Question about merging two v3 forums

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FORDification
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Question about merging two v3 forums

Post by FORDification »

The forum I run is fairly busy...we have 4000+ members, about 250K posts and average maybe 100 posts per day.

In an effort to minimize the forum downtime while I convert from v2 to v3, I installed WAMP and got a clone version of the forums on my computer, so I could practice the conversion and iron out any snags before doing the real thing, and I'll be handling the real conversion in the same manner (offline on my computer). I'm trying to figure out how I should go about this to minimize forum downtime and yet not leave my users without a place to hang out for several days. I had an idea that I thought I'd better run past you guys to make sure this might be a feasible alternative.

So...I was thinking about temporarily disabling the v2 forums to do a complete database dump, in order to download it for the conversion. As soon as I had the dump, I'd re-enable the forums and allow the members to continue using it while I'm converting the database, which will take several days (with my limited time available to work on it.) I'd upload the new database, get the v3 forums running and get everyone using that one, and then take the v2 forums offline and again to a database dump, convert it to v3, and import the data into the first v3 database...essentially merging two v3 databases into one. That way I'd be able to keep all posts and any new members during the conversion process.

Can anyone foresee any problems with this plan?
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TheGerman
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Re: Question about merging two v3 forums

Post by TheGerman »

I just wonder if the forum is so critical that you can't afford an hour or two (at most) of downtime while it converts. You could simply announce a scheduled downtime in day X between hours Y and Z. Though maybe I shouldn't be posting this as it's not my business what's in it, I'm just curious :?

The only problem I see is that you will have duplicated post/user id fields. Say you make a db dump and let the users keep posting. Then convert the dump, and let the users keep posting there. New posts from after the dump (but before the conversion), will have the same id as new posts from after the conversion, and trying to merge those into the same database is a primary key conflict (the "alternate timeline" problem). I don't think that will be easy to get around, especially if we're talking about so many users/posts a day.
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FORDification
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Re: Question about merging two v3 forums

Post by FORDification »

No, it's not that critical...a scheduled downtime isn't out of the question. I was just running several different ideas around in my mind, and was just curious if something like this was possible. Yes, it would be more work, I'm more curious about the logistics....COULD it be done. I didn't know if there be any data on either that would conflict trying to merge two databases like that.
TheGerman wrote:...The only problem I see is that you will have duplicated post/user id fields. Say you make a db dump and let the users keep posting. Then convert the dump, and let the users keep posting there. New posts from after the dump (but before the conversion), will have the same id as new posts from after the conversion, and trying to merge those into the same database is a primary key conflict (the "alternate timeline" problem). I don't think that will be easy to get around, especially if we're talking about so many users/posts a day.
That's exactly what I was foreseeing as well, but I'm no expert. Thanks for the info...I'll just go with the planned downtime.
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