Upgrade & Fear
 

Hi. I'm looking for some guidance on how I can upgrade and not break my site and put my client out of business. Here's where I am: I am using ata 3.5.3 on WP 3.1.

To allow different sidebars on various pages, I used the Shiba Widgets plugin and the plugin isn't working anymore. When I try to manage the widgets, I get this error: "Fatal error: Call to undefined function tag_rows() in /home/content/a/b/e/abekurek/html/wp-content/plugins/shiba-widgets/shiba-edit-widgets.php on line 212". Of course I've contacted the plugin author but got no help.

I know I can just apply the ATA and WP upgrades and do my best to rebuild the site but here's my issue: because I can't see the widget content in the admin panel, I will have to build all the sidebars from scratch. And that will put my client out of business while I'm scrambling to rebuild.

Can any of you smart people recommend a path for me to recover the 'hidden' widget content for my client and bring his site up to speed? Here's the URL: http://abetheinspector.com

Thank you!

What did you change that started causing the error?

First thing to do is backup your database and wp-contents folder so you could get back to where you are now. You can backup the database with phpMyAdmin.

Take a look at the FAQ forum on updating and it explains how to manually update the theme so you can swap back and forth.

Have you tried just disabling that plugin?

To have different widgets display on different pages check out 'widget logic'

Hi Juggledad. It's been a while since I've been here... it's nice to see you back (that's how long it's been!) Hopre you're ok.

I'm not sure what caused the widget to break...I upgraded WP, probably, and everything worked great on the site so I didn't give it another thought. It's only when I tried to add a widget a few months later did i discover my problem.

I'm afraid to disable the plugin because I don't want to lose the content in those widgets...there's a lot there!

I've backed up the site so I'm slightly calm but the prospects of an all nighter to rebuild the site if I break it are pfffft.

I might upgrade everything to the latest version and see if that makes it work.

Did you upgrade the Shiba Widgets plugin to 1.4?

Hi Larry. I did consider updating the plugin but I'm a little concerned that upgrading will make the sidebars on the website disappear. In your opinion, is that likely? Right now, the admin panel is broken and I can't add the functions to the site that the client needs but, at least, the site is working.

if i decide to try to upgrade, i'll likely do it during daylight so i dont have to pull an all nighter getting the site back up, should it break.

thanks!

I wouldn't want to say it is or isn't likely as I have not had experience with that plugin in awhile. I did just install it to see if it installed OK and it did. I wouldn't expect problems with an upgrade and I always keep my site up to date as there can be issues with older plugins. If you are concerned just make notes of what you have in the various sidebars and pray before you upgrade.;)

Thanks Larry. I've copied the sidebars into word (which keeps the links) and notepad (when it was plain text). so i will upgrade the plugin to 1.4. two questions, please:
1) should i upgrade the ata theme too?
2) should it upgr wp to 3.1.3?

thanks!

I would upgrade WordPress. I wouldn't worry about the theme at this time. Also do you have backup of the Db?

I do an auto backup weekly. I will also go into the phpmysql and do a backup tomorrow morning, then i'll do the upgrade of WP and the plugin.

it's always an adventure....