this post was submitted on 11 Mar 2025
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47
[Resolved] How to update Immich now that I am way behind? (lemm.ee)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by [email protected] to c/selfhosted
19 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

I have Immich Server Version: v1.115.0. They're up to v1.129.0. I am guessing there have been lots of breaking changes in that range, since that was true the last time I updated.

Is there a safe way now to update without making me read all the release notes and carefully craft my docker compose file in multiple steps to make sure I don't lose anything in the process of getting caught up?

Thanks for any tips.

ETA: Or just, how do you handle your Immich (in Docker) updates in general?

2ND EDIT: I did read the release notes. After a lot of reading, there was 1 change (updating their internal Port # for the main service to 2283) It's done. Thanks y'all. My cats appreciate you all.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Yum-cron is the way.

Maybe immich will see the way.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago

Yum-cron

Hmmm, I've heard some people use watchtower too.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 hours ago

Good opportunity to test your backups.

Restore to a new directory, update that and see what happens. If it works do it to the original.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'd take a backup, first, and then just send it. Then, if that doesn't work out, do it the hard and slow way.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Haha this was my first thought too.

Immich is very clear: "⚠️ Do not use the app as the only way to store your photos and videos."

In that case, you have your content elsewhere. Make a backup of relevant volumes and a database dump (for your albums and such) and then try updating. Roll back if it doesn't work. If if you don't have much in the way of Immich meta data, and the upgrade didn't work, then you could just start from scratch and re-import your content.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That first part is why I still maintain my Google Photos account. I have most of it on Immich at this point, but given that's still in active development, I like having options.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 23 hours ago

I treat Immich like a frontend. I have photos in Nextcloud, plus local and remote backup (1 2 3 style). Then Immich is set to absorb the photos from Nextcloud, and the photos are exposed read-only to Immich so it can't damage anything.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 13 hours ago

Lol, i was going to post the same question one of these days. I too am almost on the same version and I was hoping some kind soul would help me out.

On top of it I'm not very well versed with docker backups so I'm doubly scared. What I am going to do is to take a mirror image of my whole OS drive in my zfs mount that I use as backup, give a release notes a glance and go YOLO based on what I can make out.

Your post gives me a lot of hope. Thank you!

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I neglected to update for like seven "major" versions recently. I took the safe-ish route to just read every release note as I go and install the last minor version of each major version release, then start, quick check, stop, next one. It turned out fine.

edit: Backup, backup, backup. Then you can't fail.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 day ago

I just had to do this. Don’t skip the release notes. They’re really good at highlighting potential pitfalls, just scroll back through and look for the heading “Breaking Changes.”

In my case there were a few, but they were only for API calls I’m not using, so I just did the update in one go and it worked out great. (Of course, I made sure to take a backup first.)

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I yoloed from a year old version up to the latest, it was fine.

[–] non_burglar 5 points 23 hours ago

Love that for you.

However, that is not everyone's experience and doesn't really answer op's question.

[–] AustralianSimon 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You're going to have to read every single release with breaking changes.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That's one of the reasons I favour Semantic Versioning...

[–] [email protected] 5 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Don't trust Semantic Versioning claims, devs can and so screw it up. That said, if they claim to follow semver, it'll probably work, but I've had patch versions break my code before.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

That's true, but it applies to any versioning system. If they're not following semver and just mentioning breaking changes in their changelog, we'll inevitably run into situations where developers make mistakes.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 hours ago

Yup. As always, do backups for anything important. Semver is certainly helpful in communicating scope of changes.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 21 hours ago

Make backup do yolo. So far backup has not been nessasary.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

I just update. If it breaks, I read the notes. Probably the wrong way but it worked. And I use it for a long time. To me, it was never that unstable. And since a couple of months it's very stable. Backup first.