Migrating from Yahoo Groups to Xenforo?

DavideBianchini

DavideBianchini

New member
I was wondering if anyone has an experience migrating from Yahoo Groups to Xenforo. Yahoo is closing down their Groups within a few weeks, and we are now scrambling to find an alternate solution.

We have 5,000+ members and likely over 100,000+ posts.

Thanks,

Davide
 
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I can get full administrative privileges if the owner decides to go forward on this. I assume this includes some sort of export function, maybe CSV. I don't know, since I have never migrated from Yahoo Groups before. I doubt there is direct access to the server-side database, as you would find in Control Panel with MySQL.

-Davide
 
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I honestly would hire a developer to scrape the entire group for content and names and then import all of that into XF as "guests" (using their Yahoo! alias).

This is because I'm highly unsure whether that export would include their Yahoo! email address. It might come with the alias and content, to include attachments, used in the group. However, the alias is not linked to any Yahoo! address nor password.

There will be no initial way of determining who is who on any import, whether the data downloaded includes everything you need or a scrape takes place.

You might just need to trust people to "claim" specific names (or, take their email address in a Google Form with their alias in the meantime to cross-reference).
 
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frm said:
I honestly would hire a developer to scrape the entire group for content and names and then import all of that into XF as "guests" (using their Yahoo! alias).

This is because I'm highly unsure whether that export would include their Yahoo! email address. It might come with the alias and content, to include attachments, used in the group. However, the alias is not linked to any Yahoo! address nor password.

There will be no initial way of determining who is who on any import, whether the data downloaded includes everything you need or a scrape takes place.

You might just need to trust people to "claim" specific names (or, take their email address in a Google Form with their alias in the meantime to cross-reference).
Click to expand...

A scraper was my first thought, but considering what a hack job that would ultimately be, plus who knows what sorts of changes Yahoo will be implementing between now and the time they close down the service. Plus, a scraper is probably a violation of the ToS, like it is virtually everywhere.
 
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doublespaces said:
Plus, a scraper is probably a violation of the ToS, like it is virtually everywhere.
Click to expand...
Well, you can "justify" that by them closing their doors and you needing to find a viable solution now, when the files may not be ready for 30 days. A scrape job can be done in about a day on freelance sites and I doubt Yahoo! would change the structure that fast to prevent it.

Do you even know what kind of data they're going to provide, and in what structure; in other words, have you ever downloaded the data before and saw what's in it to see if it's possible to import?
 
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You need to act now.

Create a XF forum and post a message in your group letting them you have moved. If your forum is active and your members are willing they will migrate.

Yahoo isn't going to give up any member's personal info so you can forget about migrating accounts. If the content is important you could create a read-only archive, but time is of the essence I'd make that post.

Attention: Starting December 14, 2019 Yahoo Groups will no longer host user created content on its sites. New content can no longer be uploaded after October 28, 2019. Sending/Receiving email functionality is not going away, you can continue to communicate via any email client with your group members.
 
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beerForo said:
Send an email to <your_group_name>@yahoogroups.com
Click to expand...
Nice find.

I was more into the 'scraping' and 'claiming', but quite possibly add it to an archived node and people can start over and/or claim those posts. My way of thinking is the UGC is going to be deleted from public view, thus making the scraped content unique again, if it can't be downloaded. But to get a copy in 30 days is somewhat ridiculous, especially when they don't specify what is being downloaded.

I would definitely blast that email out once every 2 weeks announcing the forum.

And, I'd create an account with that email address and "watch" newly, interesting, created threads or nodes. That way, the entire group will be notified when a new message is created/replied to as well.

Eventually, it's gonna die off and you're going to get those that you get. But, take all that you can. And, use the older content for a boost in SERPS (depending on your niche, etc., and if it's worth it).
 
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For XF you can setup yahoo as a connected account which would make registration process for your group more convenient.

Of course if you somehow get all the data from your yahoo groups migrated to a XF, you could potentially wouldn't need any registrations as all people could use their yahoo accounts. But that is much unlikely.

I am also looking for some ways of at least backing up of some yahoo groups, but I couldn't find a good way right now. Tested some python scripts but yahoo keeps blocking me and doesn't let me scrape.
 
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First step is to grab a copy of the data before it goes. Without the data, everything else is pointless.

The best way is likely to be with some kind of scraper, as this can get usernames etc. I doubt any official data export will do this.

Downloads & Archived Yahoo Groups

Downloads page. Here you can download every version of PG Offline and archived Yahoo groups.
www.personalgroupware.com

The author of this software has some info about subsequent conversion to Wordpress and phpBB. It can export to a SQL database, and from there, conversion is possible, but potentially costly and difficult.

Much as I love Xenforo, perhaps a better option might be migrating to

Groups.io: Powerful Email Groups & Collaboration Platform

groups.io groups.io

Its really more of a like-for-like replacement than any forum would be. They are however requiring you buy a full 1 year paid subscription ($110 US) to migrate your Yahoo Group data. I guess they've got you over a barrel right now. A lot depends on how important the old data is to your group.
 
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We do have a copy of the database, thankfully.

We originally looked into Groups.io, but then discovered that some alternative medicine practices are against their policy and may be subject to censorship. Since our forums is precisely in this field, we could not risk censorship from them.

-Davide
 
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