Upgrading Python 3

This guide describes how to upgrade an existing Alliance Auth (AA) installation to a newer Python 3 version.

Hint

In accordance with the installation guide we will assume you perform all actions as root. If you are not running as root you need to add sudo to some commands.

Note

This guide will upgrade the software components only but not change any data or configuration.

Install a new Python version

To run AA with a newer Python 3 version than your system’s default you need to install it first. Technically it would be possible to upgrade your system’s default Python 3, but since many of your system’s tools have been tested to work with that specific version we would not recommend it. Instead we recommend to install an additional Python 3 version alongside your default version and use that for AA.

Note

For stability and performance we currently recommend to run AA with Python 3.7. It has proven to be the fastest and most stable version in use currently.

To install other Python versions than those included with your distribution, you need to add a new installation repository. Then you can install the specific Python 3 to your system.

Ubuntu 1604 1804:

Note

Ubuntu 2004 ships with Python 3.8, No updates required.

add-apt-repository ppa:deadsnakes/ppa

apt-get update

apt-get install python3.7 python3.7-dev python3.7-venv

CentOS 7/8:

cd ~

sudo yum install gcc openssl-devel bzip2-devel libffi-devel wget

wget https://www.python.org/ftp/python/3.7.11/Python-3.7.11.tgz

tar xvf Python-3.7.11.tgz

cd Python-3.7.11/

./configure --enable-optimizations --enable-shared

make altinstall

Preparing your venv

Before updating your venv it is important to make sure that your current installation is stable. Otherwise your new venv might not be consistent with your data, which might create problems.

Start by navigating to your main project folder (the one that has manage.py in it). If you followed the default installation the path is: /home/allianceserver/myauth

Activate your venv:

source /home/allianceserver/venv/auth/bin/activate

Upgrade AA

Make sure to upgrade AA to the newest version:

pip install -U allianceauth

Run migrations and collectstatic.

python manage.py migrate

python manage.py collectstatic

Restart your AA supervisor:

supervisorctl restart myauth:

Upgrade your apps

You also need to upgrade all additional apps to their newest version that you have installed. And you need to make sure that you can reinstall all your apps later, e.g. you know from which repo they came. We recommend to make a list of all your apps, so you can just go through them later when you rebuild your venv.

If you unsure which apps you have installed from repos check INSTALLED_APPS in your settings. Alternatively run this command to get a list all apps in your venv.

pip list

python manage.py migrate

Make sure to run migrations and collect static files for all upgraded apps.

Restart and final check

Do a final restart of your AA supervisors and make sure your installation is still running normally.

For a final check that they are no issues - e.g. any outstanding migrations - run this command:

python manage.py check

If you get the following result you are good to go. Otherwise make sure to fix any issues first before proceeding.

System check identified no issues (0 silenced).

Backup current venv

Make sure you are in your venv!

First we create a list of all installed packages in your venv. You can use this list later as reference to see what packages should be installed.

pip freeze > requirements.txt

At this point we recommend creating a list of the additional packages that you need to manually reinstall later on top of AA:

  • Community AA apps (e.g. aa-structures)

  • Additional tools you are using (e.g. flower, django-extensions)

Hint

While requirements.txt will contain a complete list of your packages, it will also contain many packages that are automatically installed as dependencies and don’t need be manually reinstalled.

Note

Some guide on the Internet will suggest to use use the requirements.txt file to recreate a venv. This is indeed possible, but only works if all packages can be installed from PyPI. Since most community apps are installed directly from repos this guide will not follow that approach.

Leave the venv and shutdown all AA services:

deactivate

supervisorctl stop myauth:

Rename and keep your old venv so we have a fallback in case of some unforeseeable issues:

mv /home/allianceserver/venv/auth /home/allianceserver/venv/auth_old

Create your new venv

Now let’s create our new venv with Python 3.7 and activate it:

python3.7 -m venv /home/allianceserver/venv/auth

source /home/allianceserver/venv/auth/bin/activate

Reinstall packages

Now we need to reinstall all packages into your new venv.

Install basic packages

pip install --upgrade pip

pip install --upgrade setuptools

pip install wheel

Installing AA & Gunicorn

pip install allianceauth

pip install gunicorn

Install all other packages

Last, but not least you need to reinstall all other packages, e.g. for AA community apps or additional tools.

Use the list of packages you created earlier as a checklist. Alternatively you use the requirements.txt file we created earlier to see what you need. During the installation process you can run pip list to see what you already got installed.

To check whether you are missing any apps you can also run the check command:

python manage.py check

Note: In case you forget to install an app you will get this error

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'xyz'

Note that you should not need to run any migrations unless you forgot to upgrade one of your existing apps or you got the newer version of an app through a dependency. In that case you just migrations normally.

Restart

After you have completed installing all packages just start your AA supervisor again.

supervisorctl start myauth:

We recommend to keep your old venv copy for a couple of days so you have a fallback just in case. After that you should be fine to remove it.

Fallback

In case you run into any major issue you can always switch back to your initial venv.

Before you start double-check that you still have your old venv for auth:

ls /home/allianceserver/venv/auth /home/allianceserver/venv

If the output shows these two folders you should be safe to proceed:

  • auth

  • auth_old

Run these commands to remove your current venv and switch back to the old venv for auth:

supervisorctl stop myauth:

rm -rf /home/allianceserver/venv/auth

mv /home/allianceserver/venv/auth_old /home/allianceserver/venv/auth

supervisorctl start myauth: