1. Upgrading to 2.5.3 doesn't require the uninstallation of an old version.
2. Portal config will be lost because 2.5.3 has a much different take on the portal. So you have to reconfigure portal other than anything else after the upgrade.
3. In general, a new release would be securer because some bug fixes and optimization. You may consider to upgrade if you need more portal features and a more stable system.

Notes from the TP-Link website
1. Please upgrade your EAP to the latest firmware with a note "If you want to use new features of EAP Controller 2.5.3 or above, please upgrade your EAP to this Firmware".
2. Once upgraded to this version of EAP Controller, you will NOT able to downgrade to an earlier version.
3. Portal configuration will be lost after upgraded to Controller 2.5.X from 2.4.X or earlier version.
4. Supporting 64-bit Linux operating system, including Ubuntu 14.04/16.04/17.04, CentOS 6.x/7.x and Fedora 20 or above.
5. Require JRE 1.7 Java environment.

R1D2 wrote

Next version will fix some known problems of v2.5.3. Are you running the Controller in a private LAN or over the Internet?

Thanks for you help. I'm running this in a private LAN. Just trying to decide if it is worth it to upgrade. Sounds like it should be pretty straight forward. I have a lot of other things I maintain in my free time, so when something is stable I try to pick the right time to upgrade. But if it is low risk and easy and not expected to take much time then I'll do it to stay current.

Well, I went ahead and upgraded. Was a little worried because I had to start the controller three times before it was fully successful. First time (automatic after install) failed. Second time said it was successful, but I couldn't connect to the management interface. Third time was the charm. Reconfiguring portal was easy. Miss my terms of service, which I assume was an oversight and will be back in a future release (And I have to go find what I had there - forgot to save that! - I'm sure it's in a document somewhere Or I'll re-write.


I thought I already posted this - but to answer your question, R1D2, this controller is run on a private LAN.

One other strange thing... My maps are gone. And not just the maps. The whole tabbed interface is blank - so I have no way to add a map. I click on the map tab and I get a nothing but the settings control underneath the main nav. Everything in between is blank...

I didn't clear the browser cache, but I did try different browsers that I hadn't used to access it before - same issue.

I created a backup in the uninstall process. I have a eap.db.tar.gz, but not an eap.map.tar.gz file in that directory. no images in the .../data/map/directory
The map functionality simply doesn't seem to exist. I'm tempted to reinstall. The tab just gives me a blank page - no controls or anything - on all browsers I tried. i wouldn't mind re adding the maps, but I have no way to do so via the interface...

What is normally in the map tar ball? Maybe I can recreate it manually and see if I can get the functionality back...

R1D2 wrote

The map TAR archive just contains the map files from directory EAPC_HOME/data/map, see the code in uninstall.sh:

[CODE] #backup map，solve Bug 189651
tar zcvf $MAP_FILE_NAME map
cp -f $MAP_FILE_NAME $BACKUP_FOLDER/
[/CODE]

But as I wrote: it's much better to just rename the old installation instead of overwriting the files, that's as easy as manually executing a single mv command and it will become a non-destructive update. I always save old versions of the complete EAPController directory when installing new versions.

I would suggest to re-install the EAP Controller and test it before installing the DB backup. Do the missing tabs appear then?

Yeah, I was curious what exactly the map files are in tar ball - beyond the user supplied images. If it is a config file or files I could possibly reconstruct. Binary files, not so much.
Since I have backups of the configurations and recreating the maps is easy, I didn't see the need to back up the entire directory. However, I shouldn't need to have a backup to just to maintain the functionality of recreating the maps. I plan on reinstalling when I have another good window to reinstall. It is only the Map tab that isn't present that displays a blank page. The other tabs have all the previous functionality. The maps I had in there were just a nice to have, so not really a priority for me. I might just wait until another version comes out.

Does a new installation normally have anything in the EAPC_HOME/data/map folder? Looking at the controller tar ball and the install.sh file I don't think so. If a new installation typically is blank, as mine is, there was problably a problem somewhere else in the install.