I’ve looked at the options for exporting my blog from WordPress and back in to MT (PapaScott’s Export from WordPress and Carthik’s option) and … well, there is one problem. I have a LOT of posts. I mean, a LOT. Like 6000 posts or some crazy number like that. I’m afraid that the options out there will cause my server to seize up in to a coughing, wheezing ball if I try to run either of them. The load would be just to much to bear, and would probably fall apart somewhere in the middle.
I just don’t see a good solution.
Would it be wrong of me to just start fresh? To point people to the old site if they want to run a search? Or better yet, to test out something like the Google “search within this site” option to allow people to search both the MT and WP versions of my site?
I hate to lose the history. I would include the old archives in my archive page somehow. But moving data around just doesn’t seem to make sense, and it is the only roadblock in my move back to MT.
So is it wrong to start fresh? Or should I just go for it? I’m asking you guys because you’re more likely to look at old archives than I am. If I need something, I just go to Google. (They seem to index all of my posts there anyways!) So, what do you think? Your opinion matters!
19 replies on “Starting from Scratch?”
This is probably going to sound stupid, but didn’t you back up the old MT blog before you converted it to WP? Is it possible just to reinstate the old blog and then convert the new WP stuff?
There’s nothing wrong with starting from scratch. I reckon go for it if it’s the best thing for keeping you sane in your switch back to MT. 🙂
I had to at the beginning of this year when I re-purchased notsweet.org and i’ve also done that voluntarily in the past more than once. You should be able to keep your wordpress archives by keeping it installed, but your friend Matt would know about that better than I would?
I don’t see a problem with starting over, it makes for a clean break. On the other hand, you’re married to the guy who wrote the MT->WP conversion scripts. You could talk to him about a database import routine.
It’s been months since I moved, so I don’t believe I have a backup of the old MT blog. In addition, I don’t think I can split it up like that and migrate only the new WP content. If I could split things up, then the server load issue wouldn’t be a problem.
I’ve tried talking to that guy that did the MT->WP conversion script. He wasn’t much help. Maybe I should make him sleep on the couch for a few nights and see if he rethinks that decision? 😉
I’m a big fan of starting fresh. I know that shocks you. Hee.
It sounds like starting fresh would work best. You can always link to this (“old”) site with something like “Archives prior to x date” and then to more recent archives with “Archives since x date.” As long as people can find the old stuff easily, who cares whether it’s in a separate blog or not?
Christine,
OT: Apparently you just dropped by at my blog and left a comment about transferring web hosting companies. At least, I hope it was you and not the start of yet another spam attack. Anyway, thanks for visiting and for your comment. Best wishes.
If you think your server will time out on the export script, you can take a dump of the database, install it on a local machine, and run the script there. My script doesn’t need WordPress installed, just php and MySQL.
i have started from scratch before, but it depends how you want to refer to ‘back issues’. when you first exported to WP, you must have expoerted a file from MT… can you not just pop it rigt back in from that file and not from the WP copy? That way you only have to struggle with the posts you’ve written since your WP migration (considerably less than 6000!!). Good luck 😉
I remember in MT you have to do a rebuild every time you post a new post. I don’t really understand why you want to move back to it. It was a helluva lot more glitchy when I was using it.
And I have started from scratch quite a few times now, nobody complained, but then I don’t have the number of posts that you do.
I would suggest that you use search to find all the old stuff.
I hope you get it worked out if you really want to switch back to MT. I’m happy with WP and have been using PHP for a few years, as you know. Why do you want to switch? Is something not working for you with WP? I just log in and post and it’s working fine for me!
Can you keep this WP database, start fresh with a new MT db, and for your archives, just have links to the WP stuff? Does that make sense??? 🙂
I’m curious why you would want to move back. I’m not trying to be zealotous or anything. I just want to know, if you went through the pain of going MT->WP, what the motivation would be for going back to MT.
i have you beat in the number of entries, Christine! 🙂 but i would take the easy way and painless way and just start fresh. it felt good to start fresh with WP even though i still use pMachine for other things. plus, i dupe up my entry into pMachine for those what ifs (and to keep track of my number of entries). i say January 1st is a good time to start fresh. link to your archives. since you don’t really use it for searches, that internal google search thing should do the job for your readers.
I think starting fresh is a good thing. Importing into MT is a bad thing… I’ve tried. It geeks up on ya halfway through and makes a damnable mess. :/
I’m moving back to MT because – for me – from a design perspective – it is what I am comfortable with. I’ve never been completely comfortable with this site in WP, but it’s probably because I didn’t do the conversion – Matt did it for me since I helped name WP. I think that is why I’ve always felt lost here.
I am keeping WP on all of my other sites. And for me, rebuilding in MT wasn’t a big deal – I used includes for headers and footers, so they didn’t have to rebuild. I didn’t notice a big difference in that when I switched to WP.
although i’m partial to wp over movable type i understand after using something for so long how/why you would want to go back. in my original export using carthik’s tool and then going into expression engine i had about 500 posts or so and it went with no problem.
having said that, that doesn’t mean that movable type will be kind or that yours will go smoothly. although i certainly wouldn’t object to having to reference old posts from somewhere else or searching for them.
for me the bottom line is simple – you have to do what makes you feel the best at your site. i’ve used b2, wordpress, movabletype, ee, textpattern – and back and forth between all of em a handful of times, and if i ever feel like i need a change – i’ll do it 😉
Hey, go for the restart. That way, I can say “I remember the day that BPC restarted, that was a grand day” and I can keep up with it better.
Yes, it’s all a me thing.
Christine, I am quite comfortable in SQL and you can import your WordPress entries in MT. However, you would have to a) export your WordPress entries to an Excel file b) change the field names to represent those in your MT database and c) import the revised spreadsheet into MT. This would all be done through SQL.
If you were to do this, then I would create a copy of my weblog entries table as a backup in case the import went wrong.
I could help you if you really want to save your entries.