Can’t restore blog from backup

  • Help! I made a noob mistake. I wanted to change hosts, so I made a backup of my blog using MySQL. But when I tried to create a new blog on my new host, it didn’t work because I was not using the most current version of WordPress when I made the backup. So I have installed the older version (2.6.1), deleted all the tables out of it, and imported my backup, and it still doesn’t work. This is the error I get when I try to log in to my admin panel:

    The requested URL /wp-admin/upgrade.php was not found on this server.

    Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

    I was able to log in and everything was fine before I imported the backup files. Why is it looking for upgrade.php? Can I get that file from somewhere and put it in that folder? Would that even fix the problem?

    I would appreciate any help anyone can give me. Also, I’m not completely sure that 2.6.1 is the version I was using when I made the backup; can anyone tell me what version would have been available in May 2007? I don’t think I ever upgraded it from then. I wish the WordPress people had dates on their archive page.

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
  • Thread Starter thessalyrose

    (@thessalyrose)

    P.S. I checked, and the upgrade.php file is there in the wp-admin folder. So does this mean I haven’t installed the right version of WordPress?

    If you install WordPress (any version) on your new host with a completely new database, can you then login to your admin panel? If you can get to this point in the install, then you can begin the process of importing your backed-up database.

    Thread Starter thessalyrose

    (@thessalyrose)

    Yes, I’ve gotten to that point. The problem occurs after I import my backups.

    Before you did the import, did you update the pathname to your webspace in your database backup file? Since you’re attempting to move your blog to a different host, it may be that the reason WP can’t find the upgrade.php file is because, after importing your backup, WP is looking for that file in the directory structure of your old host. If you didn’t update all the pathnames to your webspace in your database backup file (e.g., by using a text editor to perform a global search and replace on the backup file), then they’re still pointing to your old space.

    Here’s a description of the steps I went thru when I moved a WP site to a different host.

    Also, here’s the link to the codex that describes the detailed steps to upgrading WP manually. Step 9 may be particularly relevant for you.

    Thread Starter thessalyrose

    (@thessalyrose)

    That makes sense, because originally the error message said it couldn’t find needle/update.php, and there was no needle folder on my new server, but there was on my old server. When I installed WP in a folder and named it “needle,” that part of the error message went away.

    Thanks for the links. I’ll post again if this gets it working.

    Thread Starter thessalyrose

    (@thessalyrose)

    Thanks, Bledsoe, my blog is back online now! Your suggestion wasn’t the only thing that was wrong, but it helped me and my tech support (my brother!) find and fix the other things that were wrong. Turns out, my backed up files were still looking for my old theme, which I hadn’t re-installed yet, which is why I was getting a white screen in the first place. But changing the pathnames would definitely have been necessary at some point. Thanks again!

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
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