Update 5.0

The update to version 5 is mainly an update about the new Chinese language, a new basis OS upgrade and some major and minor function changes (check provider changelog). But we also did some cleanup for the CSS and icons in the user interface.

There are a few things to know and consider for updating the system. Please read carefully!

Important Upgrade Notes: Major OS upgrade

This update is making a major OS upgrade of your regify provider. The CentOS 6 system is updated to CentOS 7.5, which requires a few reboots and SSH re-logins. It also takes some more time than a normal patch updates (10 to 30 minutes, mainly depending on your system speed).

Important ToDo before upgrading! READ ME

More RAM for the Virtual Machine

For the upgrade to work, the VM must have at least 2GB of RAM. If you do not yet have 2GB RAM assigned, you may want to shutdown the machine (shutdown -h now) and re-assign some more memory before you switch it back on and start the upgrade.

If you're using the NAGIOS capabilities

Please note that /etc/nagios/nrpe.cfg will be overwritten and nrpe will not run after the upgrade. You may want to make notes of the needed settings before upgrading.

If you're behind a firewall / inside of DMZ

Please make sure that you have WebSocket support in your firewall. Otherwise, regibox clients will not work!

If you're behind a loadbalancer

Please note that with provider V5 a websocket server was introduced for regibox. Even if we do not use extra ports, make sure that your load balancer supports it (eg does not cut long-term connections). If you do not offer regibox, you don't have to care about.

If you installed third party tools like VMWare-Tools, Backup-Tools etc

Please note that other running demons and scripts might crash the upgrade. Please stop all running third party demons and scripts which are not original by regify. In case of doubt, remove them prior to the upgrade! Please also note that, due to all our documentation and contracts, we are not reliable for any issues caused by such third party software. Maintenance efforts due to such issues will be charged. In general, we strongly suggest to not run any third party tools at all (not even virtualization or backup tools)! The regify provider appliance offers a build-in backup function and virtualization tools are not required at all.

Ensure the right persons available

This update changes the CSS and therefore it is very likely that you need someone with CSS skills to fix the appearance after update. Especially if you edited the used icons.

Make snapshots shortly before upgrading

In order to be able to rollback an upgrade, please

1. Set provider to maintenance mode (Web-Admin -> Provider maintenance -> Enable maintenance mode)
2. Make a snapshot of your virtual machine(s) shortly before starting the upgrade (if you're on VM).

Starting the upgrade

To update your regify provider appliance, please log in via SSH (PuTTY) and select the first menu item "Check for updates". The update process can take up to 30 minutes. If you are running a redundant system, do this directly one after the other on each appliance.

IMPORTANT: Read and follow the dialogues during update!

If dialogues or notes coming up during update, please READ them carefully and follow instructions!

ToDo after upgrading

System in maintenance mode?

If you turned on maintenance mode before upgrade, the system will come up in maintenance mode after update. Please enter Administration and use "Provider maintenance" dialogue to restore operation.

The update requires a few reboots and SSH re-logins. If dialogues or notes coming up during update, please READ them carefully and follow instructions!

Icons

Many images have been replaced by font icons (a font containing icons instead of characters). We've chosen typeicons and it works great. By this, we also tried to make it much more easy for you to adapt the colors to your needs. Please check the provider customization documentation (found in your web administration) and the Provider_customization WIKI article for further help and some CSS template. You can still use CSS to overwrite the icons with own uploaded ones. Please do with a skilled web developer.

If you uploaded your own images for customizing (eg grey ones), you very likely have to remove the CSS and the uploaded images after the update! Please check the Provider_customization article for further help and some CSS template.

Please understand that we can't offer detailed help on CSS customizing for free. If you like us to help you on CSS and customizing, please ask us for an offer about professional service by a skilled developer.

codeFooter.php

The update also tries to adapt the codeFooter.php file of your customization. The switching of languages and the mechanism for displaying the flags was enhanced and some code must be removed or changed to work. We try to update your footer automatically, but if the automatic update of this file failed, you will get some red ToDo warning in your web-administration main page. In this case, please reset the codeFooter.php to the default and make your changes to whatever it was before.

Provider-SDK access

The provider-SDK is now using IP whitelisting for any access by default. If you use the provider-SDK, you have to enter the incoming IP addresses in the Web administration at Provider settings -> Allowed IP-Ranges for Provider-SDK. You can enter single IP addresses, ranges and subnets. It is also possible to allow access from everywhere (*), but please use that option only if needed.

RAM for the Virtual Machine

Maybe you like to shutdown (shutdown -h now) and set RAM size back to what it was before (eg 1GB)?

Consider updating your Terms and Conditions

With the new provider release, we also ship new templates for Terms and Conditions. Even if we do not assume any liability for these, we have nevertheless attached importance to largely fulfilling the requirements of the GDPR (DSGVO). Especially §7 has changed accordingly. Maybe you want to use the new templates?

We suggest to first copy the existing ones onto some text editor like notepad (to keep a copy of changes you made for reference). Now use the "Reset to default" button on the bottom of the template editor to get the new regify default template.

If you created snapshots, remove them

In case you created a fresh snapshot, you might consider removing it. Going back to such a snapshot later may cause data loss and is only possible together with a current provider appliance backup.