Difficulty upgrading website on Ventures template to Joomla 4

Hi,

I have just attempted to upgrade my client's website, built on the Ventures template, from Joomla 3 to 4. The website is in a staging folder here:  marysawyerot.com.au/j4/ . I updated or removed incompatible or outdated components. However I did not update the Joomla 3 template itself, before migrating to Joomla 4. Should I have?

Here are the first few stack items from the error screen:at /home/marysawy/public_html/j4/libraries/src/WebAsset/WebAssetRegistry.php:134
at Joomla\CMS\WebAsset\WebAssetRegistry->get()
(/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/libraries/src/WebAsset/WebAssetManager.php:263)
at Joomla\CMS\WebAsset\WebAssetManager->useAsset()
(/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/libraries/src/WebAsset/WebAssetManager.php:197)
at Joomla\CMS\WebAsset\WebAssetManager->__call()
(/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/templates/sparky_framework/error.php:58)
at require('/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/templates/sparky_framework/error.php')
(/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/libraries/src/Document/HtmlDocument.php:741)
at Joomla\CMS\Document\HtmlDocument->_loadTemplate()
(/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/libraries/src/Document/HtmlDocument.php:796)
at Joomla\CMS\Document\HtmlDocument->_fetchTemplate()
(/home/marysawy/public_html/j4/libraries/src/Document/HtmlDocument.php:613)Thanks,
Julia.

Small extra note: The Joomla update advice lists this as a "Potential Upgrade Issue":

System - Sparky On Save

I left it active in place ... Should I have deactivated it?

Thanks again,
Julia.

Hello,

The upgrade procedure is explained here: docs.joomla.org/Joomla_3.x_to_4.x_Step_by_Step_Migration

Our templates, modules, or plugins will not break the migration process. So, even if you see any of our extensions marked as "Not compatible" on the Extensions Pre-update Check section, please ignore this warning. However, other extensions installed on your website may break it (check this with the extensions developers).

When your website is upgraded to Joomla 4 and all content is migrated, you should download the Joomla 4 version of the template from our website (you will need an active subscription) and install it. You can use the standard template installation as explained here www.hotjoomlatemplates.com/template-inst...on-without-demo-data

There are extensions, especially plugins, that can block the upgrade process. None of our extensions will block the process, but if you have extensions from other providers, it's possible that you would need to uninstall some of them before upgrading.

Once the upgrade process from Joomla 3 to 4 is blocked (with errors displayed), you will need to delete this website and database and start from the beginning.

Best regards,

Milos Stankovic
HotThemes

Hi Milos,

Thanks for the detailed reply. I have now re-started from scratch - good advice. I kept the Joomla 3 Ventures template in place while I did the migration. The J4 site frontend displayed with a 500 server error again while the backend worked fine. I switched the default template to Cassiopeia (website then displayed), deleted the Ventures template, installed the J4 version of Ventures and switched the default template back to Ventures. It is now displaying nicely on the frontend. Hooray!

Thanks for getting back to me so fast.

Kind regards,
Julia.