Moving to new server

Software Support
1

Is there any information about procedures for moving OJS to a new server? We are running Open Journal Systems 3.4.0.7. We are using only the manuscript tracking at this time, we are not using OJS for our actual journal, so our primary concern is moving the database of emails and keeping all existing emails functional.

Unfortunately, the person who did our original installation is no longer with us.

Sign me, a little scared!

Jennifer

2

When we had to do it we stitched it together from the installation guide and upgrade guide. The most valuable part was how to do backups (https://docs.pkp.sfu.ca/dev/upgrade-guide/en/#4-create-backups)

3

Just follow the @cager’s advice. The most valuable part is, indeed, backups.

My list of things to backup includes:

  1. OJS code (you may want to copy the whole shebang, and not only public, config.inc.php, .htaccess and plugins as recommended, since you don’t know what that person may have patched)
  2. private files
  3. database table dump
  4. web server configs (e.g., /etc/apache2/sites-enabled if apache)
  5. SSL certificates
  6. php.ini file with the php settings

The first 3 are officially recommended. The last 3 are optional, but may help to spin up the website faster.

Nothing else comes to mind right now.

Unfortunately, “what lies where” depends on your OS and the personal preferences of the previous admin, so there’s no universally working guidance in this regard.

2 Likes
4

Thank you for this information!

5

We have all the back ups in place, but the mail is not working. Is there some way to transfer all the email addresses into a new server or do we have to rebuild?

Thanks,

Jennifer

6

Hi @jrumford ! I’m afraid from your description it is not clear what your problem is.

The email addresses are stored in the database. If you have the database dump, there they are (if I remember it right, in the users table), and when you recreate the database in the new server the emails should be seen from the OJS code.

Since OJS only sends and doesn’t receive emails, the actual inbound emails are stored in the inbox of your email server - on the old server if you used a self-hosted solution and on the third-party’s one if this is the case.

The settings defining how to connect to the email server are in config.inc.php. If the emails are not sent from OJS, this is probably the first place to check (e.g., for typos).