b2evolution 7.2.5 — PHP 8.x porting bench

A disposable Docker bench to run b2evolution 7.2.5 on PHP 8.2 → 8.5 with your own site data (database dump, media, skins, plugins), so that compatibility fixes can be made as clean, reviewable commits against the upstream tag and tested against real content.

The patch series produced with this bench lives in https://github.com/DrYoEU/b2evolution, branch php8-compat (one commit per family of fix, no reformatting).

docker-compose.yml   mariadb:10.11 + php:${PHP_VERSION}-apache (Dockerfile adds gd mysqli mbstring zip intl apcu exif)
.env                 PHP_VERSION=8.5  BENCH_PORT=8090      (copy .env.example)
php/zz-bench.ini     error_reporting=E_ALL, log to log/php-error.log, display_errors Off, opcache Off
conf/_config_TEST.php     db credentials + $baseurl/$assets_baseurl in http:// (included BEFORE _advanced.php)
conf/_overrides_TEST.php  $display_errors_on_production = false      (included AFTER _advanced.php)
bin/setup.sh         builds src/ from the checkout + overlay/, writes .git/info/exclude; --db applies bin/db-settings.sql
src/                 git checkout of b2evolution — the tree you patch; `git -C src log` is the series
overlay/             your site: conf/_basic_config.php, media/, extra skins/ and plugins/ (never committed)
db/                  *.sql.gz dump(s), loaded by mariadb on first start of the db container
log/                 php-error.log (+ overlay-diff-*.txt written by setup.sh)

git clone --branch 7.2.5 https://github.com/b2evolution/b2evolution.git src
cp .env.example .env
# copy your site's conf/_basic_config.php, media/, skins/, plugins/ under overlay/
# put a mysqldump of your site under db/  (gzip -9 ... > db/site.sql.gz)
bin/setup.sh
docker compose up -d --build
bin/setup.sh --db               # require_ssl=0, http_protocol=allow_both on every collection
tail -f log/php-error.log

Open http://<host-ip>:8090/. Log into the back-office with your production credentials.

• HTTPS redirect loop (301 to https://). A production dump carries require_ssl=1 and http_protocol=always_https; $htsrv_url/$admin_url are derived from $baseurl in _advanced.php, before _overrides_TEST.php is read. Hence _config_TEST.php (early) for $baseurl, and bin/setup.sh --db for the two database settings. Run --db again after reloading a dump.
• Chrome remembers the 301. Once it has seen a redirect to https for <host-ip>:8090 it keeps applying it from cache even after the server is fixed. Use a private window, another browser, or clear site data for that origin. Firefox is not affected.
• "headers already sent". _advanced.php forces display_errors=On when $display_errors_on_production is true: one notice printed before a redirect and the page breaks. The bench sets it to false and reads the log instead.
• Permissions. _basic_config.php from production is usually 0600 root; Apache is uid 33 in the container. setup.sh does chmod a+r src/conf/*.php and chmod 777 log.
• php -l lints only the first file passed on the command line. Loop file by file: find src -name '*.php' | while read f; do php -l "$f" | grep -v '^No syntax'; done

tail -f log/php-error.log | grep -v libpng        # watch while you click through the site
grep -h 'PHP Deprecated' log/php-error.log | sed 's/.*PHP Deprecated:  //; s/ in \/var.*//' | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn
: > log/php-error.log                              # reset between two rounds (keep a copy first!)

Fix in src/, one git commit per family of deprecation (null to string functions, dynamic properties, optional-before-required parameters, ...), never mixed with reformatting. PHP_VERSION=8.3 docker compose up -d --build switches the PHP branch; docker compose down -v throws the database away, the next up reloads the dump (then run bin/setup.sh --db again).

The installer (/install/), XML-RPC clients, and whatever your own skins/plugins do — lint them with the loop above and watch the log while using them.