Import feature in WordPress

I don’t believe that using WordPress to import your posts will do anythign at all to your Blogger site. That’d take some major scripting work to do something like that. (Why on earth would anyone write an import feature that would amliciously destry the original? No way.)

If you’re talking about your template in WordPress being messed up – all the import feature does is import your posts – nothing else. *You* must back up your template files – a simple copy/paste into Notepad of the source code would work – but you *should* already have a copy of it on your hrad drive. (You *did* back up your files before trying this, right?)

As for the error message – sounds like one of Blogger’s servers is down. Again.

Note: “try again later”?

It is temporarily out of service. Please try again in a few minutes.

Don’t blame WordPress – it has nothing to do with your Blogger files getting messed up in your Blogger area.

Doodlebee – No offense, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. Yes, the homepage message **WAS** created by the WordPress import feature. In fact, the message contains a link to a “better blogging tool” (anchor text that links to www.ads-software.com). There’s no way Blogger would put a link to WordPress and call it “a better blogging tool.” Blogger’s system is up and running fine. I have more than one blog, and all homepages are fine, with the exception of one blog that I imported into WordPress.

Oh, and the “temporarily out of service message” has been displaying for the past 28 hours. Blogger is NOT down, and has NOT been down for the past 28 hours.

Back to the point…

1.) Whoever created this plugin, needs a warning that the import feature will modify your template. The code appearing inside the template is, in fact, created by the import plugin. This is the code the Import feature inserts into the Blogger template…

<MainPage>

Are you looking for
MyBlogNameHere? It is temporarily out of service. Please try again in a few minutes. Meanwhile, discover a better blogging tool.

<BloggerArchives>“><$BlogArchiveName$>
</BloggerArchives></MainPage><ArchivePage><Blogger>
<wordpresspost><$BlogItemDateTime$>|W|P|
<$BlogItemAuthorNickname$>|W|P|<$BlogItemBody$>|W|P|
<$BlogItemNumber$>|W|P|<$BlogItemTitle$>|W|P|
<$BlogItemAuthorEmail$><BlogItemCommentsEnabled>
<BlogItemComments><wordpresscomment>
<$BlogCommentDateTime$>|W|P|<$BlogCommentAuthor$>|W|P|
<$BlogCommentBody$></BlogItemComments>
</BlogItemCommentsEnabled></Blogger></ArchivePage>

2.) Is there any way to restore the old template and get rid of this new “message” that’s appearing on the Blogger homepage?

It’s not WordPress. What’s the URL?

EDIT: Whooami, you just use the <?php wp_hack_blogger('message') ?> template tag!

lol, wow wordpress is miraculous, it can even alter sites like blogger????!! I never knew!!

chris, No offense, but you don’t know what you’re talking about.

Well, even though I apparently don’t know what I’m talking about (and I wonder why in hell I even bothered, but I did) I did a quick search on this issue. I found several articles on this issue in the support forums here, on WordPress.com and in some other places (doing a simple Google search).

Apparently the end consensus is this:

When you import files from Blogger to WordPress, WordPress has to convert the files to something it can read. While it is in the process of doing so, WordPress puts up a simple message telling people who may be happening to visit while the conversion is happening that something’s going on, and to come back later.

Normally, after the WordPress script compiles the posts and converts them, it then reverts Blogger back to it’s original status.

However, if the blogger server goes down while this process is happening, or of the end user closes the window that opens during this process, or if there’s a hiccup between the Blogger server and your WordPress server – or any number of things that would cause an interruption in the performance of the script, then this error occurs – and WordPress isn’t given a chance to return the template back to it’s original state.

The way to get around this possible issue is what the import directions state (and anyone who’s about to do somehting huge to their websites should do prior to doing so) is to make a backup of their site *before starting*, in case crap like this happens.

So, in the end, what I’m saying is that, when you were exporting to WordPress, something somewhere got disconnected and the script was interrupted while performing it’s function. Server error or end user error, who knows. But things like this happen, and if you want your Blogger template back up, you need to reupload your backup files.

You *did* make a backup, right? It’s in the instructions.

So, I will concede that WordPress does offer up a message on your Blogger site – but it’s temporary (which is why I was confused about your original message – God forbid), and if the script ran without getting interrupted in some manner, then your site would have been put back to it’s normal state. But, as the saying goes, sometimes shit happens. That’s why you prepare for it by making a backup.

Now, if you *didn’t* make a backup of your site – although God knows why you would do such an insane thing – it’s *possible* for you to go to the wayback machine (archive.org) and enter in your site, then view your source code there, and get your template back.

lol, wow wordpress is miraculous, it can even alter sites like blogger????!! I never knew!!

Well, now you know, because the poster is absolutely correct. The Blogger importer that comes with WordPress logs into Blogger, CHANGES THE TEMPLATE, and then uses the new template to pull the posts and data from Blogger into WordPress.

Now, during a normal import it will change the template back afterwards, but if something stops midway through, it leaves the altered template there. IMO, it makes this perfectly clear on the importer screen in WordPress, and even tells you to make a back up of your template just in case, but that is indeed how it operates.

See it for yourself. /wp-admin/import/blogger.php

Otto, thank you. I had 3 people all saying, “It’s not WordPress/WP can’t do that.” Geez.

Problem is now solved. I chose a standard Blogger template, and the site is back online, with all my posts. It’s not as great as my customized template (prior to the import), but at least it’s back online. I’ll post a message on the main Blogger template to refer people to the new WordPress site. It’ll be nice having the Blogger site still online, since it’s got PR, and will provide an incoming link to the new WP site.

I still think that the plugin author should state that the import script CHANGES the template (and then changes the template back–assuming the import is successful). If I had read text, informing me that the import feature would be **modifying** my template, I would have had a compelling reason to backup the template.

I figured the plugin author was just being overly cautious, telling everyone to backup everything before importing. Thus, I ignored the “the backup your template” step. Lesson learned (the hard way): backup your template before importing.

Thanks again.

>>I had 3 people all saying, “It’s not WordPress/WP can’t do that.” Geez.<<

…and you had one that went back and discovered she was partially in the wrong (and admitted it), and went out of her way to help you find a way to get your template back, and posted said solution. But I guess that doesn’t matter, because being wrong/initially misunderstanding in the first place makes you eternally stupid, and not worth listening to.

Oh well.

Doodlebee – I do appreciate your suggestions in your 2nd post. Thank you.

Oh man, well now I feel dumb. Sorry for the unnecessarily harsh post; I jumped to the conclusion. And nice find, doodlebee. Never would’ve thunk’it.