Did I bork my backup transfer?

[Haltingpoint]

I'm in the process of transferring my development environment from my old Vista 32-bit machine to my new 64-bit machine and when I try to load a site that has a database component I'm getting "unexpected T_ELSE" parsing errors. Not all sites with databases are affected however. I have two different Wordpress installs and one has issues, the other doesn't.

The transfer process I followed was essentially:
1. Copy htdocs folder from old machine and paste into new machine
2. Export applicable databases from old machine to .sql file
3. Import applicable databases from old machine to new machine

Did I bork something with the export? When I check out the specific code errors they seem to be PHP issues which is even more confusing. The sites work perfectly on the old box and only have these issues on the new one...

I'd appreciate any help people can offer as I'm leaving town soon for several days and need to have this transfer complete because I need to send my old machine back to tell for good when I return. Happy to provide any additional information (not sure if its important what settings I used for the export or any of that).

[Nobbie]

I'm getting "unexpected T_ELSE" parsing errors.

No, that is only a very small fragment of the real error message.

You definately get a full message, as well as a full qualified path name of the php module, where the error occurs, as well as a precise information, on which line of that module this error occurs.

Is there anything easier than simply starting a text editor and looking into that file, moving the cursor to the specified line number, in order to look whats going wrong?

[Haltingpoint]

I understand that the full error message points to a specific line of a specific file. The problem is that NOTHING has changed with the file in question. I literally copied and pasted the file between machines and it works fine on the old machine and simply doesn't parse on the new one. It just doesn't make sense. And while I could try to go through and debug each error, I'd rather find the root cause which all signs point to having something to do with the actual transfer of files.

[Izzy]

Are both PCs using the same XAMPP versions?

More importantly are the MySQL versions the same or is the MySQL version on the PC that is giving you the errors a newer version?

If newer then you may have to run mysql_upgrade.exe in the \xampp\mysql\bin folder on the PC that is giving you the error, but first make sure that MySQL is running before running the upgrade exe file.

[Haltingpoint]

You know, I didn't think to check that. The new machine probably does have a newer version of XAMPP and/or MySQL. Do I need to do anything other than run the upgrade file? What exactly does it do to my databases?

[Izzy]

Do I need to do anything other than run the upgrade file?

Not usually but make sure that MySQL is up and running.

What exactly does it do to my databases?

It updates and repairs your database tables with any changes or anomalies that are different in the older version of MySQL to those in the newer version of MySQL that you imported your databases in to.

You have kept a backup of your exported database sql files in case things go pear shaped?

[Haltingpoint]

You have kept a backup of your exported database sql files in case things go pear shaped?

Sounds good. I did keep a backup and I'll still have access to my old machine over the next couple days in case I need to re-export it. Its bizarre though that the parsing errors seem to be for PHP code when I check the files...I wonder if it is indeed the MySQL stuff causing it.

[Izzy]

If you consider it to be a PHP script fault then Nobbie had some sound advise.

Also make sure that your script is compatible with the PHP version on your new XAMPP installation - check with the author of the script.

[Haltingpoint]

So oddly enough it must have been the versioning issue.

I didn't know if it would work but here's what I did to fix this...

Renamed my XAMPP directory on my new computer to XAMPP-a. Copy and pasted my XAMPP folder from my old machine directly to the new one. Started XAMPP and EVERYTHING works perfectly.

I was worried that I couldn't just copy the folder over since I thought it installed like a regular program and there might be registry keys and junk like that but apparently it worked!