Simple WordPress Update Script



I need to update this wordpress install every once in a while. There are lots of bash scripts on the internet that perform this task, and they are complicated beyond reason. This is what I use:
function cfg {  
    grep $2 $1/wp-config.php | awk 'BEGIN {FS="[, )\x27]*"}; {print $3;}'
}

echo "> backing up database."
mysqldump --user=$(cfg $1 DB_USER) \
          --password=$(cfg $1 DB_PASSWORD)  \
          --host=$(cfg $1 DB_HOST)          \
          $(cfg $1 DB_NAME) > backup.database.sql

echo "> backing up website."
tar -cjf backup.files.bz2 $1
    
echo "> retrieving latest wordpress."
wget -q https://wordpress.org/latest.zip
unzip -qq latest.zip

echo "> updating wordpress."
rm -r $1/wp-includes $1/wp-admin
cp -r wordpress/* $1/

echo "> cleaning up."
rm -r wordpress
rm latest.zip
It takes a single argument, which is the name of your wordpress root directory. It backups your database to the file backup.database.sql and backups the files to backup.files.bz2, then it simply proceeds as described in the wordpress codex for updating manual. I do not see what all the fuzz is about.

2 Replies to “Simple WordPress Update Script”

  1. There is a command line interface for Wordpress which comes in handy for updating, especially because plugins and themes can be updated with it as well. After the backups, the script can be as simple as:
    wp core update
    wp core update-db
    wp plugin update --all
    wp theme update --all
    
    provided wp executes the wp-cli.phar and you are in the wordpress directory.

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