Best way to upgrade to 2.0-RC1?

chpalmer

I love to do fresh installs, so is it possible to perform a fresh install ofl pfSense 2.0-RC1 and then upload the config file from pfSense 1.2.3? Will this work? Are they compatible? i tried finding something on this, but couldn't.

Thats my preferred method… Ive had no problems so far.

Good Luck!

skear

I decided to upgrade to 2.0 using the web interface and I haven't noticed any issues as a result of going that route. All of my settings remained after the upgrade. I can understand wanting to do a clean install though.

Bummer

Hey chpalmer

Have you upgraded using a clean install and uploading the backup config file from 1.2.3?

I only ask because I don't know if the XML files can be interchanged.

Thanks!

jimp

Doing a firmware upgrade to 2.0 and doing a clean install and restoring a config from 1.2.3 should be quite similar in net effect. The same config upgrade code is run in both scenarios. The main advantage of the clean install method would be that any leftover bits from old packages would be gone for sure.

Bummer

Hey jimp

Cool - you've made my day!

Thank you!

Sodje

Hi,

I've tried upgrading to 2.0 via the web interface and also run a clean install and tried to import the config from 1.2.3. Both fail, the latter with "The configuration could not be restored" on the Backup/restore screen when trying to restore "All". Restoring parts work e.g. just "Firewall Rules" or "NAT" which leads me to the obvious conclusion that something in the config is causing it. I've tried trimming parts out of the config file to identify the cause but no luck (and perhaps this is only making things more confusing as I may be removing mandatory elements).

Is there any log file that written to during an attempted restore process that I should be looking at that might point me in the right direction as to what might be causing the problem?

Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this.

jimp

No log really, it's an all or nothing process.

Restoring parts of a 1.2.3 config to 2.0 can and will cause problems. Don't do it.

First thing, try a recent 2.0 snapshot, not the official 2.0-RC1 image, as there are known upgrade issues in the official RC1 that are fixed in snapshots. If you still have problems, try running your config through xmllint to see if it finds and problems. The usual cause is international characters in the XML file, which have never been supported on 1.2.3, but some fields of 1.2.3 weren't rejecting them like they should have been. They do work in places on 2.0.

Bummer

Hey Jimp,

Thanks for the info. I plan on doing this Saturday evening. I just want everything to go as smoothly as possible so that my clients aren't down too long.

Sodje

Many thanks Jimp.

Using xmllint and the latest snapshot worked a treat.

Bummer

Well, I upgraded from pfSense 1.2.3 to the latest snapshot. It was very easy and all is working great. I love the new psSense!

I accessed my existing pfSense gui and upgraded to the latest snapshot. It was painless and fast. Everything seemed to work perfectly.

What can I say, I like fresh installs, because it makes me feel good and I know that there aren't any misc or ill configured files hanging around that might mess things up. So I exported the config.xml file to my computer, performed a fresh install of the latest pfSense snapshot, and then uploaded the config.xml saved earlier. All is great and easy!

Looking at the config files of 1.2.3 and the 2.0 snapshot, I can see the differences.

All I can say is… NO PROBLEMS! Yeah!