How to update bundled Revolition Slider impeding PHP code update to 7.4

[BreakMaker]

Hi there,

our escape room is running this website built with the X Theme and Revolution slider bundled with it.
https://www.make-a-break.de/

Our site is still using an old PHP version, and we are getting security alerts from Wordpress that we should update to 7.4 (recommended).
Now before updating PHP we ran a compatibility check to make sure that all plugins will tolerate PHP 7.4. And the finding was that Revolition Slider would drop errors. Revolution slider told us they cant help unless we upgrade to their premium pland and told us to turn to you.
Have you developed instructions on how to update revolution slider so PHP can be updated to 7.4?
Thanks a lot!

[marc_a]

Hi Zoltan,

Thanks for reaching out.

I couldn’t replicate your issue on my staging install. My staging environment is running PHP 7.4 and Revolution Slider 6.2.23 and I don’t see any error. Can you tell us what’s the error you get when you update your PHP to 7.4?

Hope that helps and let us know how it goes.

Thank you.

[BreakMaker]

Hi Marc,
Thanks for your message.

Just to clarify: We have not made the update to PHP 7.4 yet, but have used the PHP Compatibility Checker as a precautionairy step to anticipate if any plugins would be incompatible after updating to 7.4. This is the result of the log after completing the scan:

Name: Revolution Slider

FILE: /home/makeabreak/webapps/make_a_break/wp-content/plugins/revslider/inc_php/framework/db.class.php

FOUND 1 ERROR AFFECTING 1 LINE

29 | ERROR | Extension ‘mysql_’ is deprecated since PHP 5.5 and removed since PHP 7.0; Use mysqli instead

FILE: /home/makeabreak/webapps/make_a_break/wp-content/plugins/revslider/inc_php/framework/functions_wordpress.class.php

FOUND 0 ERRORS AND 1 WARNING AFFECTING 1 LINE

240 | WARNING | Function create_function() is deprecated since PHP 7.2; Use an anonymous function instead

FILE: /home/makeabreak/webapps/make_a_break/wp-content/plugins/revslider/inc_php/revslider_operations.class.php

FOUND 1 ERROR AFFECTING 1 LINE

42 | ERROR | “$this” can no longer be used in a plain function or method since PHP 7.1.

FILE: /home/makeabreak/webapps/make_a_break/wp-content/plugins/revslider/inc_php/revslider_slider.class.php

FOUND 1 ERROR AFFECTING 1 LINE

825 | ERROR | preg_replace() - /e modifier is deprecated since PHP 5.5 and removed since PHP 7.0

To sum up, the results complain that some functions or code that is used by the Revolution slider would be deprecated in the 7.4. environment, causing errors.

Now , having said that, I wonder why we cannot update the Revolution Slider plugin to go beyond 4.6.? To us it shows that no update is available! How did you update Revolution Slider to 6.2.23?

See a screenshot of our plugin list.

[prakash_s]

Hello

It would be best if you could copy your live site to a staging server where you can update your PHP version to 7.4 and MySQL version 5.6. You can check our version compatibility page for more information https://theme.co/docs/version-compatibility

Please make sure your theme and extension plugins are updated as per our version compatibility recommendation.

Now to update the Revolution Slider you can go to your Dashboard(WP-ADMIN)–>Plugins–>Click on Update.

In case if it is not working you can Go to Plugin–>Deactivate and delete the plugins and Install it again from X/Pro—>Validation

Install

Hope It Helps
Thanks

[BreakMaker]

Hello,

thanks. If I delete the Revolution Slider to reinstall, will we lose all Revolution Slider content (like our banner video)?

[prakash_s]

Hello @BreakMaker

No, the slider will not be deleted since the slider is been saved in the WP Database and the Revolution Slider table is not going to be deleted if the plugin is deleted.

For the safe side, I would recommend you take a backup of your slider from the Revolution slider
Please have a look at the screenshot given below.

Thanks