Category: ExpressionEngine
Right so, a quick re-cap… we’ve exported our data from Textpattern, imported it into ExpressionEngine and done a quick find and replace to fix up our embedded images.
Next job on our list is to fix up any links to file assets which we have in our entries. Textpattern uses a file download manager which records total file downloads and obfuscates the actual file path in the URL which you place in your entry. ExpressionEngine, whilst being a fantastic CMS, does not provide support for file download counts or obfuscation (here’s hoping for EE2!) which is a shame but hey ho… let’s soldier on.
We’re going to have to repair any links to files in our entries because the two systems link to file assets in different ways. So within the ExpressionEngine control panel navigate to the ‘Edit’ tab and use the search tool at the top of the screen to search for the string ‘/file_download/’ in ‘titles and entries’. This should give you a list of all the entries that you will need to fix up.
Unfortunately we’re going to have to do this manually (unless you can think of a better way!) so download all your file assets from your Textpattern install and then upload them to your file upload destination in ExpressionEngine (Prob best done via FTP).
Now we just need to amend the file paths in our entries so work through the list of entries that contain the ‘/file_download/’ string and replace the old Textpattern file path references with the new ExpressionEngine file path references.
Now, you can either use the ‘copy and paste info’ that the ‘File Manager Module’ provides you with (a standard href link) or hand craft a Textile based equivalent. The choice is yours.
Ok so I ran out of time a little today and didn’t have a chance to explain how we can migrate out Textpattern Links but I promise I’ll cover that in my next post! :)
Next Step…
Now comes the exciting part. We’re going to import our old Textpattern artcicles into ExpressionEngine!
First off we will need to upload the text file that we generated in our export from Textpattern in Step 2. I just dropped my file into the web root of my server so I could get at it easily from ExpressionEngine.
Once your file has uploaded log-in to your ExpressionEngine control panel and navigate to the ‘Admin’ tab and then ‘Utilities’ and ‘Import Utilities’. We’re going to use the ‘Movable Type Import Utility’.
Complete all the fields on the import screen, your file path should be something like ‘../txpexport.txt’. Everything here should be pretty obvious, I just made sure I un-ticked the ‘Create members from commenters?’ option but obviously you might want to do things differently.
I’d suggest you do a few dry runs first of all with a small export from your Textpattern install to verify that everything is working as expected. I did an export of 10 entries from Textpattern initially just to test and then deleted all the entries and categories before performing my final import.
Ok so we have all our articles imported now but we’re not quite done yet. We need to set up a ‘File Upload’ location for our Textpattern Images. I decided to just use the default ‘Main Upload Directory’ which is already configured in ExpressionEngine.
I downloaded all my image assets from my Textpattern image upload folder and uploaded them all to my ExpressionEngine image upload folder. Now in my case the file paths are different (though you could always mimic the folder location which Textpattern uses in ExpressionEngine. If like me you didn’t you can quickly and easily do a find and replace on all your article image file paths.
Navigate to ‘Admin’ and then ‘Utilities’ and select ‘Find and Replace’. In my case I entered ‘/images/uploads/’ in the ‘Search for this text’ field and ‘/images/uploads/uploads/’ in the ‘replace with this text’ field. Select the entry field that you want to affect and the click submit.
All of your article entries should now include any inline images or media. Next we’ll be looking at how to deal with Textpattern ‘links’ and ‘file assets’.
Next Step…
So now we have our ExpressionEngine install pretty much ready we need to export our data from Textpattern. At this point it may be wise to upgrade your Textpattern install to the latest release.
During a bit of a forum tennis match almost 3 years back(!) Jon Hicks and I managed to refine an export method which had been used for Textpattern previously to incorporate clean Textile and entry comments. I’ve summarised the steps you will need to take and the code you will need to use in your Textpattern templates below.
Before you start you will need to install a couple of Textpattern plug-ins to ensure that we can get our data out in just the right format.
First is a Textpattern plug-in called msv_show_article_field which is written by Martin Å vihla. This plug-in allows us to return the Textile formatted content for the articles instead of the HTML equivalent. This means that our articles will maintain their nice clean Textile formatting once imported into ExpressionEngine. Bonus!
Next is a plug-in called glx_thiscomment (old dead link) which is written by Johan Nilsson. This plug-in allows us to pull out the plain text name value for comments rather than the name wrapped in a ‘href’ linking to the comment authors website URL or email (the default behavior for the built in Textpattern comment tag). This is essential if we want to maintain article comments.
Now create 2 new Textpattern forms, one called ‘export’ and one called ‘exportcomments’. Add the following code to your ‘export’ form:
TITLE: <txp:title />
AUTHOR: <txp:author />
DATE: <txp:posted format="%m/%d/%G %I:%M:%S %p" />
PRIMARY CATEGORY: <txp:category1 />
CATEGORY: <txp:category2 />
<txp:php>echo "-----"."\n";</txp:php>
BODY:
<txp:msv_show_article_field name="Body" />
<txp:php>echo "-----"."\n";</txp:php>
<txp:if_excerpt>
EXCERPT:<txp:msv_show_article_field name="Excerpt" /></txp:if_excerpt>
<txp:php>echo "-----"."\n";</txp:php>
<txp:if_comments>
<txp:comments form="exportcomments" break="" />
</txp:if_comments>
<txp:php>echo "--------"."\n";</txp:php>
…and the following code to your ‘exportcomments’ form:
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: <txp:glx_thiscomment key="name" />
EMAIL: <txp:comment_email />
URL: <txp:comment_web />
DATE: <txp:posted format="%m/%d/%G %I:%M:%S %p" />
<txp:message />
-----
Finally we need to call our ‘export’ form from a page template. Create a new page template called export and add the following code:
<txp:article_custom section="name-of-your-txp-section-here" form="export" limit="500" offset="0" />
Obviously you will need to tweak the parameters in your page template to suit the number of blog entries you have and the section from which you wish to export entries.
With all of the above done we should now be able to visit the public URL for this page template in our web browser (http://yourdomainname.com/export/) and see the output. I had over 400 entries to export so the page took a while to load. Once fully loaded view source and save a copy to a plain text file on your local machine (txpexport.txt for example).
I know I promised to cover how we import this data into ExpressionEngine but I’ve been rambling on for a while now so I’ll leave that until my next post. :)
Next Step…
Ok so a lot of this will be obvious but hey, here we go… I’ve decided to tackle the migration by setting up an ExpressionEngine Core Install on a sub domain (http://ee.nathanpitman.com) where I will be able to get everything up and running before I switch from the old Textpattern install for good.
First step quite obviously is to install ExpressionEngine Core (The free version of the CMS). I won’t explain how to do this, it’s dead easy and there are a ton of useful resources out there for you to look at if you’ve never used EE before.
First thing to do after you’ve completed the install is to modify the default custom field group for the default weblog to match the fields which you have in Textpattern. Textpattern has a ‘Body’ and ‘Excerpt’ field so you could simply rename the default ‘extended’ field if you want to feel at home.
As we’re migrating from Textpattern all our posts that we will be importing will be formatted with Textile or XHTML so we’re going to need to mimic that environment in ExpressionEngine. To do so we’ll need to install a handy little 3rd party plug-in called ‘Textile’! You can download the Textile Plug-in from the ExpressionEngine website. Once installed you will need to log-in to your ExpressionEngine control panel again and change the default formatting for the custom fields (body and excerpt) to use ‘Textile’ rather than XHTML. Don’t worry if some of your Textpattern blog posts have XHTML in them, Textile will still render these just right.
Finally, before we move on to exporting our blog entries from Textpattern we need to install a module that will allow us to more easily upload and manage files as we are used to doing so with the Textpattern ‘Files’ tab. The nearest equivalent that I have found over the years is the Low File Manager Module. It doesn’t provide download counts but it does pretty much everything else you could want and ties in beautifully with the ExpressionEngine File Upload preference settings.
Next we’ll be looking at how to export all our blog entries from Textpattern and pull them into ExpressionEngine. :)
Next Step…
I have made a cast iron decision. I am migrating (this) my personal blog from Textpattern to ExpressionEngine. I thought others might find it useful if I blogged my progress along the way.
So, this is the first of a number of posts which will explain the how, why when and what in as much detail as I can muster. If you’re looking to do the same then perhaps you’d like to follow me…
:)
Update: Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, Step 4, Step 5, Conclusion.
