Title: MT database import
Last modified: August 18, 2016

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# MT database import

 *  [royalts](https://wordpress.org/support/users/royalts/)
 * (@royalts)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/)
 * I would like to migrate my 1000 blog posts and about 2000 comments from MovableType
   to WordPress, however there is a problem that I just cannot solve:
    My server
   always times out during the export of the data. When I’m lucky, I get about 400,
   most of the time, however MT just exports around 300 posts+comments. Is there
   no other way to get WordPress to import MT-data? Maybe directly from the database?

Viewing 10 replies - 1 through 10 (of 10 total)

 *  [Jack](https://wordpress.org/support/users/moxie/)
 * (@moxie)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51053)
 * Do you have access to a program like phpadmin on your server? You could then 
   make a dbasebackup outside MT.
 *  Thread Starter [royalts](https://wordpress.org/support/users/royalts/)
 * (@royalts)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51062)
 * I do have phpadmin. How do I do the dbasebackup you are talking about?
 *  [carthik](https://wordpress.org/support/users/carthik/)
 * (@carthik)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51070)
 * RoyalTS, could you try asking your host to change the time – out setting for 
   you? The direct database option won’t work. The database tables are different,
   for one.
    The MT export script may be modified to work from the command line,
   if you have ssh access, and are good with perl.
 *  [willm](https://wordpress.org/support/users/willm/)
 * (@willm)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51083)
 * If I were you, I’d install a [basic PHP/mySQL setup](http://wordpress.org/support/7/4083)
   on my PC and do the import locally. That way you can change the timeout settings
   yourself.
 *  [katkin](https://wordpress.org/support/users/katkin/)
 * (@katkin)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51220)
 * If you can’t do it locally, use the template, but unless you really need to export
   by category, it would be much easier to just use that template from the mt support
   templates without the category thing. Just change the first line and rebuild 
   each time.
    First one: <MTEntries lastn=350″ sort_order=”ascend” > First one:
   <MTEntries lastn=350″offset=”350″ sort_order=”ascend” > First one: <MTEntries
   lastn=350″ offset=”700″ sort_order=”ascend” > And so forth. You just change the
   output file each time too (export1.txt, export2.txt, etc.) It’s a pain but should
   work..
 *  Thread Starter [royalts](https://wordpress.org/support/users/royalts/)
 * (@royalts)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51272)
 * Thanks, splitting up the exports via index templates worked just fine. Now, however
   I have another (probably newbie) problem:
    When I feed WordPress the first batch
   of data from my MT export it asks me to assign an author to the posts. I pick
   the only author in my WP installation, the admin, and then tell it to go ahead
   with the import. The import then works just fine, however instead of assigning
   the imported posts to the admin user account that I told it to use WP creates
   a new user with the exact same user name and assigns the posts to that user. 
   What am I doing wrong?
 *  [carthik](https://wordpress.org/support/users/carthik/)
 * (@carthik)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51277)
 * Do you remember if you deleted the pre-filled in text in the form to change the
   author names?
    This could be some problem with the importer, and we can solve
   it. No problem 🙂
 *  Thread Starter [royalts](https://wordpress.org/support/users/royalts/)
 * (@royalts)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51305)
 * that was the problem exactly. Deleted the contents of the form and it worked 
   just fine. There seem to be some other weirdo problems with the import script
   though. I managed to work around them, but it may be worthwhile to fix them nonetheless:
   WP seems to think that some of my commentors are authors and treats them as such.
   Funky =)
 *  [carthik](https://wordpress.org/support/users/carthik/)
 * (@carthik)
 * [22 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51323)
 * RoyalTs, could you post examples, or something more we could work with? Fixes
   in the source will help everyone who wil face the same problems in the future.
 *  [carthik](https://wordpress.org/support/users/carthik/)
 * (@carthik)
 * [21 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51571)
 * rubyji, I noticed you left a comment (or two) at my post that describes the mt
   to wp move. Could you please email me, and I could help you sort this problem
   out.
    mail at carthik dot net is the address. If I could get some of the posts
   where the error happens, I could fix the importer for you, and for everyone else.
   Or I could suggest a solution.

Viewing 10 replies - 1 through 10 (of 10 total)

The topic ‘MT database import’ is closed to new replies.

 * In: [Installing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/installation/)
 * 10 replies
 * 5 participants
 * Last reply from: [carthik](https://wordpress.org/support/users/carthik/)
 * Last activity: [21 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/mt-database-import/#post-51571)
 * Status: not resolved

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