A sixteen-year-old phpBB 2 board brought up to the current version

A bulletin board that had been running phpBB 2.0.11 since around 2005, moved onto the current phpBB 3 release with its posts and user base intact.

The objective

The board had been on phpBB 2.0.11 for sixteen years. There's no direct upgrade path from that version to a current one, and the modifications built into the old board were written against a codebase that doesn't exist anymore.

The client didn't need those modifications carried over. What mattered was the posts, the user accounts, and a board the members would still recognise.

What I did

I converted the 2.0.11 database through phpBB's conversion process to phpBB 3, then upgraded from there up to the current release.

I left the old modifications behind, as we'd agreed, rather than rebuilding code written for phpBB 2.

And I built the new board's styling to stay close to the old design.

The result

Sixteen years of posts and accounts moved onto a supported version. The client's own summary was that it went through without any problems.