Updating to a new version

Upload the new theme and plugins, let WordPress replace them, and know what has to survive.

What has to survive

A theme or plugin update replaces program files and nothing else. These are yours, and the update never touches them — but they are exactly what a backup is for:

What	Holds	If you lose it
Your database	Settings, restaurants, menus, orders, customers — everything you entered.	Everything.
wp-content/uploads	Every image anybody has ever uploaded.	Every dish photograph, logo and cover, gone.
Your child theme	Any code or style changes you made.	Your customisations.

The procedure

The new download holds the same three pieces as the first one: the theme, the two Sigma plugins and the page builder. Update all of them together. A new theme expects the plugins from the same release.

1. Back up the database and wp-content. Your host's backup tool or a backup plugin both do. Not optional, and not worth skipping on the grounds that it is a small update.
2. Turn maintenance mode on, so nobody orders halfway through — see Maintenance mode & backups.
3. Update the theme. Appearance → Themes → Add New Theme → Upload Theme, choose the new quickmunch.zip from Theme Files, and press Install Now. WordPress sees the theme is already installed and offers Replace active with uploaded — press it.
4. Update the bundled plugins. Plugins → Add New Plugin → Upload Plugin, choose sigma-core.zip from the download's Plugins folder, and press Replace current with uploaded. Repeat for sigma-restaurant.zip and js_composer.zip.
5. Update everything else the normal way, under Dashboard → Updates — WooCommerce, Redux and the other plugins from the WordPress directory.
6. Open any wp-admin screen once. Whatever the new release needs set up happens then, on its own — see below.
7. Turn maintenance mode off and check the storefront, a dashboard, and one order.

Database changes happen on their own

There is no upgrade command and no upgrade screen. Each part of Sigma Restaurant records the version it last set up. The first time an administrator opens wp-admin after an update, any part whose version changed runs its setup again — roles, dashboard addresses and the settings the release needs — and records the new version. It is written to be safe to repeat, so an interrupted visit is simply finished by the next one.

WooCommerce keeps its own schedule for this. If it shows a database update required notice after you update it, run it from the notice.

What survives and what does not

Survives	Does not
Everything set in wp-admin, in Theme Options and in the dashboards — settings, branding, page wording, menus, plans.	Edits made directly to files inside the quickmunch theme or the Sigma plugins.
All your content and orders, and every uploaded image.	Translations saved inside the theme's own languages folder.
Your child theme, and translations kept in wp-content/languages.	Anything you added inside a folder the release replaces.

If you need to change code, do it in the child theme shipped in Theme Files/Child Theme. That is the one place an update can never overwrite.

Afterwards

• Open WooCommerce → Status and look at the Templates section. Quickmunch restyles WooCommerce's pages with its own template copies; after a WooCommerce update this section is where an out-of-date copy would be flagged.
• Look at your payment gateways and confirm webhooks are still arriving.
• Place one test order end to end. It exercises more of the product than any amount of reading does.

When it doesn't work

"There has been a critical error" straight after updating

The theme and the Sigma plugins are from different releases. Upload all three from the same download. If the error hides wp-admin too, rename the plugin's folder under wp-content/plugins by FTP to switch it off, then upload the matching version.

"The package could not be installed"

The file you uploaded is the whole download rather than the theme or the plugin inside it. Unzip the download first, then upload quickmunch.zip or the plugin's own zip.

A dashboard address shows "page not found"

Open Settings → Permalinks and press Save Changes without changing anything. That rebuilds WordPress's address rules, dashboards included.

A customisation disappeared

It was in a file the release replaced. Reapply it — in the child theme this time.