Question Which parts of DB contain latest Kunena information?

The topictitle is a bit confusing, but please let me explain.

I have a quite complex website (Joomla, Kunena, Jomsocial etc) that I want to update. The people didn't do this for quite a time, so almost everything used on the site is quite old and has a newer version.

To do things as fast as possible but with the least downtime for the live website I want to do all the updates on my local machine in MAMP. In the meantime as I am updating the website and all the components, modules and plugins, the members are still using the old forum.

Is it possible to export just those tables that contain Kunena information from the live site at the last moment and import those into my brand new updated site on my local system?

If yes, which tables exactly do I need to update Kunena (new users, profiles, topics etc), but not affecting any of the settings already done on the updated site?

There are a couple of ways you can approach this problem. One way is to do as you have explained and, in my opinion, this way is a little too complicated and involves a high risk that the last-minute migration might be unsuccessful. The benefits of your suggestion are that there is only one interruption to services as far as your users are concerned.

There is another way you can approach the problem that is less complicated, lower risk, involves more interruptions to your users but, if managed properly, your users will be happy to co-operate with you.

The first step is take a snapshot of your website now, before you begin. I use Joomlapack (which is now known as Akeeba Backup ) which makes taking a backup as simple and pleasurable as having a stroll in the park. Learn how to make backups and how to do site restorations.

The next step is to recreate your website in your local MAMP testbed. You can recreate your site using Akeeba Backup's "kickstart" program. Verify, at this point, that you can actually use your "cloned" test site. Unfortunately, unless your testbed has every facility that's available on your live hosting platform (e.g. e-mail services) you may not be able to test everything; if those other services are important, you might consider conducting your upgrade simulations on a test site located on the production web server. But, at this point, you're now ready to tackle those upgrade issues!

So, just how out-of-date is the software on the live site? Unless we're talking about converting from J! 1.0 to J! 1.5, it shouldn't be all that difficult.

Let your users know that there may be several interruptions to services in the near future. You can provide better details when you're closer to the exact time.

Simulate the upgrade procedures on your test site. Make sure that you are familiar with them. When you're [as] confident [as you can be], that's when you should begin the work in earnest. It's at this point that you should take a new backup of your live site and stop user access to it. Upgrade one component only, in situ, restore access to your website and verify that that upgrade did not have an adverse effect. Post a message in the forum letting your users know that you have made a change and wait for a reasonable amount of time (maybe 24 hours) to await users' reports of problems before upgrading the next component. If you encounter an insoluble problem then you have the comfort of knowing that you've made backups to allow you to roll-back to a previously "working" version of your site.

That would be my overall approach. Obviously I would have a documented plan of the detailed steps, but I think you get the idea.

In general terms, start with the most important foundation products: (1) Joomla (2) Kunena (3) JomSocial. Others might recommend a different sequence: (1) Joomla (2) JomSocial (3) Kunena.

Good luck.

What needs to be copied?

Tables: jos_fb_*
Files: images/fbfiles/*

Those should cover all Kunena related information. In addition I suggest that you will copy all user related tables (jos_users, acl) so that your old users can still log into the new site.