Ambiguous description of "manual update" (for 9.2.6 -> 10.0 upgrade)

1st Official Post

    The post about release of 10.0 says:

    LibreELEC 9.2 setups will not be automatically updated, you will need to manually update.

    Following the link displays an article that has no particular information about "manual upgrade"

    So.. what exactly is the procedure to upgrade from 9.2.x to 10.0 - while keeping the database and most settings ?

    A couple of days ago I tried to install LE 10 over LE 9.2.6 on an x86_64 device and it was a disaster. I have a LE 9.2.6 that acts as a server in a small network of amlogic devices, some with CE 9.2.8 and S912 processor, and others with CE 19.2-Matrix_rc3 and S905X3 processor with which I had no problem updating to kodi 19.2-Matrix. My LE x86_64 server uses very few addons but many docker services and it was impossible for me to update from the LE 9.2.6 version without problems, in the end I had to do a reset to boot with LE 10.0.0 without warnings, but the problems did not end. I couldn't start the tvheadend docker server either, after half an hour I reinstalled LE 9.2.6 again and recovered the last backup, since then everything works fine again with LE 9.2.6. I will wait a few months to make a second attempt at installing LE 10.0.0.

    it's somewhat "hidden" under section named "SSH Console".

    please pick the correct image for you box in the wget command from here:

    Downloads - LibreELEC

    in any case backup before !

    P.S.

    I'm not sure, but I guess you should be able to do the upgrade now also via auto-update by short time activating "Show custom channels" (which should update the contense of the subseq. options/boxes), adjust subseq. options and de-activate "show custom channels" afterwards and then upgrade the box. [1]

    P.P.S

    don't forget to update your addon's afterwards too

    [1]

    ... if the upgrade from 9.2 to 10 is allowed at all (me came from 10-RC)

    +++ EDIT +++

    from here:

    LibreELEC (Matrix) 10.0.0 - LibreELEC

    cit.: "So unless you are already running an image with Kodi 19 inside, a clean install is preferred..."

    nightly, RC have kodi 19

    and from here (for boxes running generic):

    LibreELEC Generic - LibreELEC

    LibreELEC 9.2 has Kodi 18.9

    combining both sentences:

    - clean install for an upgrade from 9.2 to 10 is preferred

    - but an upgrade from 9.2 to 10 is also allowed, but could fail

    Quote from elonesna

    ...

    I will wait a few months to make a second attempt at installing LE 10.0.0.

    I guess doing so would change anything, cause the update procedure stays the same for LE 10 and LE 11 is out then

    Edited 4 times, last by GDPR-7: Merged a post created by JoeAverage into this post. (September 10, 2021 at 9:28 PM).

    • Official Post
    Quote from Anke

    LibreELEC 9.2 setups will not be automatically updated

    Normally upgrades of major LibreELEC versions (8, 9 ,10..) will not be done automatically, mostly because of possible breakage of installed add-ons. Now especially, because of the Python 2 to 3 transfer. Not all skins have been made Matrix-compatible or are even available in Kodi 19.

    so... a clean install is recommended, ... is it as harsh as it sounds, or can a 9.2.x backup be restored on 10.x ?

    - At least a partial backup be restore, like DB only ?

    - otherwise - the loss is significant.

    It is possible to copy over your MyVideos database and Kodi will upgrade it to the newer db version. Don't copy over the addons database (or other such associated folders), as it would kind of defeat the purpose of the clean install recommendation.

    I asked a similar question to yours here: Is a clean install required for LibreELEC 10.0.0?

    I redid all the settings to be sure everything was clean, and it didn't really take me long. My videos and watched state got cut over fine, and once I set my sources and scrapers back up (be careful not to rescan), I was mostly fine. I scraped my music back in from scratch as there were no ratings or watched nonsense to worry about. I also copied over my smart playlists and playlists from my backup.

    It's possible. How harsh you find it really depends on your skill and comfort level.

    • Official Post

    If you're comfortable at the command-line and know what Kodi files are important and where they live it's pretty simple to do a manual update from 9.2.x to 10.0.x .. the only problem thing is add-ons (so move them out of the way before updating). I'd guesstimate that 85% of our userbase is not comfortable, and staff don't want to be drowned in "but my add-ons broke" support work, which is why the clean-install advice is pushed.

    Quote from chewitt

    If you're comfortable at the command-line and know what Kodi files are important and where they live ...

    Anke, if virtual.system-tools addon is installed you have also mc (midnight commander) which is helpfull to move files around, but one hint here:

    start it with parameter "-u" => mc -u

    in case you've virtual.system-tools version < 125 installed - IIRC -

    Edited once, last by GDPR-7 (September 12, 2021 at 3:14 PM).

    I am perfectly comfortable with SSH'ing into it and doing it properly.

    What I wish for, is a rough description what/how (which file, from/to , whatever database needs to be shutdown etc.)

    chewitt you wrote " it's pretty simple to do a manual update from 9.2.x to 10.0.x .. the only problem thing is add-ons (so move them out of the way before updating)."

    Please define "move them out of the way"

    could you please describe the process for me?

    It does not need to be very detailed, just like: (with filenames/paths)

    on 9.2.x:

    -do full backup (SD image + libreelec backup)

    -uninstall some plugins (which? - the ones I remember to have installed, or all?)

    -stop some service(?)

    -scp some db files.

    copy in some .tar file ? (or I can write a new 10.0 image to the SD)

    -stop some service

    -scp the database files to [path]

    -start some service

    -reinstall plugin as needed

    Thank you.

    • Official Post
    Quote from Anke

    how do I preserve the database, the movie/episode status and such ?

    • Make one or more backup copies of your video database file.
      In case of using MySQL/MariaDB, do a regular mysqldump export of the video database. Don't forget to enable the creation of the table schemas.
    • Enable the watched status and resume settings in Kodi's advancedsettings.xml file
    • Do a regular video library export into separate files, where nfo files are created next to the videos with the current scraped video content as well as their watched statuses / resume points.
    Quote from Anke

    Anyone ? - please help do actual *upgrade*

    There should really be a guide for that.

    Log into your machine via SSH, I'm going to assume you know how to do that

    1. ssh into your machine (username: root, pass: libreelec unless you changed it)

    Optional Backup Settings (I have a lot of movies, so I did this to avoid having to rescan and make a new database)

    1. "systemctl stop kodi"
    2. "mv /storage/.kodi /storage/.kodi-old"

    Optional Backup your Backup in case you screw up some later steps

    1. "cd /storage/.kodi-old"
    2. "tar -czf userdata.tar.gz userdata"

    Download and install the update (I'm assuming you're doing this on a PC, otherwise, the image file changes)

    1. "cd /storage/.update"
    2. "wget http://releases.libreelec.tv/LibreELEC-Gene…4-10.0.0.img.gz"
    3. "reboot now"

    Optional Restore Settings

    1. The first time you start 10.0.0 it'll have some on-screen questions for you to answer. Make sure you do that first before doing the following steps or you're going to end up overwriting your old settings and then you'll be sad.
    2. ssh into your machine again (after you answered those on-screen questions)
    3. "systemctl stop kodi"
    4. "mv /storage/.kodi-old/userdata /storage/.kodi/userdata"
    5. "systemctl start kodi"

    * disclosure: I'm no expert, you're doing this at your own risk!

    eisenb11 I am using Rpi4 - but the description is perfectly fine for that too, with small changes.

    This is now the closest thing to a upgrade path published ever.

    Somebody mentioned plugins - did you remove/disable them prior to upgrade?

    - I'll be back for a short vacation after next week, and will give it a try then.

    Anke I mainly use Kodi for movies so I didn't have many plugins. I think I just had my skin (Aeon Nox), a weather plugin, and I replaced the movie info scraper with some Python one.

    Prior to upgrading, I switched my skin back to the default: Estuary just to be safe. But, in hindsight, I don't think I had to do that as using the steps in my prior post, I had to reinstall all my plugins afterwards when I had 10.0.0 up and running.

    Thanks ! I did this on a rpi4, upgrading from 9.2 to 11.0.3, and everything went perfectly.

    I just also moved the ".kodi-old/addons" to ".kodi/addons" in the "optional restore settings" phase, and since I have only youtube/trakt and some minor addons, I didn't have any issue.

    The only thing not working was audio through hdmi (and CEC configuration to manually re-do), and I fixed it using this answer : RE: RPI4 No HDMI Audio :

    - remount /flash read-write (see https://wiki.libreelec.tv/configuration/config_txt )

    - edit /flash/cmdline.txt to add `snd_bcm2835.enable_headphones=1 snd_bcm2835.enable_hdmi=1 snd_bcm2835.enable_compat_alsa=0` add the end of the line (I guess that only the enable_compat_alsa=0 is needed, but I didn't check)

    - reboot

    - enjoy !