Updated 29 July 2010
Hey there!
I recently needed to import someone’s database from Joomla to WordPress yet again but this time it was a very VERY old Joomla database into WordPress 3. I seriously had my doubts.
Just for the hell of it, I tried a different script (or the same one but modified again by someone else!) that I found here but alas! I kept getting error messages and it refused to work (note that doesn’t mean it won’t work for you, so it’s worth trying!).
Fortunately, the author of that article, Chris, has planned for the event of someone not being able to use his script and has linked to yet another importer script (so many clever coders out there!) by Jason Anton which can be found at the end of his post. That alternative one worked for me with absolutely no problems.
Amazing! You can find a script that still works after all this time and so many changes to both CMS’s!! I recommend you try any or all of these and see which one works for you. Three to choose from, what more could you ask for?
Chris also has instructions on his page that are easy to follow and apply to the other script too.
I should point out that the script I used did not import the sites three pages that were titled “About”, “Contact” and “Discography”. I’m assuming this is because these pages were not part of a category system and the script can only deal with categories (and what Joomla refers to as “sections”). It didn’t matter in my case because I could just go to the database in phpmyadmin and copy and paste the details into the WordPress dashboard system and reconstruct the three missing pages. But it might be a pain for you if you happen to have a lot of them.
Again, these scripts only import content – NOT members etc. I’m still looking for a way to import users. I think I’ve found the answer (fingers and toes crossed!) but I need to try it out first and if it works I’ll post it for you!
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Original post
I just posted this in the WordPress Codex after a couple of people posted asking about migrating from Joomla to WordPress.
Because I know how hard I find it searching on the codex site I thought I’d also post it here to help people find the solution.
There is a script for importing content from Joomla to WordPress at this link:
I can’t stress enough how important it is to read all instructions AND comments at that site before you use it.
NOTES ABOUT THE IMPORTER:
- It does NOT import users – but the author mentions a tweak you can make to configuration.php to at least alter defalt author name.
- It doesn’t work for all versions of Joomla – but the author has an extension to convert your Joomla installation back to a 1.0.13 so that you can import it into WordPress – (check the comments, he links to the extension in there, I dont know how effective it is since I didn’t need it)
- It doesn’t work with a 2.7 WordPress installation – but you can install an earlier WP version (I think it works with 2.3.2), import content from Joomla and THEN upgrade to WP 2.7 (that’s what I did)
- You need to set up categories in WordPress to match the Joomla content BEFORE you import and people have had some difficulties so read the directions and comments etc carefully.
TEST IT FIRST
My recommendation is to test it out first to get a feel for how it works and how you might be able to manipulate it for best results, then set it all up for real. You might find you need to make changes in Joomla to make the transition easier – and you will see what I mean if you run a test using the importer.
I found that I could also run part imports and then go off and change the configuration.php for a specific category or change a category name in WordPress that made more sense for the import.
Anyway, just plug it in and experiment BUT just make sure you use a whole new database for playing, testing and finally running the real import, NOT the one currently powering your site. Set up a subdomain and test it there.
Unfortunately the script doesnt import registered members. I don’t know of any import script that does this (if you do please tell us!!)
BUT with one of my sites I had Joomla linked to an SMF forum so I plan to find a way to get the 1,000 or so members imported by linking the WordPress installation to my forum – preferably SMF – but I will convert to another forum first if it will put my members into WordPress (eg phpbb).
I’ll post back here when I sort it out and let you know how I did it!
Hope that helps someone!
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