This document covers the upgrade process from HowNow v4.0 or v4.2 to HowNow v5 or above, we recommend a minimum of 45 minutes to complete this process.
Note that not all scenarios will be covered in this document, you may need to use your best judgement or speak with development if you encounter an issue during the update.
Please update this document with any fixes or troubleshooting you identify.
IMPORTANT:
Before the upgrade, IT must have reviewed the minimum system requirements, if the minimum requirements are not met it is best not to proceed with the upgrade until this is rectified.
Ensure that ALL USERS have exited HowNow for the upgrade, the upgrade will fail otherwise.
This upgrade must be performed on the server that HowNow and Firebird are installed.
Performing the upgrade
Obtain admin access to the client server.
Perform a sanity check of the server specs against the minimum requirements.
Open your browser, navigate to HowNow Support Downloads, right-click the HowNow Support Updater (HSU) download button and copy the link address.
Open the browser on the client server, paste the download link for the HSU to begin download.
Open the Downloads folder, locate the HSU exe and right-click, select Properties, then unblock the file.
Cut the file from the Downloads folder, paste it in the HowNow folder.
Double-click the HSU exe to open.
Take a deep breath and click the button to begin.
The updater will download the upgrade files and restart Firebird automatically.
It will then place the downloaded files into the HowNow folder and open the HowNow Software Updater.
You will be prompted that there are no DB updates to be performed, click close to continue.
The updater will then open PowerShell.
Powershell will do a best effort to locate Firebird, if it’s successful, follow the prompts to continue.
If it’s unable to locate Firebird, paste the path to the Firebird exe in the Powershell window.
The path used will need to be the folder that the Firebird exe is located, i.e., Program Files\Firebird\Firebird_3_0\ for Firebird 3, Program Files (x86) for FB 2.5.If it still cannot locate Firebird, perform the actions manually:
Perform a backup of the HowNow database through the Support Utility, close the utility.
Uninstall Firebird. Confirm that Firebird is uninstalled by checking services.
If FirebirdServerDefaultInstance is still present, stop the service.
Open CMD as admin.
Run the command sc delete firebirdserverdefaultinstance.
Once Powershell states that Firebird has been uninstalled, check services to confirm.
If Firebird is still present, follow steps listed in 9.b.ii.If Firebird is uninstalled, continue the process in Powershell.
Powershell will install Firebird 3.
If you receive a prompt that dependencies couldn’t be renamed, perform these steps before continuing.
Navigate to the Firebird folder in Program Files, open the WOW64 folder.
Copy the fbclient.dll file.
In the HowNow folder, rename fbclient.dll to fbclientFB25.dll, rename GDS32.dll to GDS32FB25.dll.
Paste the new fbclient.dll, rename this to GDS32.dll and paste the fbclient.dll file again.
Powershell will then attempt to perform a restore of the database.
If you performed a manual backup, you will need to restore the database manually through the Support Utility now. The Powershell script may close at this point.Once the update is complete, open HowNow.exe, once open, check for a software update and complete it.