Trying to upgrade OJS from 3.1.1.2 to 3.1.2.2 (PHP 7.0.29, Apache 2.2.22, mysql 5.5.60).
I update through the command line and get the following error:
PHP Parse error: syntax error, unexpected '?', expecting variable (T_VARIABLE) in ***/lib/pkp/classes/notification/PKPNotificationOperationManager.inc.php on line 373
There are no additional errors in php-error logs, only the same line.
What is the reason and how to solve the update problem?
Today I raised PHP version to 7.3.10 and tried updating to 3.1.2.3.
I got exactly the same error. Incredible… 
@asmecher, can you please help us with this? I rummaged through the whole forum and don’t understand at all why this component may give an error when updating?
Hi @rkhalikov,
I suspect your command line PHP interpreter is older than you think; try running php --version from the command line to verify.
Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team
Thanks, yes, that’s it. I checked the version and used the command from /opt/php73/bin/php to update.
After that, I got a problem “You are trying to downgrade the product “” from version [3.1.1.2] to version [1.0.0.0]. Downgrades are not supported. You are trying to downgrade the product “” from version [3.1.1.2] to version [1.0.0.0]. Downgrades are not supported.” due to plugins SWORD and(or) QUICKSUBMIT. I deleted them - and finally got the correct update! Thank you all, we’ll dig the new version.
One more thing. @asmecher, I think we should fix system requirements on the download page.
Because actual requirements for the latest version are the following: PHP >=7.1 instead of 7.0.
Just a quick note on this. I was able to fix my issue as well by updating my command line PHP interpreter. I use a Linux server and I was able to run the following command from root to change the version:
update-alternatives --config php
Just in case others need help with that.