Backward Compatibility

When upgrading OrientDB to a more recent version, you should always follow the migration instructions (see upgrade guide ).

This said, in OrientDB development process we always try to support binary compatibility between two subsequent minor releases.

For example, lets suppose that we have following releases 1.5, 1.5.1, 1.6.1, 1.6.2, 1.7, 1.7.1 then binary compatibility at least between 1.6.1, 1.6.2, 1.7, 1.7.1 releases will be supported.

If we have releases 1.5, 1.5.1, 1.6.1, 1.6.2, 1.7, 1.7.1, 2.0 then binary compatibility will be supported at least between releases 1.7, 1.7.1, 2.0.

Binary compatibility feature is implemented using following algorithm:

1. When storage is opened, version of binary format which is used when storage is created is read from storage configuration.
2. Factory of objects are used to present disk based data structures for current binary format is created.

Only features and database components which existed at the moment when current binary format was latest one will be used. It means that you cannot use all database features available in latest release if you use storage which was created using old binary format version. It also means that bugs which are fixed in new versions may be (but may be not) reproducible on storage created using old binary format.

To update binary format storage to latest one you should export database in JSON format and import it back. Using either console commands export database and import database or Java API look at com.orientechnologies.orient.core.db.tool.ODatabaseImport, com.orientechnologies.orient.core.db.tool.ODatabaseExport classes and com.orientechnologies.orient.test.database.auto.DbImportExportTest test.

• Current binary format version can be read from com.orientechnologies.orient.core.db.record.OCurrentStorageComponentsFactory#binaryFormatVersion proporty.
• Instance of OCurrentStorageComponentsFactory class can be retrieved by call of com.orientechnologies.orient.core.storage.OStorage#getComponentsFactory method.
• Latest binary format version can be read from here com.orientechnologies.orient.core.config.OStorageConfiguration#CURRENT_BINARY_FORMAT_VERSION.

Please note that binary compatibility is supported since 1.7-rc2 version for plocal storage (as exception you can read database created in 1.5.1 version by 1.7-rc2 version).

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