Transferring to dot org
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Hello happiness engineers,
I’m trying to move my current dot com site over to a hosted wordpress.org over at http://ledesmaphotography.com. I’ve exported the WXR file that about 25mb. When I go import it to the .org site the limit is 8mb. So, reading around I see that certain apps split the WXR file into smaller parts and then I upload these.
Some of my media attachments are moving over but yet the vast majority are still being hot linked from my http://ledesmaphotography.wordpress.com blog.
I’m trying to understand this but it seems like it works somewhat but not all the way. I also noticed that you have a package to move the dot com over to a WP dot org account for about $129 and I saw you guys move the entire content yourselves.
So, if you guys do this, why can’t I do it on my own via the provided WXR (XML) file or am I forced to pay the $129 to have it all done. I’m also planning to purchase a $13 Site Redirect service as well not to loose my SEO but I didn’t anticipate having to pay an extra $129.
Please confirm, I’d like to know how to do it myself or do you guys have to do it for $129 which kind of makes me sad.
Best,
JorgeThe blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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Hi Jorge,
The 8 MB limit is put in place by your new host—for example, the host I use for my WordPress.org-based site has a 50 MB limit while WordPress.com has a 1 GB limit for uploads.
You can reduce the file size yourself when exporting via your WordPress.com Tools->Export by downloading your content into chunks based on type or date. (Instructions at http://en.support.wordpress.com/export/#download-your-content )
If the “Download and import file attachments” box is checked, WordPress.org should import all of the media attachments. Within each individual post, if WordPress.org couldn’t determine the source of the image, it may still hotlink to your older site. From our perspective, that’s not a problem and you’re free to let that stay, or update them at your convenience over time.
With our package, one of our Happiness Engineers will spend a few hours moving your site over, checking it over for issues like that (and correcting) as well as set up your site to as close to the existing site as possible. One caveat is our agreement with premium theme sellers don’t allow us to transfer over those themes as part of the package.
If you have any other questions, please let me know. Cheers!
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Hello,
Thanks for chiming but look at this situation. I called Bluehost and had them update my hosting account to handle 50mb uploads so I should not have any issues.
And in fact, I didn’t, through the admin in http://ledesmaphotography.com (hosted account) the WXR file of 25mb didn’t have any issues uploading besides the message that it didn’t match “something” there but I’m sure you’re more familiar with those types of messages.
Ok, so I go to my posts and guess what, none have been updated, it didn’t import any posts nor any pages as well, only pages that were in the “draft” status.
So, then I check my media folder via the WP admin and I only have 342 images upload from that import, its missing 3,600 files (ie. images) and that was 2 hours ago.
One would think that the media library would be updated progressively as the images are uploaded to the hosted account via the WXR but in fact, it seemed to have stop only at 342 images.
So, what do I do now. I have confirmed that via WXR the images are in fact uploaded but for some odd reason only 342 images.
In essence, I’m forced to pay the Happiness Engineers to move my site for something that should be seamless once I talked to Bluehost and they updated my account to handle unto 50mb files.
Tell me what am I suppose to do sir.
JL
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Hi Jorge,
I can only help so much since the issue is on the Import side. I did a test by exporting your site and importing it into a WordPress.org install. Everything imported fine: https://cloudup.com/cHDABMYArzQ
When importing images, it’s possible that BlueHost’s server is timing out the process—in addition to upload limits, they can set time limits on how long a process is allowed to run before it is “killed” as a way to ensure a broken script or program won’t keep a server bogged down for too long.
You may want to still try using smaller files to break up the import of media into different processes to try to avoid the sever timing out. It does take time to upload the images from WordPress.com to another server, so it’s worth the effort.
I’ll send you an e-mail with a link to a zip file of the export broken into 8 files.
When re-importing, the system will not import anything that is already present—including in the trash. If you want to start completely fresh, please be sure to empty the trash as well.
Bluehost’s support may be better able to help, since they can see what is going on with your server.
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Thanks again. I deleted everything as you said as I really want a clean install of all the data. I went ahead and started with the first xml file and it seems to be working fine but by the 3rd file. I noticed that the images are being hot linked to my wordpress.com install: http://ledesmaphotography.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/20120501162913_untitled.jpg
But I check my media and they are importing successively but unattached to the post information. So again, all very weird, why would they be unattached if its coming from a wpdotcom generated by yourselves (the one you sent me).
I’ll report back when I finish the rest of files but at the moment, in the 3rd xml, things are starting to have a hiccup.
Also, I called Bluehost and they verified that my upload limit is now 50mb and the server time out is maxed out to 60 seconds. They said, that if a script takes longer than 60 seconds then the script has something going like some error.
So at this point, I don’t know what else to do. Its guys, that moving away from dot com to dot org is not as seamless as it should be. I would understand a blogger or even squarespace but its from you guys.
As I said, I’m planning on buying the “Site Redirect” as soon as this blog transfer is working fine but at this moment, its not and I don’t really feel I should have to pay $129 to have you guys do it, especially since I’ve already talked to Bluehost and done everything on my part and I’m not a newbie user so I can handle a few imports etc.
So, if all of a sudden when I’m done importing the xml, if it self correct itself, the image hot linking to dot com, then I take it all back but I dunno guys.
Tell me, happiness engineers, what’s next. I just uploaded the 5th XML file, so I’ll report back.
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Hi Jorge,
What’s the post that the image is being hotlinked in? I can check it on the test import I did.
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Hello kraft,
Here’s one http://ledesmaphotography.com/2013/11/06/fuji-xe1-xpro1-rebecca-lily-presets/ I found and I continue to check the rest of the post.
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Kraft, I resolving itself, the last post I sent you now looks good and it was uploaded to the server to the dot org. I’ll continue to check and let it do its thing and report back.
thanks
Jorge -
Hi Jorge,
Great—all of the images on both posts are pulling from the new site for the test import. It sounds like the import script may be just a little slow, so it is pulling the hotlinked version until it verifies that the image has been fully uploaded to the new server.
I’ll log off for the night in about ~45 min, but will check in first thing in the morning if we’re still waiting. Thanks!
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all seems well. Now questions for you, how can I ascertain that the site redirect works well moving on from ledesmaphotography.wordpess.com over to ledesmaphotography.com.
I keep the same permalink structure on the posts, what worries me are the pages.
thanks,
JL -
The way the site redirect works is anyone visiting http://ledesmaphotography.wordpress.com/ will be taken to the same URL on your new domain.
For example, http://ledesmaphotography.wordpress.com/123456 will be taken to your domain, http://example.com/123456
Pages should work just the same as before. If you move them around to set different parents, etc, that could break the redirect if you didn’t add some type of internal redirect on your new site.
Cheers!
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Thanks, I’ll straighten the page url schemes before redirecting the site. I linked the ledesmaphotography.com url with Jetpack already. Is it possible that you guys transfer my stats, subscribers, and followers please.
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Thanks, stats are good but I don’t know where to find the subscribers in the admin.
Question, once I purchase the “Site Redirect” how long will take to start redirecting. Does it have to propagate like all things and it will start in a few hours?
Thanks,
JL -
Hi Jorge,
The site redirect will start to work almost immediately. Sometimes, your browser’s cache can override it, so emptying your browser’s cache may be needed. Naturally, the cache will expire in a few hours for any recent visitors, worst case.
You can access the stats and subscribers in your Jetpack-powered WordPress.org blog by going to the dashboard at http://ledesmaphotography.com/wp-admin/ , then visit the Jetpack->Site Stats . The number of followers will be in the lower-left by default ( see screenshot from a test site of mine: https://cloudup.com/cgEAQrG4C7v ). Clicking “Blog” or “Followers” will take you to the list of followers.
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