Hi! Haven't used phpBB in years, need advice on old DB found

[shibbyshibby]

Hey everyone, I used to run a forum about 10 years ago, and let it die ultimately from low attendance. Anyway, I just found a copy of the database on an old computer, and wanted to install the forum again in hopes of reviving it again.

I don't have and of the phpBB files, just the database. I don't even remember what version of phpBB I was using.

How would I go about getting it to work again? I have the webspace already. Will a 10 year old phpBB database work on the latest release of phpBB? Would I have to use the original version I used back then?

Any help is GREATLY appreciate, thanks!

[warmweer]

I don't have and of the phpBB files, just the database. I don't even remember what version of phpBB I was using.

There's probably a config_table in the database. And it probably has a field version >>> that should tell you the phpBB version.

How would I go about getting it to work again? I have the webspace already. Will a 10 year old phpBB database work on the latest release of phpBB? Would I have to use the original version I used back then?

Download the files with the same version as that mentioned in the database.
Depending on the version you may have had mods or extensions in which case you should look for those and also upload them.

Let's start by determining the database version and go from there. I suspect it's a 3.0.x version in which case it's quite easy to restore the board (although non default images and wil be lost unless you can find a file backup.

[shibbyshibby]

Thank you so much for the input!

I just uploaded the database and tried looking in phpBB3_config. I didn't see anything relating to a version. Do you know exactly where I would look for it? I'm not really too good with this database stuff. lo

Thanks again!


EDIT: Actually, I found it. It's 3.0.11.

Now my question is, if I download that version and upload it to my hosting account, would it work with php8? That seems to be the only version of php my host uses.

[AmigoJack]

No, phpBB 3.0 doesn't work with PHP 7 or 8 out of the box - you'd have to tweak a couple of files yourself. The most crucial one is the preg_replace problem (also with PHP code in your database).

[Mick]

You can upgrade it on your desktop machine using a personal web server where you can use whatever version of PHP you want, I think for 3.0 it should be 5.6. See: KB - Installing and Setting Up Your Own Web Server. Once upgraded to 3.3.11 you can transfer it to your domain following KB - Transferring Your Board to a New Host or Domain.

Instruction for upgrading from 3.0 to 3.3.

[shibbyshibby]

Ok great, thanks so much for the info. I'll have to setup my own server I guess and mess around with it.

I just imported the copy of the database I have, and these are all the tables that imported (it uploaded successfully without any errors):

mx_block
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_block_system_parameter
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_column
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_column_block
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_function
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_menu_categories
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_menu_nav
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_module
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_page
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_parameter
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_parameter_option
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_portal
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_smartor_album
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_smartor_album_cat
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_smartor_album_comment
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_smartor_album_config
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_smartor_album_rate
Expand/CollapseStructuremx_smartor_album_sp_config
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_acl_groups
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_acl_options
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_acl_roles
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_acl_roles_data
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_acl_users
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_attachments
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_banlist
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_bbcodes
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_bookmarks
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_bots
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_config
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_confirm
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_disallow
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_drafts
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_extensions
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_extension_groups
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_forums
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_forums_access
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_forums_track
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_forums_watch
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_albums
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_albums_track
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_comments
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_config
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_contests
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_favorites
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_images
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_modscache
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_permissions
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_rates
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_reports
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_roles
phpbb3_gallery_users
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_watch
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_groups
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_icons
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_lang
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_log
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_login_attempts
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_moderator_cache
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_mods
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_modules
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_poll_options
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_poll_votes
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_posts
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_privmsgs
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_privmsgs_folder
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_privmsgs_rules
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_privmsgs_to
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_profile_fields
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_profile_fields_data
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_profile_fields_lang
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_profile_lang
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_ranks
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_reports
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_reports_reasons
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_search_results
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_search_wordlist
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_search_wordmatch


Does this seem like everything, or are there tables missing? I do have a couple other sql files that are smaller, maybe they have tables on them that may be missing? It's been so long that I can't remember what the deal was. lol But I did have it up and running on my host, so I have to have everything one way or another! lol

[warmweer]

The mx_ tables are not phpBB tables

I don't see an ext_table
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_gallery_roles
phpbb3_gallery_users
+
Expand/CollapseStructurephpbb3_mods

>>> All of this implies that it's a 3.0.x database (gallery is a mod but the data can be used by the extension (with phpBB3.3): see the Extension topic for the way to keep the data in 3.3

BTW you only show page 1 of 2

First you'll have to install a board (same phpBB version) to test whether it's complete, then you'll have to sanitize the database (using the 3.0 STK) BUT if you want to keep the gallery: do NOT blindly let the STK clean the whole database as you'll need the gallery tables .

[shibbyshibby]

Hmm, interesting. There is no 2nd page, that's all of the tables. I was looking for the users table, so I guess it's an incomplete database? I don't know why it would be incomplete, because I definitely had it working from this backup (had to take a backup and upload it to a new host shortly before it went offline for good).

[AmigoJack]

There is no 2nd page

Look closer. By the way you copied the text to paste here and didn't even care to delete all the Expand/CollapseStructure (search & replace is so easy in an editor) I guess you also are too quick to determine that no further page exists. It doesn't have to stand there as text - sometimes it's just angle brackets (like ">" or ">>").


(Thank you, phpbb.com, for your Cloudflare intervention to check if I'm a spammer or not - it successfully erases my original submitted form content, speak: all my typed in text. I may have posted on this board for the last time!)

[shibbyshibby]

Yea there definitely was no other pages, the database was incomplete.

BUT

I just searched my old external hard drive and found ANOTHER DB copy...and this one is complete!

I almost gave up, and then came across it. Really didn't expect it to work, as the file was much smaller.

So happy right now. Ok, I'll let you all know how it goes when I mess around with upgrading the phpBB versions.

Thanks for ALL the help!

[shibbyshibby]

Ok, I installed XAMPP and tried to import a copy of the sql.gz database into phpMyAdmin, but it instantly says it's probably too large of a file. It's only about 80MB. Does that seem right? Can I change something so it will work? It referred me to some documentation but I really didn't understand it at all. I'm really dumb when it comes to this stuff.

Thanks for any help!

[Mick]

What documentation?

[warmweer]

Ok, I installed XAMPP and tried to import a copy of the sql.gz database into phpMyAdmin, but it instantly says it's probably too large of a file. It's only about 80MB. Does that seem right? Can I change something so it will work? It referred me to some documentation but I really didn't understand it at all. I'm really dumb when it comes to this stuff.

Thanks for any help!

For one, you can empty the search tables. If that doesn't help, you could import the posts_table seperately.
Another way is to use bigdump.php.

[Prosk8er]

go to /xampp/php/php.ini and change the value of upload_max_filesize
might also want to change the value of these
max_execution_time
memory_limit
post_max_size

[shibbyshibby]

Ok, finally got it to import fully. Changed all the values in the phpmyadmin files, and was still having timeout issues. Somehow, I finally got it working after more adjusting in the files.I placed a fresh copy of phpBB 3.0.11 into the XAMPP htdocs folder. When I access it to install via http://localhost/forum/install, I get this error:



[phpBB Debug] PHP Warning: in file [ROOT]/install/install_main.php on line 73: Undefined property: install_main::$p_master

Fatal error: Uncaught Error: Call to a member function inst_language_select() on null in C:\xampp\htdocs\forum\install\install_main.php:73 Stack trace: #0 C:\xampp\htdocs\forum\install\index.php(326): install_main->main('overview', 'intro') #1 C:\xampp\htdocs\forum\install\index.php(203): module->load() #2 {main} thrown in C:\xampp\htdocs\forum\install\install_main.php on line 73



Any ideas what's wrong?