4.08?????????? Yikes.

The current version of DNN is 9.9.1. Your version is very much out of date with all of the negatives that come with that. May I humbly get your site up to date before addressing the questions you've asked here.

When you say that the folder in question is a Virtual Directory, does that also mean that it is not visible to the DNN File Manager?

Yes, you're right - it's just a regular virtual directory. It's not visible to DNN file manager. We're uploading documents and images by using a regular asp.net fileupload control.

I don't mind to upgrade but I'm afraid it's too late, I mean upgrade from DNN 4 to the latest version. Am I right?

 

No, it's not too late to upgrade DNN 4 to the latest version.  Depending on your website, though, it may be easier to create a new site and move your content and users to it.  It all depends on what you have.

The module DNN Global Storage from evotiva.com is a set of DNN Folder Providers (connectors) that allows your DNN site to connect to folders external to DNN and make them available to DNN users. You can use the usual DNN user and role permissions to control access to those files.

It's a great product, but you'll need to upgrade DNN in order to use it.

Is there any way to jump from DNN 4 to 9? Or i is better yo start from scratch with 9?

Can I move users by preserving their UserID? I know that passwords are salted in DNN 9 so it can't be done just by using T-SQL statements. If I will use a DNN code - how can I preserve UserID? I need it because I have a lot of tables where UserID if the Foreign Key. 

 

There is a suggested upgrade path to follow.

Anyway, to do this I would recommend to set up a testing environment. Before you start: uninstall all extensions that you don't use, and delete all files in the following folders under /install (except the file PlaceHolder.txt):

• AuthSystem
• Container
• Language
• Library
• Module
• Provider
• Skripts
• Skin

Backup (files and database) before each upgrade step (see here for details), test the site, find upgrades to the modules that don't work, find fixes for skin issues, check all extensions you use, esp. third party and custom extensions. Then backup, and do the next upgrade step. And so on...

Make a clear documentation about each step you do.

And then, when everything is fine, do the upgrade in the production environment.

By the way: There is an easy way to include an extension upgrade in the DNN upgrade. Let's assume you have a module XY, version 1.0.0 in your DNN 4.8 installation. When you upgrade from DNN 5.6.8 to DNN 6.2.8 it turns out that you need an upgrade for this module to version 1.1.0 as well. You have two options:

• Unzip the DNN 6.2.8 upgrade package to a local directory, and copy the module installation package for version 1.1.0 to the /install/Module folder, and then re-zip the DNN upgrade package. Use this package to upgrade DNN.
• Unzip the DNN 6.2.8 upgrade package, and before running the installer, copy the module installation package to the /install/Module folder of your DNN installation.

The same for all other extension types (skins, providers, language packs...). When doing several upgrade steps, I prefer the first method, and have customized upgrade packages for each step, which allows me to speed-up the upgrades in the production environments later.

Happy DNNing!
Michael

Thank you for your advice. But what about users? How to transfer users from DNN 4 to DNN 9? I need to preserve their UserID - is it possible?

If you upgrade, all the users and roles remain in your system.

If you set up up from scratch, there are some user import/export tools, e.g. forDNN.UsersExportImport by fordnn.

Happy DNNing!
Michael