Upgrade from 2.1 to 2.3 errors

[bronskyblu]

Dear all, hi James (or Matt?)
I've just upgrade my ocs version as in the subject (from 2.1.2.1 to 2.3.3.1, I don't have the server control so I had to install the whole package) and I've experienced some problems, the most part easily fixing but the others very annoying.

First of all the "files browser" tool, very useful, that now shows me the "schedConfs" dir only (once opened it, it's showed the "1" dir which bring me back to the previous dir again, in an end-less loop) . Did I wrong something in the "config.inc.php" config file or what? On the previous version it worked well.

Second. My conference is on the meddle of the review process and it seems that the reviewer comments are lost: in the "Paper Review" page (of each paper) the system tell me only "no comments" even if the reviewer set "revision required". For sure I know that these comments were written and uploaded and so they should be available.

Third (off topic, not caused from the upgrade). The system stops any effort of the Track Director to select the same old reviewers for a "second stage" of the review process. This issue looks like more a political choice than a problem, isn't it? Can I go around it?

Fourth (off topic, not caused from the upgrade): can users know their position about the conference registration once they were enrolled? From user account it seems there's no way to know about it, when should be useful.

PS.
Many thanks to all team guys for the work they did with OCS.

All the best,

Gabriele
__________________________
www.icae2011.org

[jmacgreg]

Hi Gabriele,

See below:

First of all the "files browser" tool, very useful, that now shows me the "schedConfs" dir only (once opened it, it's showed the "1" dir which bring me back to the previous dir again, in an end-less loop) . Did I wrong something in the "config.inc.php" config file or what? On the previous version it worked well.

Have you checked your files_dir parameter in your config.inc.php file against where the files directory actually is on your server? Have you moved that directory around at all? Also check inside the directory to ensure that everything is as it should be.

Second. My conference is on the meddle of the review process and it seems that the reviewer comments are lost: in the "Paper Review" page (of each paper) the system tell me only "no comments" even if the reviewer set "revision required". For sure I know that these comments were written and uploaded and so they should be available.

Have you applied the recommended patches, listed here? Additionally, this may be the problem reported here: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=5760. Note that to apply the included fix, you will have to revert to your pre-upgrade OCS backup, upgrade the files, apply the patch, and *then* run the upgrade script.

Third (off topic, not caused from the upgrade). The system stops any effort of the Track Director to select the same old reviewers for a "second stage" of the review process. This issue looks like more a political choice than a problem, isn't it? Can I go around it?

You should be able to resubmit the paper for another round of review, and then reselect the original reviewers.

Fourth (off topic, not caused from the upgrade): can users know their position about the conference registration once they were enrolled? From user account it seems there's no way to know about it, when should be useful.

When they log in, they should see from their User Home which roles they have been enrolled in. Or do you mean actual registration to the conference? IIRC, they should also be able to see that in the sidebar, in the user block, and it should tell them that they are already registered if they click the "registration" link while logged in.

Let us know if you have any further questions!

Cheers,
James

[bronskyblu]

Hi James,
thank you so much for your answer.
1. My "files_dir" is a directory at the same level of OCS dir (not web accessible, as requested) and it looks like to work correctly. Inside (from my ftp client) I could see the dir tree: Conferences > 1 > schedConfs > 1 > Papers (all the paper dirs) and tracks. So it seems that the file browser is pointing on the "schedConfs" dir but, unexpectedly, it stop to its child dir "1". The "fles_dir" directory belongs to the old installation and it was not moved at all. So till now I don't understand where I wrong.

2. I cannot work on command-line to apply the patches because the hosting service don't let do it (for this I upgrade the whole package). Anyway I'm a bit worried to come back to the 2.1 installation via DB to apply patches and then re-install 2.3 ... for the rest my installation does not seem to show the problems of this topic.

3. I have to check it with track directors who show me this issue.

4. James, we are both speaking about the registration at the Conference, enrolling users at "Conference Manager" > "Registrations" > "CREATE NEW REGISTRATION" after user have payed for registration fees? In this case I don't see any information for the use nor in the user home nor in user blok on the sidebar. Do I miss setting in the "Registration" panel (Registration, Type, policies and options: I've add just some Types without specifying any option or payment method until now)?.

Let us know if you have any further questions!

Cheers,
James

Don't worry: my users give me a lot of opportunities to ask you for issues!
Thanks a lor and all the best,

[jmacgreg]

Hi Gabriele,

These are some interesting problems! I'm going to ask a developer to take a closer look at this thread, especially at problems 1 and 2. In the meantime, could you check your server's error logs to see if there are any errors being reported?

Regarding problem number 4: my apologies, I thought that there was actually a "registration" notification in the sidebar, but it appears that there is not. The only place where users will be able to see if they are registered in the conference is on the registration page itself: for example if they attempt to register themselves, they will be told that they have already been registered. They will only see this notification if they are logged into the system. I agree that this isn't particularly clear for visiting users. I have submitted a feature request to help with this matter, here: http://pkp.sfu.ca/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=6386. Please feel free to CC Yourself to that report for future updates, and also to suggest any additional improvements.

Cheers,
James