Ok.
1) What "telerik DLL"? Where do I find it? And do you mean the folder called "bin" directly off the dnn root folder?
2) That is the exact oldVersion-newVersion line that already exists in the release.config which I found in the update download package.
I finally had to give up on 5.4.2; removing all instances of "telerik" from the web.config file didn't help. then I noticed that the connection string is different; in the new version's release.config, the line looks like this:
<add name="SiteSqlServer" connectionString="Server=(local);Database=DotNetNuke;uid=;pwd=;" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />
whereas the web.config I'm currently using for 5.1.2, there is a line which refers to a wholly different file, "connectionstrings.config" -- so I have absolutely clue what to do about that.
I may just have to deal with 5.1.2, or maybe download the upgrade pkg for 5.1.4, because I'm not sure that my host supports the ASP.NET 3.51; I think it might be just 3.5.
But maybe I'm just stuck with this 5.1.2, because this is my VERY first excursion into MS servers, and I have no clue on earth what is going on with this thing-- it's sure nothing like the simplicity of Linux servers and applications, but I figured if I wanted to call myself a web designer I needed to have more than one trick up my sleeve. *sigh*
Thx,
Andria