[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] Consequences of having to upgrade the staff client too Re: Any more recent doc on upgrading Re: Evergreen 1.4.0.6 released

[Jason Etheridge]

On Mon, Sep 7, 2009 at 1:46 PM, Repke de Vries<repke at xs4all.nl> wrote:
> Mike: your doc focusses on the server side upgrade but all staff PC's will
> need the new 1.4.0.6 staff client before the combination works.

You could use a 1.4.0.4 staff client against a 1.4.0.6 server,
assuming that there is directory on the server for:

/openils/var/web/xul/rel_1_4_0_4/

If such a directory is a symlink to the later rel_1_4_0_6/ directory,
then you'll also get server-side bug fixes from the upgrade.  However,
there is at least one client-side bug fix that the 1.4.0.6 client has
that 1.4.0.4 doesn't, and that's with transactions in offline mode not
clearing unless the Print receipt checkbox is checked (though you
don't actually have to print the receipt, just confirm or cancel the
print dialog).

> Question:  the new staff client install on the PC will keep all data on the PC in tact ?
> Like someone's workstation registration and everything else Evergreen stored uniquely on your own PC ?

Yes and no.  Workstation registration, list column preferences, Z39.50
defaults, sound preference, font preference, any locally saved receipt
templates, and maybe a few other things will be preserved.  Certain
"sticky" settings like checkboxes for Strict Barcode, Auto-Print, the
position of certain screen splitters, and the fields in the Print
Label interface are saved locally, but they're associated with the URL
of the remote server, which includes the version information for the
client.  So in practice, you'll lose those settings on an upgrade
(because the URL will change).  I've been changing how this works in
the main development branch ("trunk"), but it needs a few more tweaks
before I backport it to the 1.6 branch.  In the long run I'd like to
offer a choice of where such data gets saved (on the machine per
workstation, or as library settings, or as user settings).

I hope this helps.

-- 
Jason Etheridge
 | VP, Tactical Development
 | Equinox Software, Inc. / The Evergreen Experts
 | phone:  1-877-OPEN-ILS (673-6457)
 | email:  jason at esilibrary.com
 | web:  http://www.esilibrary.com