Since the summer of last year, the owners of online stores developed on the basis of an outdated version of the platform Magento 1, возникла необходимость в проведении обновления. Конечная цель которого — перенос сайта на to the Magento 2 platform. As part of the material, we will consider the most important steps that lie ahead for you on the way to transition to the updated version. The purpose of the material is to familiarize users with the correct chronology of actions. But, we strongly advise against performing the migration process without having the necessary skills and knowledge of the process — contact the specialists who are engaged in magento extension development.
Save the analysis before transfer and Make the final decision
First, conduct or order a store analysis, which will include, among other things. when listing each custom extension or feature that requires migration. This is the best time to identify the flaws of the old store that you can fix in the new version. At this stage, you can also analyze store traffic and determine future goals.
Such an analysis allows not only to clarify the scope of work, but also to collect all the requirements together. Thanks to this, programmers will be able to advise and suggest specific solutions that can improve the store’s performance, and the process itself will be much easier to plan and execute.
The goal is also to know all your affairs, as well as an indication of its strengths and weaknesses, as well as recommendations for improving them.
The result of the analysis is the definition of a clear and specific area of implementation. On its basis, you can draw up a migration estimate, which will allow you to calculate the profitability of this operation. Then there will only be a final decision whether to proceed now. If it is positive, you should choose a company that will implement the project and complete all the formalities necessary for the developers to get started.
Installing Magento 2
Visit Website and choosing the latest stable version of the platform. What if a new version comes out during the migration? You will need to update your store before it is finally launched.
Transfer of design
Porting the current store appearance to a new platform will be very time consuming, because there are no tools to do this, and the appearance needs to be implemented from scratch. However, it is worth treating this inconvenience as an excellent opportunity to refresh the look of our store.
We have two solutions to choose from:
- Buying a template. A ready-made graphic theme probably won’t fit the bill, but it will certainly be relatively cheap. The problem can arise when customizing the template for our specific needs. There is a risk that the code will be sloppy, not conforming to standards, and modifications can take a very long time. However, if the number of potential changes is small, the solution remains the cheapest.
- Create a new template. This solution gives you complete freedom in the appearance and operation of the site. Potentially, it is more expensive than a ready-made template, but in the end it can turn out to be much better we are confident in the quality of the code and making corrections to it will not be a problem for programmers. In addition, using the services of experienced designers, we will receive a design adapted to the industry in which we operate, based on rigorous research and research, optimized in terms of customer needs and thus contributing to high conversions.
Therefore, despite the cost, we highly recommend this solution.
Migration of extensions and Data transfer
Some extensions, especially those created by well-known module vendors, have analogs adapted to both versions of Magento. In this case, the module in the Magento 2 version will have to be purchased again, and then installed and configured in the new store.
Worse, if the developer of the Magento 1 extension has not prepared a version for the new platform. Then you will need to find an analogue of another company in the Magento Marketplace with the same effect and, ultimately, create the functionality from scratch by the developers.
We have come to one of the most important parts of the whole process data migration. Depending on the needs, we can transfer information about:
- products,
- customers,
- orders,
- newsletter subscribers and all other data available in Magneto 1 to the new solution.
Data migration tool
An official tool from Magento, designed to minimize risks when moving to a new platform. At the moment, one of the best solutions to this problem. The tool is constantly evolving and adapting to the latest versions of both platforms.
Direct script migration
An alternative to the vendor’s solution is to export data from Magento 1 to CSV files and create scripts that will import them into the new store.
This solution is useful for migrating data that is not stored in Magento’s own database tables. It is much less efficient and time-consuming than the data migration tool and should be used as a last resort.
Tests
After completing the basic tasks, run the tests to verify that the data migration and functional deployment was successful. If the previously mentioned tests show errors, they should be corrected at this stage.
Launch of the store.
Finally, you should finally set up the server and the Magento instance itself and take care of the redirects so that you don’t lose your search engine rankings. The final step is to reconfigure the domains to point to the new store.