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The next Laravel release is 5.5 which arrives this July. Now let's say I make a policy where I'll upgrade my web app every year in July/August to the latest version.
During that year of running the web app what should I do to keep it up to date with security fixes and bug fixes?
For example let's say I deploy on version 5.5.2 and by December there's a 5.5.8 what's the best way to keep the minor changes stay up to date without jeopardising the web apps availability?
I asusume you would need something to run commands like composer update Every so often etc. But what would the exact commands be and can they be run using Laravels scheduled so it is cross platform - if so, how?
Thanks!
I suppose it would greatly depend on if your app is only run on your server (laracasts for example) and everybody else accesses it there, or whether it's something like wordpress where people download it, install it and run it on their own server.
Download and install on their own servers.
So I guess what I'm asking is: is it safe to run a composer update automatically every day through a cron?
Considering the composer.json would say 5.4.* that would mean the app would stay up to date with security and bug fixes right?
Have minor changes that would be a part of a 5.4.* release ever broken things (will it always be backward compatible)?
You should probably stick with a LTS ( Long Term Service ) version as they will never introduce any breaking changes
It's always tricky to update your website.
I would suggest having a staging server which you update first, test it out and if theres no breaking changes you update your production server :)
So when 5.5 is released having a cron that runs composer update will keep the app up to date with security and bug fixes until LTS runs out?
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