This month we’ll dive into upgrading a PHP 7.1 application originally built with the Laravel framework version 5.6 with reckless abandon. The only way this kind of upgrade can succeed is with a robust suite of tests. Tests allow us to leap major versions of our framework and dependencies and even PHP versions in some cases. Without a strong test suite, we couldn’t possibly have the confidence to jump versions without thoroughly testing each change manually. If you’d like to jump versions for your projects, ensure you start by writing as many tests as it takes to provide confidence in major structural changes. by Joe Ferguson