[TYPO3-english] Upgrade strategy

[David ARNOULT - Edition & Internet Operations]

Hello guys,

I run a big web site on 4.3.11 that works fine so far and some extensions
update start requiring 4.4.0 minimum (realurl for instance). I know 4.3 is
deprecated (but it works as it is!) and I wonder what is best strategy to
upgrade and avoid breaking everything. I feel that core requirement for
extension is not always clearly specified and I don't know how to deal with.

In general, is it better to update core before updating extensions (4.4 or
4.5?), or can I safely assume that all extensions are supposed to work in
any latest 4.*? Can I update directly from 4.3 to 4.5?

Today, are all main extensions (tt_news, realurl, etc) running fine with
latest 4.4/4.5? To help upgrading it would be great to have a certification
for extension (for example this ext is certified for 4.5.X, 4.4.7 etc)

Thanks for your feedback!

David