AbleCommerce Gold R10 - R12 installations can directly upgrade to any version of AbleCommerce 9.
AbleCommerce, versions 7.0.3 through 7.0.7, and all Gold versions, can upgrade directly to AbleCommerce 9.0.8 or latest version.
Please READ this first -
Do not upgrade until you understand the following:
This is a major upgrade between version and will require a re-skin of the storefront.
A separate development environment will need to be setup for the upgrade process.
Only the data can be upgraded. (Orders, Users, Product, etc)
The retail facing pages are part of a new CMS editing system. Time will be needed to complete a re-skin of the store.
We developed a new plugin and process to make upgrading easier. Please see Merge CMS Staging Data for more information.
What you need before upgrading -
Notable Changes:
1) Download AbleCommerce applicationTo install the AbleCommerce application,
you will need to have an active software subscription for your
license. To check your existing license, you can submit a request
through your order and we'll do it for you, or you can view the
License details from the Security menu within AbleCommerce. e.g. AbleCommerce9-{buildnumber}-WAP.zip 2) Request a License Key for version 9.0.xAbleCommerce v9 has a new license model which limits the number of Admin users. As an existing Gold customer with a current subscription, you will be entitled to the UNLIMITED admin user license. To request your keys, find the latest order and submit a request with the name or IP address of the development site you will be using for the upgrade. At the same time, we will issue a new production license key for your future upgrade to AC9. NOTE: An installation running in DEMO/DEVELOPER MODE is not valid for the upgrade. Make sure you have a license key before continuing. The key type can be issued with Development or Live. For more information, please License Keys. 3) Install AbleCommerce
4) Copy existing images and assetsAll of your images and digital files should be located in the following folders of your <installpath>.
Copy all files to the new installation location. The paths will remain the same. 5) Email TemplatesThe email templates have been updated in the new version, but you may still use your email templates from Gold if you have customized them. Otherwise, we recommend that you use the new email templates. To use your customized email templates, copy them from -
To the same location of the new installation location. The names will remain the same.
NOTE: The URLs in the new version no longer end in .aspx, so any links in the old email templates will need to be updated to the new format and tested. Tech Note: A new email template is included for multifactor (2-factor) authentication services (MFA). The "Google 2FA QR Code.html" file is required if you enable Google's MFA feature.
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Pre-Upgrade StepsBefore upgrading, keep in mind that some payment gateways and shipping gateways are no longer supported in the new version. You will need to check and see if you are using one of the gateways that has been deprecated and decide how to proceed.
Another possible issue can arise if you are upgrading from an older version of SQL 2000 database. There are field type changes that must be made before upgrading. Please open a support ticket if you need assistance with any of these issues. |
Post-Upgrade StepsYour new Merchant Dashboard will have a section showing any warnings or alerts that need to be taken care of. 1) CHECK FOR A MACHINE KEY Open the web.config for your AbleCommerce Gold installation and see if a machine key exists. If it does, then you will need to specify a machine key in the web.config for the new version. If you do not need a machine key, then continue to the next step. 2) ENABLE SSL Make sure to re-enable SSL. The setting is in a new location. Within the menu, go to the Configure > Security > SSL Settings page. You have the option to secure all pages, use the default SSL configuration, or use your own settings. 3) RESTORE ENCRYPTION KEY Restore a backup of your encryption key (.bin) from AbleCommerce Gold. Find the Configure > Security > Encryption Key page from the menu. In the Backup or Restore Encryption Key section, choose the key backup file and press the Restore Key button. 4) CHOOSE CAPTCHA METHOD There are two CAPTCHA options available from the Configure > Security > Passwords page. The "CAPTCHA services section" has the configuration settings for Google's reCAPTCHA service. A test account is in use for demonstration purposes only. You'll need to obtain your own credentials and update them within the CAPTCHA services section. If you do not want to use Google's free service, then simply change the option to "Use standard image CAPTCHA" instead. 5) REPLACE DUPLICATE WAREHOUSES WITH SHIP GROUPS This is a new feature which will eliminate the need to have multiple warehouses to create unique shipping scenarios. If you have multiple warehouses with the same address, then you should review the changes you'll need to make to use the new feature. 1) Open two browser windows, (side-by-side) and go to the Configure > Shipping > Warehouses page in one, and the Configure > Shipping > Ship Groups page in the other. 2) For each warehouse that has the same
address, create a new Ship Group using the same name as
the warehouse. 3) Once all the Ship Groups are created, click on the (0) indicator in the Products column for the first Ship Group. a) Open the Advanced Search Options section of the search form. b) Find the Warehouse selection, and choose the warehouse name that matches the Ship Group you are editing. c) Press the Search button and select 'Unassigned Products' from the drop-down. d) In the products results, confirm the number of products matches the warehouse assignment (check with your other browser). e) If the number of results exceeds 20, change the Show selection to "100" or "Show All", but a reasonable amount of records needs to be selected so you can make the mass assignments. f) At the top of the first column, check the checkbox to select all results. The Update button should activate. g) Press Update button and choose the option 'Assign Selected Products'. Wait for the operation to complete. Once all records are assigned, there should be a message in red indicating there are no additional records in the results. Press the Back button. h) Continue by repeating for each new Ship Group, until all have products assigned. i) Confirm again that the number of products assigned to your warehouses matches the products assigned to your new Ship Groups. 4) Delete the duplicate warehouses. As you remove each one, there is an option to reassign the products to a new warehouse. Select your default warehouse and press Delete. Repeat until all duplicate warehouses are removed. 5) The last step involves assigning Shipping Methods to the Ship Groups. To do this, we suggest you review your existing Gold store. The Ship Group feature was added so you can reduce the number of shipment options displayed to the customer by combining shipping methods that are common to the products within that shipment. To utilize this new feature in the best manner, you'll need to review your shipping method to warehouse assignments in Gold. If a shipping method was assigned to a particular warehouse in Gold, then assign it to the matching Ship Group. If a shipping method can be used in more than one Ship Group, then make sure to assign it to each of them, or make it applicable to All Ship Groups. A new "Special Condition" shipping option is now available for each product. The available options are to 'calculate shipping costs separately' and add the calculated amount into the total shipping cost, or you can select a new option to indicate that the 'Item Ships Separately', in which case it will always be in its own shipment.
FINAL TESTING Above all, test your store and make sure that systems for email, shipping, tax, and payments are all working. Please post upgrade issues to a forum that we have setup for this purpose.
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Store Design - Customize!There are a few steps that can be taken to customize your store after upgrading. You can try it yourself, or contact us for information on upgrade services. Set a Theme
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Update your Store LogoThe first step will be to upload your Store Logo for the full-size website, small-size mobile devices, and customer invoices.
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Choose a Store Header and Footer (optional)At this time, we offer only a few choices for the store header and footer, but we welcome you to create your own custom design. If you do not want to select a different header of footer at this time, continue to the next section, "Add your Contact Information..." If you would like to change to a different header or footer, we provide instructions on how to apply the change to multiple pages or a single page. To apply a different header or footer to multiple pages, follow the instructions provided in the Merchant Guide:
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Add your Contact Information in the HTML SnippetsReplace our sample contact information with your own.
Tip: The sample data includes two header boards and two footer boards. Just swap out the boards from any page template and edit the content as needed. |
Edit your Content Pages to remove old codeRemove any references to ConLib objects within your existing content pages. Please read through all steps before beginning.
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Increase Image Upload Sizes (optional)A good responsive website design should use large images because they expand or collapse in size. You may want to adjust the default image upload sizes, or keep your existing settings. This will only change the size of new images when the 'upload and resize' feature is used. It will not change the size of your existing images. The upgrade did not change your existing image settings. To change these values, go to the Configure> Store > Image Settings page. The new recommended settings are as follows: Icon Image width 75 and height 75 Thumbnail image width 270 and height 180 *Standard image width *2048 and height *1365 Defaults for options are 75 by 75 *If you change the settings, make sure to upload images that are greater than the Standard image width and height set.
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Tips for the new Storefront Design features
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If you need to help with customizations,
please contact
us. |
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