title: Best practice to do online game server upgrade?
body: <p>Let's say I have an online game up and running, and its version 1.0.</p>
  
  <p>I keep developing on staging server and bring new features into the game. The staging server is a separate server from the live server. (I am sure most of the people do it this way)</p>
  
  <p>OK. I finish the new version 1.1. Now what is the best practise to do online game server upgrade?</p>
  
  <p>Let's assume it is a simple game server PHP+MYSQL. So there are new php scripts or changed scripts, and new mysql tables, columns or modified columns. I hope not to do it manually - Manually do the same changes one by one on the live server. That's ugly and easy to make mistake, and have to remember every single changes you did.</p>
  
  <p>Another way I can think of is make the staging server to be live, and import all existing database data over. I don't like it, seems mistake can happen any time.</p>
  
  <p>What is the best way you can recommend? </p>