conversion fails (phpbb2 to phpbb3)

[ZombieSlayer]

I'm about fed up with this conversion process (using WAMP offline). 6 hours a day for the last two days and I can't get any further than step 17. I can't even continue a previous conversion That's when the page suddenly times out, the last thing I see before that is;

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filling table phpbb_posts:

skip_rows = 5905

Although the 5905 varies from 5105 to 5905.

Things I have done;

Offline conversion .. yes many many many times.
Edited /install/install_convert ... yes many many times (different combos of time and limit sizes). In fact the relevant code will be posted below.
Edited my.ini (mysql) and increased max_allowed_packet to 10M (was at 1M)
Gone into phpmydamin and deleting posts with a gazillion smilies and/or spaces ... yes, in fact I deleted an entire forum (spam forum) where people could post anything they wanted.

Forum has 25,686 total posts.

edited /install/install_convert

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@set_time_limit(0);
@ini_set('memory_limit', '256M');
@ini_set('upload_max_filesize', '128M');
@ini_set('post_max_size', '256M');
@ini_set('max_input_time', '-1');
@ini_set('max_execution_time', '-1');
@ini_set('expect.timeout', '-1');
@ini_set('default_socket_timeout', '-1');

// snip

var $batch_size = 5000; 

var $num_wait_rows = 50;

Suggestion: put the batch size and num wait rows in the "settings" page of the conversion so we don't have to open the damn file to edit it every time.

[ZombieSlayer]

Update:

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var $batch_size = 1;

var $num_wait_rows = 1;

Got me to 6700ish (offline). So umm, now what? I can't go lower than 1/1 can I?

Also am I correct in thinking that this...

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| 6 rows/s (1 rows) | 

...means there are 6 rows in the post and they are being converted 1 row at a time?]

EDIT: Using wamp (as mentioned before) with latest FF as default browser. Using IE ends up with the page automatically closing.

[D¡cky]

If the convertor stops at the same place every time, it is likely that you have a very large post or a post with a long string of unbroken text.

Look in the phpBB3 posts table and see what the last post that got inserted is. Then find this post in the phpBB2 posts_text table and look at the next 10 to 20 posts to see if you can spot any abnormalities.

[utPaintball]

Hello Dicky,

I am working on this conversion with ZombieSlayer and I have a question. The database we are converting has about 29k posts. So as the converter works it just keeps converting posts over to phpbb3. As I was doing the conversion it stopped at 7400 and when I hit continue conversion I got a 500 server error. So what I did was go to phpmyadmin and check the latest post created in our phpbb3 database and it was post 10747 so do I need to check for errors after post 7400, or post 10747?

[D¡cky]

utPaintball,

Check after post_id 10747

[utPaintball]

Ok cool that's what I was doing but I wanted to make sure that was right. Thanks for the help dicky, after cleaning up some posts (posts containing nothing but strings of quotes and smilies for pages and pages) I am currently converting post 25000/29000 which is a HUGE improvement from dying at step 7100. Thanks for all your help so far and I'll post back when everything goes well.

[utPaintball]

Everything is working now! All I had to do was delete like 20 problem posts (nothing but smilies for pages, and pages, and pages) and away she went. Thank you so much for the tips dicky. Your the man.

[XavierPN]

Hi there,

I've been struggling for the last two days with this issue. My symptoms were as described, a 500 Error on my production server, and my offline upgrade ending up with a "download (empty) index.php". There was a post with a word long thousands of characters (kind of LOLLLLLL with 2 billion L!).

I saw many people struggling with this step 17, I will investigate a "feature request" in order to include a word length check since this seems to be causing quite a lot of problems.

But first of all, many thanks to Dicky who seems to reply to all people having this step 17 issue around here

Cheers,
Xavier

[jblack1175]

Hi, so I added the code and managed to get through a couple more button pushes, but now it's doing the same thing. I looked in the db and found the last post that transferred and looked at the next post. It didn't have any smilies in it or weird codes... But, I deleted it (using the 'edit post' function of the actual board) just in case. I choose to continue my board installation and it barely tries before just going to a white page.

I'm upgrading from 2.0.18 to 3.0.8. I've been at this for over a week...First, I had to get through deleting THOUSANDS of bogus spammer IDs that wouldn't convert (the main reason I wanted to upgrade - to try minimizing/eliminating so many spammer registrations). I then started the install over again - after deleting the users, and received a fatal error due to no 'user_conv' table being present. So, I dropped all the tables, and deleted the config.php file; uploaded a new config.php file and started the install process over again from scratch. I got all the way to step 17 and am now timing out and timing out.

I'm at a loss...Very frustrated and demoralized. I'm tired of dealing with this thing. I've searched out topics, attempted to fix...I've added the timeout code to the "convert_phpbb20.php" file, and, like I said, got through a few more lines and now, dead again.

If someone could help me figure out what to do next, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks,
Jennifer

[D¡cky]

Jennifer,

As has been mentioned in the topic, you probably have a very, very large post or a post with a long string of unbroken characters. The way to find it:

OPEN install_convert.php
FIND

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var $batch_size = 2000;

REPLACE WITH

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var $batch_size = 10;

FIND

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var $num_wait_rows = 20;

REPLACE WITH

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var $num_wait_rows = 10;

SAVE/CLOSE
When the convertor stops, find the last post inserted into phpBB3.
Find the same post in the phpbb2 posts_text table and look at the next 10 posts.

I've added the timeout code to the "convert_phpbb20.php" file

The timeout code is to be added to install_convert.php, not convert_phpbb20.php. Some servers do not allow you to override the settings with this code, so you may still experience timeout errors. If this is the case, you will have to do the conversion locally. Use EasyPHP, WampServer, or XAMPP. Some helpful tips are in this Knowledge Base article, Offline Conversions

[n2o]

I am having this problem. I have converted this same database before without this problem so im not sure what caused it to happen this time. Anyway I would really appreciate some help.

I have followed exactly what Dicky said .

The last post in my phpbb3 database is

post_id 11065
topic_id 7905
forum_id 4
poster_id 169

My question is how do I find that post in my phpbb2 database ? When I look at the phpbb_posts_text the post_id's are not in order . When I tried sorting the post_ids and look at post_id 11065 its no the same.

Please tell me how stupid I am so I can fix this problem . I gotta be missing something pretty simple here. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

[D¡cky]

My question is how do I find that post in my phpbb2 database ? When I look at the phpbb_posts_text the post_id's are not in order . When I tried sorting the post_ids and look at post_id 11065 its no the same.

Sorting by post_id is one way to find a post. Another way is to perform a query

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SELECT * FROM phpbb_posts_text WHERE post_id = xx

Replace phpbb_ with your table prefix if necessary and replace xx with the post id you are looking for.

The post_id's do not change during the conversion and neither does any other id's or the post_text. If the text is different, you must be looking at the wrong database or tables with the wrong prefix.

[n2o]

My question is how do I find that post in my phpbb2 database ? When I look at the phpbb_posts_text the post_id's are not in order . When I tried sorting the post_ids and look at post_id 11065 its no the same.

Sorting by post_id is one way to find a post. Another way is to perform a query

Code: Select all

SELECT * FROM phpbb_posts_text WHERE post_id = xx

Replace phpbb_ with your table prefix if necessary and replace xx with the post id you are looking for.

The post_id's do not change during the conversion and neither does any other id's or the post_text. If the text is different, you must be looking at the wrong database or tables with the wrong prefix.

Thanks for explaining it to me Dicky. I was able to find the offending post.

Unfortunately I have another issue now. It stopped again so I followed the same steps.

The last post in my phpbb3 database is 341092. When I look in my phpbb2 database 341092 is the last post. There are no other posts after it ????

Please help

[D¡cky]

The last post in my phpbb3 database is 341092. When I look in my phpbb2 database 341092 is the last post. There are no other posts after it ????

You sorted by post_id to verify that it is the last post?

The next table to be converted after the posts table is the private messages table. It is possible that the private messages is giving you the same problem that you had with the posts.

[n2o]

The last post in my phpbb3 database is 341092. When I look in my phpbb2 database 341092 is the last post. There are no other posts after it ????

You sorted by post_id to verify that it is the last post?

The next table to be converted after the posts table is the private messages table. It is possible that the private messages is giving you the same problem that you had with the posts.

Thanks for the info Ill take a look now.