Manual upgrade from Confluence 3.5.9 to 5.X
Asked by Keith Henderson:

I have been trying to upgrade Confluence from 3.5.9 to 5.X.  
Our 3.5.9 is running on a older Ubuntu server with a local database.  
I have been UNABLE to export an XML file from the older version of confluence running on that under powered machine. We are now using a external MySQL server for all of our Atlassian products.

I have tar'ed up the "attachments" directory and dumped the confluence database from the old server. I have installed a fresh 5.0.3 on CentOS 6.3 with the database on a seperate MySQL server running CentOS 6.3.

I have had NO LUCK trying to get our data from 3.5.9 into 5.X. Is there a way to do this, without creating a XML file. I don't mind the manual work.


Answers:
author: Keith Henderson
body: @Daniel, I have migrated out existing 3.5.9 from an old Ubuntu server with an enbedded database to a CentOS 6 server with an external MySQL database. There are a few things that are not functioning correctly.


author: Daniel Borcherding
body: Keith,

Were you using a local MySQL instance or running an embeded database?

Having an XML export is not completely necessary for a confluence server migration, often times it is not even the best idea. The only time when you really NEED an xml export is when you are swaping database architecture.

All you really need to restore.migrate confluence is a copy of the home directory and a database dump. They have a doc that I'll copy below that outlines the process better than I can here. NOTE: you will need far more than the attachemnts directory

[](https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/DOC/Migrating+Confluence+Between+Servers)<https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/DOC/Migrating+Confluence+Between+Servers>

What you cannot do is jump from an old version of on one machine to a band new version of Confluence on a new machine. You have got to walk it one step at a time. My suggestion would be to

1. Migrate from 3.5.9 on the legacy machine to 3.5.9 on the new hardware.
2. Once there perform an in place upgrade from 3.5.9 to 5.x ( they are going to recommend a smaller jump, but it is not strictly necesary)

The XML export is a one stop shop for the filesystem component and the database. It makes migration easier if you can generate one, but xml exports can make under powered boxes fall over. The confluence home and database dump is the most reliable option and so long as there are no exotic changes to database architecture you should be golden.

comments: author: Thomas Vlerick
body: Hi Keith,

thank you for that link. We are also planning to upgrade from 3.5.9 to the latest version. Finally got some people persuaded to try the wysiwyg editor instead of the wiki text editor. My plan was also to to a move and upgrade at once but I may follow this path:

* Move the 3.5.9 to a new more powerfull machine
* Upgrade to 4.0 to fix the change in the user macros
* Upgrade to 5.0 (maybe skip this skip as I have not read all the intermediate upgrade notes)
* Upgrade to 5.4.3
* Buy licences for the plugins we use that now are still free... \*sigh\*

Ofcourse, we do this in a test environment first as we will have issues with several plugins:

* ThemeBuilder has changed a lot since then. We are thinking about setting up a seperate confluence for out websites we host via the themebuilder plugin
* Check what to to with the Ad hoc Workflows plugin as it is quite expensive, great plugin thou!
* Probably some more issues as we deal with the upgrade

Thomas


author: Daniel Borcherding
body: Looks like you've got things dead to rights. Let us know if you run into trouble.


author: Keith Henderson
body: ### @Daniel, I have migrated out existing 3.5.9 from an old Ubuntu server with an enbedded database to a CentOS 6 server with an external MySQL database. There are a few things that are not functioning correctly. {#toc-hId-1485046987}


Tags: confluence-administration