How can you test the new version on a test server without people getting notifications

On a test server I upgraded OJS to 3.1.2. It was not easy to upgrade from 3.0.1 so I want to test it very well. The schedular is off, so no notifications of the editorial workflow will be send to authors/reviewers/editors. But how can I test the workflow? Is it possible to turn it off per journal? I have been searching the internet but by cron job it is also not possible.

Hi @tabber,

I guess you are asking how to turn off sending email notifications, right? If that is so, just comment the email settings in the config.inc.php. But that will cause all journals not to be able to send emails.

Regards, Primož

Hi primozs, thx for you reply. I know how to turn off sending email notifications but you cannot test the editorial workflow. I wish to test it for 1 journal so I am sure it is working fine. I assume lots of people have a test server for the upgrade to a new version and with their jounals inside. How do they test whether everything is working fine?

Hi @Tabber,

At PKP|PS, when we test an upgrade we obfuscate the email addresses in the users table with a MySQL update statement. For quick tests and non-sensitive data you can use mailinator.com and random email addresses, just so you know things are working. Once confirmed you can replace the table again from a backup.

Cheers,
Jason

Thank you, @jnugent. Do you want to share your MySQL update statement to obfuscate the email addresses in the users table? That would be great!

Hi @tabber

Sure, all you need to do is ‘break’ those addresses to prevent mail from being delivered. We usually just do:

UPDATE users SET email = concat(email, '_TEST');

which is enough to break them, but is easy enough to reverse if necessary. It also keeps them unique which is a table constraint.

Cheers,
Jason

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