Moving away from IPB

[nodle]

I just have a few questions. First off I love the way Xenforo feels. IPB is great and all but I am considering a change. I guess my first question is, does the built in IPB converter work good? I currently have a couple of addons such as blog, and files etc. I read that Xenforo doesn't convert these. Which is fine with me. I just want my members and posts. Second question is, I currently have my forum loaded on the root such as www.mywebsite.com I would like to have Xenforo to be the same thing. Now how would I go about this and the import process if my current site is hosted on the root? Does Xenforo provide a service to install and transfer your site over for a fee? I would be willing to pay to have the install and import done for me if they could do the things listed above. Like I said I don't think it would be hard, I originally did the import by myself from SMF to IPB a few years ago, but would be willing to pay to just have my users and posts moved over to Xenforo and my site loaded back on the root and IPB cleaned off and removed. Is this possible? My current forum is very small with not very many users or posts either. Has anyone else successfully moved over from IPB? What were your thoughts? Did everything go smooth? Do you enjoy it alot better? Thanks for any help!

 

[borbole]

I just have a few questions. First off I love the way Xenforo feels. IPB is great and all but I am considering a change. I guess my first question is, does the built in IPB converter work good? I currently have a couple of addons such as blog, and files etc. I read that Xenforo doesn't convert these. Which is fine with me. I just want my members and posts. Second question is, I currently have my forum loaded on the root such as www.mywebsite.com I would like to have Xenforo to be the same thing. Now how would I go about this and the import process if my current site is hosted on the root? Does Xenforo provide a service to install and transfer your site over for a fee? I would be willing to pay to have the install and import done for me if they could do the things listed above. Like I said I don't think it would be hard, I originally did the import by myself from SMF to IPB a few years ago, but would be willing to pay to just have my users and posts moved over to Xenforo and my site loaded back on the root and IPB cleaned off and removed. Is this possible? My current forum is very small with not very many users or posts either. Has anyone else successfully moved over from IPB? What were your thoughts? Did everything go smooth? Do you enjoy it alot better? Thanks for any help!

Yes, the Ipb converter works fine. There are already several users who have converted from Ipb to xenforo without any problems. After the import is finished, you can move the xenforo from what folder you have it installed to the root and then update the board url at your Acp and you should be all set.

I don''t know if xenforo provides professional conversion services but you can email the sales department and ask them about it. If they do not provide that service, then you can hire third party services here who provide conversion services.

 

[Tempest]

The IPB converter worked like a charm for me. Forum stats:

900+ Members
34,000+ Posts
1,500+ Threads

With these stats the conversion didn't take very long at all.

As for my impression with xF so far inregards to IPB, both are fantastic products and I don't particularly perfer one over the other, each has it's own specialties. My move was inspired by the "fun in posting" and management of add-ons and templates in xenForo. So far, I am very pleased in that regard. If you're looking for the answer to "Is converting to xenForo a mistake?", then I'd say no. I'd also say no to "Is staying with IPB a mistake?"

You say you have a small forum so I'm not sure how concerned you are about those indexed urls in google so if you want to wipe off IPB from your server, you can. If you are concerned about keeping all links and redirecting traffic to the xenForo urls, you'll need to keep your IPB install and upload the url redirect scripts.

Here are two useful threads regarding IPB conversion and redirection:

http://xenforo.com/community/threads/xenforo-1-0-1.14603/#post-191132

http://xenforo.com/community/threads/redirection-scripts-for-invision-power-board-3-1-x.14652/

Cheers!

 

[nodle]

Thankyou for the input Tempest. I am not concerned about re-directs. My forum is much smaller at only 40,00o post and only 34 members. I would like to wipe IPB so the server is fresh with only Xenforo software. But how would I do that wouldn't I still need to import my database?

 

[borbole]

Thankyou for the input Tempest. I am not concerned about re-directs. My forum is much smaller at only 40,00o post and only 34 members. I would like to wipe IPB so the server is fresh with only Xenforo software. But how would I do that wouldn't I still need to import my database?

You shouldn''t delete the source forum, i.e. Ipb in this case, before you have converted to xenforo and made sure that everything is working fine. Only then, you can delete your Ipb forum files and db. But even then, it would be best to make a backup of it first.

 

[nodle]

Ok I did the conversion this morning. Really wasn't to hard. Created a /forum folder uploaded all the files in and did the install and import. Then after the import I deleted the IPB files off the old root and moved the files over. Everything seems to be working great. My only question now is I was going to delete the old Mysql user for the IPB and the old database for IPB. But I noticed when I went there my new XEN database shows no file size to it but my IPB does. Is it still safe to delete my old IPB user and database?

Also I noticed this:
Previously Imported, Unarchived Data Has Been Found

I have the option to: Empty the import log without archiving

Or: Archive the import log to this new table

If I am done, do I empty it?

If I don't want to do redirects and I empty this?

 

[nodle]

Thanks for the help borbole. I did create a new user for xen and a new database for xen like it asked to on install. Here is my screenshot. You can see that IPB still shows size while the xen doesn't even though I should be running off my xen now since I did the import process. Thanks for all the help.

 

[borbole]

Thanks for the help borbole. I did create a new user for xen and a new database for xen like it asked to on install. Here is my screenshot. You can see that IPB still shows size while the xen doesn't even though I should be running off my xen now since I did the import process. Thanks for all the help.

View attachment 15813

No problem

Now that you have become a licensed customer I think it will be best if you posted at the support forum.