During a GitHub Enterprise Server upgrade, which precaution is most important before beginning?
Select an answer to reveal the explanation.
Short Explanation and Infographic
Before any GHES upgrade, rule one is: back it up. Upgrades can fail. If something goes wrong mid-upgrade, a fresh backup-utils snapshot is your recovery lifeline. Don't skip this step.
Full explanation below image
Full Explanation
The most critical precaution before upgrading GitHub Enterprise Server is creating a complete backup using github/backup-utils. Upgrades involve database migrations and package updates that can fail, and without a pre-upgrade backup, recovery options are extremely limited. GitHub strongly recommends: (1) Running ghe-backup to create a full backup snapshot, (2) Verifying the backup completed successfully, (3) Keeping the backup accessible on a separate system from the GHES appliance. Additional best practices include: reading the release notes for the target version, upgrading from a maintenance window when user activity is low, testing the upgrade on a staging instance if possible. Disabling webhooks, requiring user commits, or disabling 2FA are not upgrade prerequisites.