Popular forum exporters

bentael

so I used the bb-to-markdown config and tested a run down on your data, took 10.9 minutes, then disabled the SanitizeHTML, and it looks like the content got much better, but not enough... looks like my bbToMarkdown function is not that great, ... it was based off of https://github.com/feralhosting/BBCode-To-Markdown-Converter anyways.

I saw somewhere that you are using phpbb3, could by any chance the bb code be different in format? I am not a BBCode guy, so I would need some else's opinion on how to convert that to markdown

psychobunny

I saw somewhere that you are using phpbb3, could by any chance the bb code be different in format? I am not a BBCode guy, so I would need some else's opinion on how to convert that to markdown

I wrote this for phpBB2, not sure if its different for phpBB3. I could probably write another set of regexes for phpBB3 if I know all the possible cases

a_5mith

@bentael Hey buddy, I will try and find the logs, but I'm not sure where to look for them. I will try and repro today if I can't find. I remember what I did last time more or less. (Didn't uncomment that code for a start )

Turning off Sanitize HTML did fix a lot of the formatting, but as you suspected your plugin is out of date for latest version of NodeBB. Performance isn't a huge issue for me, I can leave it running if needs be, but I do have quite a few custom bbcode strings that I've added myself which I may tackle before I export from SMF.

I'm cracking on with a new node now, so I'll let you know how I get on with newer data. Few hundred more posts and a bit more knowledge.

I don't think the BBcode has changed from exporting from SMF to PHPBB3. Fortunately, most of my embeds are soundcloud based. And all I need to do with them is completely remove all the [soundcloud] bbcode in posts. Which I can do from phpmyadmin before I import it into PHPbb so I'm only left with the URL, which the nodebb plugin already supports.

bentael

@a_5mith https://github.com/akhoury/nodebb-plugin-sanitizehtml now supports NodeBB 0.4.x,
you're welcome

There is an "Advanced Option" that lets you write your own JavaScript to mutate the content of each post/signature, say you want to do something custom with each, enjoy the power.

bentael

@a_5mith not sure if you tested the sanitizehtml plugin, if you have, you may have noticed it crashing because of the Composer.help readme, that's fixed now. update to 0.1.3

a_5mith

@bentael Hey buddy, I'm running through the import again now, so far no errors. Apart from me running the script from the lib folder instead of the bin folder like a donut... I've manipulated a lot of the bbcode in phpmyadmin before importing, but I'm also running the bbcode-to-md for the more advanced bits like URLS and the like. But all my youtube & soundcloud links should be working fine. I will then install and run your plugin when the data is in and report back on my findings.

Thanks again for a cracking few plugins.

a_5mith

Me again. Quick query, any chance I can keep current passwords? They're currently encrypted with SHA-1, noticed that the passwords go over to phpbb with their conversion tool, but not nodeBB. We're a relatively anon style forum, so for a while, their was no account activation requirements, enter in a username, any email address and a password, and you were in. So sending emails out probably wouldn't work for each member, and I'd like it to be rather seamless changeover if possible.

julian

Passwords can't really be migrated since we don't use the same encryption technique. NodeBB uses bcrypt, whereas phpBB uses SHA1. So unfortunately, it looks like no

a_5mith

@julian hm, now that is an issue.

Not sure how to tackle this one, as a lot of email addresses aren't real, they can't just reset their passwords and I don't fancy losing members because their passwords have just been changed. Anyone got any ideas on this?

psychobunny

I didn't really think about this as an issue before, but I guess it's possible to write a plugin that checks your SHA1 encrypted password vs. the phpBB password, which then brings you to a modal which asks you to enter a new password. Not totally impossible, but would require at least one new hook to be written in core (and the actual plugin itself of course).

Others who have gone through this migration process have just mass-emailed their users with the new password. IMO not too bad of a way to get inactive users to come back, if you sell yourself well in that "We're back - new and improved!" email

Jedis

Has anyone tested the phpbb version on phpbb3? I am considering converting my forum to nodeBB, but want to make sure it works.

Thanks!

a_5mith

@Jedis Yupp, when I first tried converting my forum, an SMF exporter didn't exist (until I built one), so my workaround was to import into phpbb3 then NodeBB. Worked fine, only built my own to get around the bbcode ID rubbish that phpbb uses.

Edit: Might have been phpbb2... But pretty sure I used 3. The plugin officially supports 2, but assuming the table schema is the same, it shouldn't be a problem. If you wanted to be 100% sure, you could send a database to @bentael to clarify that the phpbb2 importer will work with phpbb3 too.

bentael

@Jedis to be honest I never had a phpbb2 db to test with, I only tested with phpbb3

If there are any missing fields from phpbb3 that NodeBB could already supports and they are not being migrated, let us know, or open an issue here:
https://github.com/psychobunny/nodebb-plugin-import-phpbb/issues but ping me in it using my github handle @akhoury

k0nsl

Sorry to necro a [somewhat] old topic, however, I've not used NodeBB for sometime now (only loosely followed it's development) and I'm wondering if migration from a somewhat vanilla phpBB3 installation is more or less seamless and without any major issues. Has somebody done it with good success?
I've got a big board that was started in 2002. Emphasis on "big"

Reik

I imported small phpbb3 database of our local students' community about 2 months ago. It took a lot of time to get it to work.
In that time:

groups weren't imported
I had to set by hand all of privileges to categories
attachments weren't imported
parents categories weren't imported
current version was doubling first post of topic, and consequently I had to back to old version of plugins (nodebb-plugin-import and nodebb-plugin-import-phpbb) and back to plugins' supported version of NodeBB
BBCode wasn't converted properly, so I had to use about 7 regex to correct that (automatic links, quote, redundant escaping characters, emoticons)
avatars weren't imported (and it looks like they aren't imported because of that)

JSey

@Reik would you mind to share your regexes here? I'm currently checking my options if I can go down this path - but missing avatars+attachments+first-post-doubling seem like major show-stoppers for me.

Groups and permissions could be something to set up manually once, though.

Reik

I hope this is the most up to date version. You don't have to import database every time, to check if everything is parsed right. Regexes are used always on 'just after import' version of database.

Preparse regex:

content = content.replace(/<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="(.*)">.*<\/a><!-- m -->/g, '$1');
content = content.replace(/<!--.*?--><img src="\{SMILIES_PATH\}\/.+?" alt="(.+?)" title=.+?\/><!--.*?-->/g, ' $1 ');
content = content.replace(/\[(.*?):\w+\]/g, "[$1]");
content = content.replace(/\[(\/\w+):\w+\]/g, "[$1]");

Postparse regex:

content = content.replace(/\\\[/g, '[');
content = content.replace(/\\\]/g, ']');
content = content.replace(/\@"(\w+)?" said:/g, '@$1 said:');

Bonus - Selenium IDE for Firefox script, which makes forum private You need sideflow extension to use it. Use it at categories page in ACP to see how it works.
http://pastebin.com/UdaT0FQF <-- deprecated since v0.7.0