The general procedure will differ depending on whether you want to do the migration while your old system continues to run uninterrupted, or whether you are able to close down the old system for a while while working on the data import.

With closed down system:

1. You stop the old system.
2. You install the new ORSEE in a different folder.
3. You configure the new ORSEE.
4. You prepare the data import.
5. You import all data from the old ORSEE.
6. You check that all data has been correctly imported. If not, you repeat the previous step.
7. You do further configurations, based on the imported data.
8. You start the new system (for example by copying it over the old system).

With uninterrupted system:

1. You install the new ORSEE in a different folder.
2. You configure the new ORSEE.
3. You disable regular tasks for the new ORSEE (this is to prevent that right after data import the system starts to firing emails etc. while the old system is still running).
4. You prepare the data import.
5. You import all data from the old ORSEE.
6. You check that all data has been correctly imported. If not, you repeat the previous step.
7. You do further configurations, based on the imported data.
8. When you think you are ready, you
   1. Stop the old system.
   2. Re-import data, but only participation data.
   3. Start the new system.

This way you can work with the imported data, and in a last step you only “refresh” the participation data.

Before you import data from an old ORSEE version, do the following:

• Install the new ORSEE version, including the database, by following the installation instructions in this wiki.
• Review General settings and Default values: these will not be imported.
• Review Participant states and Experiment participation states, since some participant data will be mapped into these.
• Review Email templates, Datetime formats, and all language terms, as these will not be imported. (There just have been too many changes to these between version 2 and 3, so an import would unlikely be successful.)
• If you are using a language other than English or German which are shipped with ORSEE, then create a new language in ORSEE (this will copy one of the existing ones). Then export your old language file in your old ORSEE and import it into the new installation with the update(!) option, so you don't import unneeded language terms. Finally, carefully review the language terms of this language, as many have changed.
• Configure the Participant profile fields that you would like to use.

The following tables will be imported with the all option:

• or_admin: All admin accounts will be imported where username does not yet exist on new system. You can disable admin accounts after impot, if you wish. When changing passwords, a stronger encryption will be used.
• or_admin_log
• or_admin_types: Will only import admin types that do not exist yet on new system. If there already exists an admin type of the same name, the old type will not be imported.
• or_cron_log
• or_experiment_types (plus lang items)
• or_experiments
• or_faqs (plus lang items)
• or_lab_space
• or_participants
• or_participants_log
• or_participate_at
• or_sessions
• or_subpools
• or_uploads
• or_uploads_data

The following tables will be imported with the participation option (i.e. only participation data is imported):

• or_admin_log
• or_cron_log
• or_experiments
• or_lab_space
• or_participants
• or_participants_log
• or_participate_at
• or_sessions

The following tables will not be imported:

• or_bulk_mail_texts
• or_cron_jobs (already defined)
• or_http_sessions
• or_lang: Default emails, datetime formats, and all general language terms will not be imported. All specific language terms (related to items in other tables) will be imported.
• or_options

The import script will need to know how fields in the old database relate to fields in the new database, such that the data can be imported correctly. It will also need to know how extensive the import will be (all or participation, see above).

For convenience, ORSEE provides a kind of “wizard” to determine the correct settings. See section Options/Prepare data import for details.

When working with an uninterrupted old system, choose all as import modus for first import and participation as import modus when you do the refresh of participation data.

Choose all if you are working with a closed-down system and only do the import once.

Importing data will delete all existing data from the affected tables (see above) before entering the new data.

The data import is executed by the script install/data_import.php. You copy the output of the import preparation into the install/data_import.php file (or you edit it yourself).

Then, you switch to the install folder and run

php data_import.php

The script will inform you about its progress. It may take quite a while to import the data if your old database is large.

After running the full import, review all your settings and items. Fro example,

• Review admin users. Disable those who do not need access anymore. Ask all existing users to change their passwords. (ORSEE is backward-compatible, but uses much stronger password encryption in the new version, so it is best if all users update their password. You may require them to use a different password than the old one, or you allow them to use the old password again (provided that it meets the password strength criteria).
• Review admin types / user privileges. ORSEE only imports custom admin types. So there may be some privileges that you changes that are not reflected in the system yet. And you custom types might miss some privileges that were introduced in the new version.

• Run a second data import with the import modus participation if you are ready to switch to the new system.