Should I upgrade from Symfony 1.2.9 to 1.4

Question

I am a few weeks from hopefully launching my site (Yes, I know like I may be tempting fate, even merely asking this question).

I am developing using SF 1.2.9 (using Propel ORM), but I am increasingly being tempted to upgrade to 1.4, least of all, I feel it will be less of an effort to migrate a life system from 1.4 to 2.0 later on, than from 1.2 to 1.4. Also, IIRC, active support for 1.2 is being phased out next year, whereas 1.4 is to be supported till 2012 (IIRC).

So, shall I bite the bullet and upgrade, or shall I take the (on the face of it - safer) option and stay put with 1.2.9?

Answer 1

Are their any compelling reasons for the upgrade? Does version 1.4 have more bug fixes, or additonal features that your appliation must have? Are their any breaking changes between 1.2.9 and 1.4? Is there any refactoring to do after you've upgraded to 1.4 from 1.2.9?

I'm looking at this from a .net framework perspective;

.net 1.1 to 2.0 - there were many changes here. many of them were breaking changes, but the benefits of the upgrade were great.

.net 2.0 to 3.0 or 3.5 - a lot of upgrades were introduced here, but not very many if any breaking changes since the last two upgrades were based on the same basic framework. You can live with the 2.0 version without upgrading to any of the other two.

So if the Symfony upgrade is similiar, I would wait for a little while. You've got your application built, tested and ready to go. See what it takes for the upgrade and then see about integrating the new features in during the next iteration of your development.

Good luck with your site, and hope this helps some.

Answer 2

If you want to use some of the new features, you should upgrade of course. As the symfony development is test driven, I assume the new versions are stable and reliable.

But: Do not upgrade to 1.4 but to version 1.3. The later has an extra compatibility layer to ensure that projects based on 1.2 still work. There are some internal changes in 1.4 that forces you to really refactor some parts of your project to keep it working. With 1.3 you can make this changes step by step.
The only differences between 1.3 and 1.4 is this compatibility layer. For specific instructions, read this upgrade guide.

As for support, 1.3 is supported until the end of next year which gives you plenty of time to upgrade to 1.4 step by step.

And in general I belief also that upgrading from 1.4 to 2.0 will be easier than from 1.2.

Edit:

You can find the changes here and the deprecated stuff here.
I don't know if 'internal changes' was the right word. There is some stuff you have to consider if you change to 1.4 but the deprecated stuff in 1.4 still works in 1.3.
I will try to upgrade one of my projects to 1.3 this weekend and I can give you feedback somehow if you want to.