Best practices before installing a magento extension/plugin

Planning for adding any new feature to your Magento website… wait!!!! Here are some suggestion which we recommend before doing such activities.

1. Ideally, nothing new must be implemented on a live website before prior testing it on a staging setup.
2. Before proceeding on live website take backup of files (you can skip media files.)
3. Enable Magento logging. Follow below instructions to enable logging:
   -> Login to Magento back-end panel. Go to System > Configuration.
   -> On the bottom of 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 below steps to clear compiler data: [Note: Magento back-end do not provide any option to clear compiler data. You need shell access to perform below steps.]
   -> Login to shell and move into 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 “. 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 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.