If you had made a backup of your database and it is possible to restart the process, I would advise you to go another way, but here you will have to move to 1.5 than to 1.6 than to 1.7:
First, you have to get SSH access from your hosting provider and connect to your server via SSH protocol.
Then,
1 – Change permissions on lib/pear folder to writable (recursively):
chmod -R 777 lib/PEAR
2 – Execute this command to prepare Magento for upgrade:
./pear mage-setup
Most likely you will see this result after command execution:
Channel “connect.magentocommerce.com/core” is already initialized
Upgrade from Magento 1.4.1.x to Magento 1.4.2.0
This step is necessary even if you upgrade your Magento store to 1.5 or 1.6 versions.
3 – Execute Magento upgrade command:
./pear upgrade -f magento-core/Mage_All_Latest-stable
Output of the command will show you what core packages were upgraded:
upgrade ok: channel://connect.magentocommerce.com/core/Interface_Adminhtml_Default-1.4.2.0
4 – When this part of the upgrade will be complete, enter these commands:
chmod 550 ./mage
./mage mage-setup .
You will see this result after command execution:
Successfully added: connect20.magentocommerce.com/community
It means that Magento connect 2.0 channel was added to the channels list successfully.
5 – Next, enter this command:
./mage sync
Here you should see::
…
Successfully added: community/Mage_Locale_en_US-1.4.2.0
Successfully added: community/Interface_Install_Default-1.4.2.0
Successfully added: community/Phoenix_Moneybookers-1.2.3
Successfully added: community/Mage_Downloader-1.5.0.0
Successfully added: community/Lib_Google_Checkout-1.4.2.0
Upgrade to Magento 1.4.2.0 is complete and now you can proceed with upgrade to Magento 1.5.1.0 or 1.6.0.0.
Before proceeding with this part of Magento upgrade, it is very important to see to what version Magento upgrade scripts will upgrade your store. Enter this command to check this:
./mage list-upgrades
If you will see this result:
Updates for community:
Mage_All_Latest: 1.4.2.1 => 1.6.0.0
Lib_Js_Mage: 1.4.2.0 => 1.6.0.0
Lib_Varien: 1.4.2.0 => 1.6.0.0
Lib_Phpseclib: 1.4.2.0 => 1.5.0.0
It means that your Magento will be upgraded to version 1.6.0.0. If it is not what you need you can change upgrade channel to “stable” and upgrade your Magento to version 1.5.1.0.
6 – Enter this command to change the upgrade channel to stable:
./mage config-set preferred_state stable
After this the “./mage list-upgrades” command will show you this result:
Updates for community:
Mage_All_Latest: 1.4.2.1 => 1.5.1.0.1
Lib_Js_Mage: 1.4.2.0 => 1.5.1.0
Lib_Varien: 1.4.2.0 => 1.5.1.0
Lib_Phpseclib: 1.4.2.0 => 1.5.0.0
Mage_Core_Adminhtml: 1.4.2.0 => 1.5.1.0
Mage_Core_Modules: 1.4.2.0 => 1.5.1.0
7 – After channel selection you can upgrade your Magento to 1.5.1.0 (or to Magento 1.6.0.0) using this command:
./mage upgrade-all –force
You will see upgraded packages on your screen:
…
Package upgraded: community/Mage_Locale_en_US 1.6.0.0
Package upgraded: community/Lib_Mage 1.6.0.0
Package upgraded: community/Lib_ZF 1.11.1.0
Package upgraded: community/Lib_Js_Prototype 1.7.0.0.1
Package upgraded: community/Lib_ZF_Locale 1.11.1.0
Now the upgrade is complete. If everything was upgraded correctly, you will see upgraded store in your browser.
In the admin panel, you can check the version of your store.
If you had made a brand new installation of Magento version, and you won’t do manual data transfer, since it would take days or even weeks. What you can do to move your database directly from 1.4 to the new Magento 1.7 you can use automated service.