Migrate a UseResponse forum to Discourse

Community wiki Sysadmins
1

Hello,
I am glad to share files with a guide how to migrate from UseResponse forum engine to Discourse.

My case looks very custom, in two words:

Old schema:

  1. Drupal host www.example.com stores users in local mysql database.
  2. Via SSO authorized users go to UseResponse forum www.example.com/support. It has its own local mysql database with matched users. That database stores topics, posts, forum settings, attachments etc.

New schema:

  1. Drupal host www.example.com is still working.
  2. Via SSO Discourse plugin users go to new forum www.example.com/discuss

Welcome to try it :wink:

Known issues:

  1. Some internal URLs in old forums posts cannot be converted exactly to new forum format
  2. Users who registered using social logins may loose their topics and posts because of Drupal behaviour (it creates duplicate accounts). Discourse does not allow duplicate registration emails, so such topics and posts will be owned by Discobot at all. It can be fixed manually or using rake scripts (not provided).
  3. Russian users should install English Discourse first before they perform a migration because of migration scripts cannot handle localized exceptions (only english).
  4. Before migration the admin should double match Discourse topic/username/email/naming/length etc rules with UseResponse source. I tried to describe all restrictions in readme, but you may face other problems.

I am an author of migration scripts. It you have any questions on migration, I will try to assist.

Good luck!

-Ivan

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