WordPress Upgrade Shell Script

By 4 Comments

WordPressThere’s a couple examples online of shell scripts to upgrade a WordPress installation. However, I’ve ended up creating my own because every configuration (server and WordPress) is inevitably different, requiring you to roll your own.

The script below handles a few things that some of the others available scripts don’t; 1. backs up your files and database, 2. removes files advised by WordPress, 3. cleans up after itself. Eventually, I should have it reach up and grab wp-config.php to gather the MySQL credentials and automatically deactivate (and possibly reactivate) the plugins for you.

Below is my own flavor of a shell script for upgrading WordPress:

#!/bin/bash
# Script Name: WordPress Upgrade Shell Script
# Script URI: http://www.redbridgenet.com/wordpress/wordpress-upgrade-shell-script/
# Description: Upgrades your WordPress installation following more closely the WordPress guidelines.
# Version: 1.0.0
# Author: Ed Reckers
# Author URI: http://www.redbridgenet.com/
# License: GPL2
#
# Usage ./upgrade.wordpress.sh
# This script is meant to run 1 up from your webroot or (directory containing your wordpress installation)
#
# Overview of the Upgrade Process via the WordPress Codex:
#
# 1. Backup your database
# 2. Backup your WordPress files
# 3. Deactivate ALL plugins
# 4. Download and extract WordPress package
# 5. Delete old WordPress files
# 6. Upload/copy over new files
# 7. Compare wp-config then remove sample
# 8. Run upgrade program
# 9. Re-activate plugins
#
# This how we Upgrade with this Script:
#
# 1. Deactivate ALL plugins
# 2. Put script above webroot/wordpress install
# 3. Update MySQL account credentials below
# 4. run script ./upgrade.wordpress.sh
# 5. Compare wp-config then remove sample
# 6. Run WordPress Upgrade program
# 7. Re-activate plugins
 
# The label for the backups
LABEL="wpbackup.www"
 
# Set mysql account credentials
MyNAME="DATABASENAME";
MyUSER="DATABASEUSER"
MyPASS="DATABASEPASS";
MyHOST="DATABASEHOST"
 
# Directory containing your wordpress installation
WEBROOT="public/"
 
# Get a sortable date like 2011-01-01 for full backups
FULLDATE="$(date +"%Y-%m-%d")"
 
# Linux bin paths, change this if it can not be autodetected via which command
MYSQLDUMP="$(which mysqldump)"
TAR="$(which tar)"
GZIP="$(which gzip)"
WGET="$(which wget)"
UNZIP="$(which unzip)"
CP="$(which cp)"
RM="$(which rm)"
 
# Backup your MySQL database
echo "backing up MySQL..."
FILE="wpbackup.sql.$FULLDATE.gz"
$MYSQLDUMP --opt -u $MyUSER -h $MyHOST -p$MyPASS $MyNAME | $GZIP -9 > $FILE
 
# Backup your website/WordPress files
echo "backing up website..."
FILE="$LABEL.$FULLDATE.tar.gz"
$TAR -zcpf $FILE $WEBROOT
 
# Get the latest WordPress package
echo "get WordPress package..."
$WGET "http://wordpress.org/latest.zip"
 
# Unzip the files
echo "unzip WordPress package..."
$UNZIP -q latest.zip;
 
# Remove the zip file
echo "remove WordPress package..."
$RM latest.zip;
 
# Delete old WordPress files (akismet & twentyten always come along)
# Deleting these directories prevents depracated files from remaining
echo "remove WordPress files..."
$RM -Rf $WEBROOT"wp-includes"
$RM -Rf $WEBROOT"wp-admin"
$RM -Rf $WEBROOT"wp-content/plugins/akismet"
$RM -Rf $WEBROOT"wp-content/themes/twentyten"
 
# Copy all new files from unziped WordPress package into your installation
echo "copy new WordPress files..."
$CP -r wordpress/* $WEBROOT;
 
# Remove the unzipped folder
echo "cleanup unzipped WordPress package..."
$RM -r wordpress/;
 
# Output that all steps are complete
echo "Wordpress Successfully Upgraded";
 
#exit from script execution

This is actually a BASH Shell script, but calling these things shell scripts is done enough that I’m sticking with calling it my WordPress Upgrade Shell Script.

Resources:

 

Post written by Ed Reckers

Founder and lead web development consultant at Red Bridge Internet : San Francisco WordPress Developers and Consultants.

4 Responses to “WordPress Upgrade Shell Script”

  1. Anthony

    What’s the best way to update multiple WordPress installations with this? I have a directory ‘subdomains/’ with about 30 different subdomains of WordPress installation.

    Would I change WEBROOT=”public/” to

    WEBROOT=”subdomains/a, subdomains/b, subdomains/c”

    Thank you.

  2. ereckers

    Anthony,

    That wouldn’t work because I’m not looping through it. Unfortunately the script really only works at it’s current state on single installations.

    If you were to run it above your subdomains directory with different values for WEBROOT, say “subdomains/a” the script still dumps the backup files in as wpbackup.www.YYYYMMMDDD.* in your current directory anyways. You’d end up overwriting those backups unless you updated the script to give these backups distinct names.

    So, short answer is, no that wouldn’t work and you’d have to do a little modification to it to get it to update your 30 subdomains (it wouldn’t take that much work).

  3. Jeff

    Hello there,

    I’ve been looking around and I’ve found your script to be quite the nice one :O and organized! Thank you.

    Question: my current wordpress is uploaded with the domain user privilege, hence other wordpress installation isn’t own by root (say website is call bridgenet, then the files as well as group is owned by bridgenet. If I use your script, it deletes the directory then writes over it, does root become the new owner? I find I could run into issues if I do it as root.

    Thank you for tip 😀

  4. Options for automating WordPress websites

    […] http://lowendbox.com/blog/wordpress-cheap-vps-lowendscript/ http://www.redbridgenet.com/wordpress-upgrade-shell-script/ […]

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