Hunting for the Simple machines forum importer?

I know there is one just can't find it?

 
 Hi! 

   I am adding composr to a website I built in 2003. The site had a simple machines forum, that I converted to mybb last year, but left it in maintenance mode. 

  I am persuaded that composr's built in forum is better. I still have the smf database and want to convert it to composrs forum.  

  I cannot find the importer script. I have been looking at all the add-ons, and searching the website for hours.
  The link in the right column of the downloads page does not work. 

These tutorials may help @ Composr Tutorial: Importing data into Composr – Composr & Composr Tutorial: Nuances of forum integration – Composr

Mystress said

The link in the right column of the downloads page does not work. 

From “Hunting for the Simple machines forum importer?”, 9th July 2024, 3:55 am

Which link are you talking about? And can you link to the page containing the broken link? Thank you!

Mystress said

I cannot find the importer script

From “Hunting for the Simple machines forum importer?”, 9th July 2024, 3:55 am

The import addon is bundled with Composr CMS v10, thus why you cannot find it in the downloads. If/when you download Composr, you already have the addon. If you do not see it, try going to the Admin Zone > Structure > Addons management and see if it is installed (install if not). Then, go to Admin Zone > Tools > Import.

Do read what Adam posted, however, as there are nuances with importing. Generally, these scripts are outdated because we don't have the developer power to always keep them up-to-date. If you experience issues importing, consider contracting a developer to help do the work for you. You can send me a message if you wish to go that route and contract me.

Patrick wrote: The import addon is bundled with Composr CMS v10>>

  Thanks for responding, I did figure that out, re-reading the tutorials.

  Responded in an intro before finding this, sorry for the delay. 

  Essentially, the importer didnt work for smf version 1.x so the php guy who is helping me sort out the mess, upgraded it to the latest, smf 2.1.4 and then discovered the importer only works on smf2.0 
   I even tried importing the converted mybb version, still could not import it.
   Always errors on the second or third step.

  I am a humanitarian, I run a non profit corp. I don't have the big corporate budget to pay your developers. $5000 usd? 
  Its already cost me $1600CAD  rent on my new office because months go by and the site to book appointments is still not ready. 

  So I guess, I like the idea of composr but implementation, not so much. 


   

Hello Mystress,

I understand your frustrations. We also don't have any big corporate budget as we're not sponsored by any company (ocProducts, Ltd. is no more as of a long time ago). As such, we unfortunately don't have the developer power necessary to keep every third-party feature up-to-date as much as we'd like. Many open-source projects suffer the same fate.

The community developers of Composr aren't that expensive, relatively in comparison to most other software developers (at least I'm not).

As far as implementation, this also suffers from the same issues mentioned above. However, we'd love to hear how you would like to see Composr improve in the future. Just note that implementation depends largely on the availability of developers.

  Ah, you are PDStig? I have seen your page and I agree your rates are reasonable. I have geeky friends and I know some charge three figures. 

  I have a friend working on my vps, he is a php expert (retired).
  
  I am very grateful for the support, he has set a goal of upgrading everything to php8.1 … most of it is still on php5.6 because I could not update without breaking a lot of stuff… back when the php setting had to the the same for the whole vps, but now domains and subdomains can be set individually. (Whew!) 
 We are using one of the empty domains on my vps for a sandbox to get stuff working before installing to the live sites. It is apache server with cpanel running php8.1 

    and then your timely announcement of composr11beta1! (Applause!) 
  (Not sure if I should post this elsewhere? Where do you want the requested bug reports for  composr11beta1? )

 We have been testing it with a freshly updated simple machines 2.1.4. 
  I could not get it working even with a new empty forum, it told me I had entered the database info wrongly (I triple-checked it, tell me 3x style) and when I started over it spewed errors complaining about missing files.  List of sodium_crypto bits. idk. 

  So I asked him to give it a shot. He got the missing bits sorted and tested it with an updated copy of one of my live forums.

  He reported: 

 I tried installing a clean composr11beta1 (comp folder) with smf2.1.4 from visitors folder, I only made it to step 7, where it says it cannot connect to the smf forum database. I put all the info correctly (user, pass etc), but I noticed the script doesn't ask for the database name of the existing smf forum, so I'm not surprised it cannot connect. That is definitely a bug in the composr 11 beta code, which I'm not sure we should even attempt to fix (if possible).

  I responded that the beta announcement includes a request for testers and bug reports so, there ya go, Patrick. :) 
  
  I really like Composr, and I think for new sites it will work very well for me. It is getting it to dance with the older sites where I am running into problems. 

  This site is the first one, not quite live yet but you can peek. It is on a greengeeks reseller account with softaculous, not my vps. 
  
  Log in  

 I think it looks beautiful and found it quite easy to adjust the appearance once I had the center column thing sorted.

Then I realized it made more sense to put the content on my highest traffic domain, kundalini-teacher.com which opened in 2003. That is where I fell into the tarpit because I am a dinosaur.

  Thank you for responding. 


  


  

Mystress said

Ah, you are PDStig?

That's my company name, yes. PDStig, LLC.

Mystress said

I have seen your page and I agree your rates are reasonable. I have geeky friends and I know some charge three figures. 

Indeed, senior engineers especially can be very expensive. Not necessarily saying that's a bad thing; they often have very deep knowledge of technology and the underlying operations of servers and IT. So you get their vast experience for that price. I, on the other hand, am a junior developer, only in my early 30s. I don't have nearly the experience senior developers do (although I have worked with websites and servers for 15 years now), therefore I think it's fair I charge lower rates. I'm also quite minimalist, so my personal expenses are lower than most, thereby making it easier for me to be generous (I'm not looking to be the next millionaire etc).

Mystress said

back when the php setting had to the the same for the whole vps, but now domains and subdomains can be set individually. (Whew!) 

That's a godsend, lol.

Mystress said

(Not sure if I should post this elsewhere? Where do you want the requested bug reports for  composr11beta1? )

We have an issue tracker for these. If the interface is overwhelming for you, I made a simplified wizard to help report bugs and feature requests. Click the colored texts to be taken to those links.

Mystress said

(SMF 2.1.4 install attempt info)

I have not gone through testing for third-party forums yet in version 11. So the code is still stuck on SMF 2.0. Actually we don't officially support most anything dealing with third parties (click the link to read more about this), which means we will sometimes update it when we have the spare time to do so, but it's low priority. And if someone really wants us to pay particular attention on a third-party feature, they can sponsor it.

…well, that was before ocProducts, Ltd. was discontinued. We don't do sponsorships anymore and are switching to a Bazaar model. This means the development of Composr will be opened up more to the community. So you can hire anyone within the community offering their services (including myself) if you want someone to pay particular attention to getting the SMF integration smooth sailing for v11.

I'll check into the issue of it not asking for DB info. It should be. Make sure you're following the correct procedure though. The installer is not the place to import SMF. That's to link your SMF forum to Composr if you want to use them together. It should then be asking for both SMF's info and Composr's (I'll double-check this is happening and clearly indicated). For your use case (from my understanding), you would want to install Composr normally using Conversr. Then, after install is done, in the Admin Zone, go under Tools > Import, which contains the tool for importing data from another forum into Composr.

Mystress said

This site is the first one, not quite live yet but you can peek. It is on a greengeeks reseller account with softaculous, not my vps. 

Nice! Like I said I can get the SMF importer working for 2.1.4 but I'd request that you hire me to do so, and I can place it on high priority. It was not on my agenda to go above 2.0 support at least for the 11.0 release (maybe 11.1 or something) because our developer power is incredibly small right now. It's just myself and Chris… but Chris will only be around for a week longer before he has to disappear again. So I have to make sacrifices in the development.

If, however, you hire me or someone else to do it, it will likely end up in the 11.0 release or even a later beta. You would also get particular attention, as-in we would ensure the importer works for your use case / site.

Patrick wrote: The installer is not the place to import SMF. That's to link your SMF forum to Composr if you want to use them together. It should then be asking for both SMF's info and Composr's (I'll double-check this is happening and clearly indicated). For your use case (from my understanding), you would want to install Composr normally using Conversr. Then, after install is done, in the Admin Zone, go under Tools > Import, which contains the tool for importing data from another forum into Composr.

  Hmm... not sure we are talking about the same thing. There is importing which is done after installation or attaching which is a checkbox at installation? 
  The old composr does not offer any option to import or attach smf2.1.x, only 2.0

  The new beta version does offer attach smf2.1.x, at installation, I assumed it would not offer import. 
  Ok I will give that a try. Thanks!