how to migrate without closing down the store for the time being

[Edward]

Hi everybody,

I always come back to this issue: How do I migrate VM without closing down the live site?

If I do the migration on localhost and test it until everything works and I leave the shop live, people have placed orders in the meantime. Means the database won't be the same. If I then upload the new store to the server, I loose the orders that were placed while I was working on the migration.

Anybody got a workable solution for this? Any idea would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers,
Edward

[PRO]

You will lose some things.

BUT: http://www.csvimproved.com/
Might be able to get the orders over for you.
AND: There are user import/export components
http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/migration-a-conversion/users-import-a-export

[Vorwaerts]

How about using Navicat for MySQL for exporting your production site VM related tables into your local installation, and then when you're ready you could do the exact same thing only the oppsite way around.

I've done this successfully earlier when updating v1.1.x to a v1.1.9 installation between two different domains (specifically to catch new customers and orders).

[Edward]

...How about using Navicat for MySQL for exporting your production site VM related tables into your local installation, and then when you're ready you could do the exact same thing only the oppsite way around....

That's possible if nothing changed in the database structure. That's what I'm always missing when looking at updates - Information on the changes in the database. Everything else then is easy as.

For example a list of changes to the database from VM 1.1.9 to VM 2.0 would be awesome to evaluate the possibility of this approach.

Cheers,
Edward