Upgrade Your Website's PHP

The ITS Web Hosting team provides support for PHP 8.1 and PHP 7.3. The PHP 8 upgrade is now available and is recommended sooner rather than later.

ITS Web Hosting will discontinue support for PHP 5.6 on June 30, 2023 and websites that are using it will need to be updated to a newer version of PHP.

The ITS Web Hosting team recommends that websites be at a minimum of PHP 7.3 and the latest version of the CMS (Content Management System, such as WordPress or Drupal) before migrating off of HTTP or Cosign.

Note: While ITS maintains the infrastructure of websites, it is the responsibility of the website owner to make updates to their site.

What if my website gets taken offline?
Removed websites can be restored once they are upgraded. However, the process could take an extended period of time depending on the number of web pages requiring changes.

What You Need To Do

Step 1: PHP Upgrade Request

Notify the ITS Web Hosting Upgrade project that you will be upgrading your website by filling out the ITS WebHosting Upgrade Form which will create a TeamDynamix (TDX) ticket. Indicate if you would like to upgrade to PHP 7.x or PHP 8.x. The TDX ticket will be used to communicate back and forth with you during the entire upgrade process.

Step 2: Update Your Hosts Files

The ITS Web Hosting team will set up access for you to test and upgrade your website on a new version of PHP. They will provide a temporary computer hosts file entry to point at the new PHP web server. Refer to Modify your hosts file if you need help on how to update your hosts file for your specific computer OS.

Step 3: Test and Fix, If Needed

Test the websites on the new PHP web server and fix any problems.

If you encounter a problem with your website that you don’t know how to solve, respond back to the TDX ticket and the ITS Web Hosting team will respond back with advice.

Note: Changes made to your website will also affect the live (production) website. If changes are made that are incompatible with the older PHP, respond back to the original TDX ticket to request an independent copy of your website on the PHP 7 or 8 web servers. In this case, ensure that any content updates made to the PHP website are also made to the copy of the website on the PHP 7 or 8 web server.

Step 4: Go Live!

Make your websites live on the PHP 7 or 8 web servers.

  1. Undo the change to your computer’s hosts file that you made in Step 2.
  2. Respond back to the TDX ticket to let the ITS Web Hosting team know you have tested your website and you are ready to switch to the newer PHP web server.
  3. The ITS Web Hosting team will respond back via the ticket that the website had been moved to the new PHP version and the website owner should test their site to confirm everything is working properly on the new PHP server.
  4. Respond back to the TDX Ticket to let the ITS Web Hosting team know that the website is working properly on the new PHP server.
  5. ITS Web Hosting will remove the older version of PHP for your website and close out the TDX ticket.