see how to integrate the mods into those.

In general though, if you have made lots of mods it will fail the upgrade to the template file and therefore you mods wont be lost - just might lose some of the improved functionality of the new version.

Cant say this for sure when 3.4.0 upgrade kit comes out though :D

By "customizations", I mean changes to the look and feel/layout of the pages, not new features.

It looks as though I'll face a moderately involved process every time I want to upgrade and I should seriously evaluate wether my client even needs the upgrade.

What is it that you "can't say" about the 3.4 upgrade kit, will it be more friendly to layout and functionality customizations?

Thanks for you opinions by the way :) !

Vince.