Best practices before installing a magento extension/plugin

Planning for adding any new feature to your Magento website… wait!!!! Here are some suggestions which we recommend before installing a magento extension/plugin.

1. Ideally, nothing new must be implemented on a live website before prior to testing it on a staging setup.
2. Before proceeding on the live website, take the backup of files (you can skip media files.)
3. Enable Magento logging. Follow the below instructions to enable logging:
   -> Login to Magento back-end panel. Go to System > Configuration.
   -> On the bottom of the left pane go to ADVANCED > Developer > Log Settings. Set Enable to “yes”.
4. Enable web server level logging by defining an error_log file.
5. Disable and Clear Magento compiler. You can follow the below steps to clear compiler data: [Note: Magento back-end does not provide an option to clear compiler data. You need shell access to perform the below steps.]
   -> Login to shell and move into the Magento data directory.
   -> Go into directory ” shell “.
   -> Run this command to clear compiler data: ” PHP compiler.php clear “
   -> Run this command to disable compilation: ” PHP compiler.php disable “
   -> Test state of the compiler using this command: ” PHP compiler.php state “. The result must be like >
   ->Compiler Status: Disabled
   ->Compilation State: Not Compiled
   -> Collected Files Count: 0
   -> Compiled Scopes Count: 0
6. Clear and Disable all types of caches from Magento backend (System > Cache Management). [This is temporary, re-enable cache types after installation & testing of extension.]
7. Take care that whatever extension or plugin you are going to install it must be from a trusted source. Because installing these from an unknown or unauthorized source may include a backdoor for hackers to gain access to crucial information related to your business.