XF 2.2 Updating an old Html website to Xenforo

[Ottavius]

We have a 20 y/o webpage that has an index.html and lots of .Html, .Htm in the articles.
We also have Xenforo software and AMS addon from Bob.

This old website resides in a shared hosting plan (not main root).
How to convert all articles or change it to a format so it is compatible with Xenforo?
Any feasible method?

 

[Paul B]

It would have to be done manually or require custom development.

 

[Ottavius]

Thanks @Brogan, but how do I go about doing manually?
Do I have to do redirects?
The site is over 500 pages, and about 100 pages will be deleted.

I have uploaded Xenforo and AMS addon.

Though, I have not created a folder or subdomain, while doing a test, it shows like this:

example.com/forums/test-page.2/​

example.com/threads/test-page.1/​

I cannot find "forums" (Must I create a folder or I can just leave it the way it is now)

 

[Mr Lucky]

cannot find "forums" (Must I create a folder or I can just leave it the way it is now)

Leave it like that. Forums appears in the same way as if there is a sub directory but really it’s just a sort of way the url is organised.

if you are using xenForo page nodes you can just copy the html of your pages. However as you have the article addon that is I assume much better in the long run for navigation and for rich text editing and formatting,

I have transferred html pages to Wordpress which may have some similarities and the best method I found mostly was not to copy the html but to copy the front end page direct from browser window, then paste that into the visual (non html) rich text editor.

Much of the formatting such as bulleted list would transfer nicely. The big decision would be to keep image URL’s or transfer to the attachment system.

 

[djbaxter]

Could you "import" the old HTML articles to your forum using RSS?

 

[Ottavius]

I have transferred html pages to Wordpress which may have some similarities and the best method I found mostly was not to copy the html but to copy the front end page direct from browser window, then paste that into the visual (non html) rich text editor.

Much of the formatting such as bulleted list would transfer nicely. The big decision would be to keep image URL’s or transfer to the attachment system.

@Mr Lucky , thanks, I have done exactly just that.

Question. How did you do with the index.html ?
The forum now is taking shape, but the main page still shows example.com/index.html

Could you "import" the old HTML articles to your forum using RSS?

Thanks for reply, I doubled checked with Google on how to do it, but the webpage never had a RSS Feed

 

[Mr Lucky]

example.com/index.html

Bear in mind I am talking about a similar process but with wordpress.

However I am confused because neither WP of XF display a URL with html extension, it would always be .php

I haven't done this for a while but i think you need to tick friendly URLs in basic options (I think for thos you must activate the .htaccess in file system by removing.txt and add the dot in front) and make sure you have the correct page set for index page route.

 

[Mr Lucky]

The forum now is taking shape, but the main page still shows example.com/index.html

Aha, I just realised, you must still have that html page and your browser is using it instead of xenforo index.php. Jusr delete it. infact none of your html pages need to be there unless you specifically want to keep some of them.

 

[Ottavius]

Aha, I just realised, you must still have that html page and your browser is using it instead of xenforo index.php. Jusr delete it. infact none of your html pages need to be there unless you specifically want to keep some of them.

I might delete index.html after , but this take me to another question.

How did you do, so Google does not think you have duplicate pages?
This website through the years got very well positioned. Although it no longer comes up on Google's first page, a typical search will (at least) 90% of the time, bring it up first on search results.

 

[Mr Lucky]

I might delete index.html after , but this take me to another question.

How did you do, so Google does not think you have duplicate pages?
This website through the years got very well positioned. Although it no longer comes up on Google's first page, a typical search will (at least) 90% of the time, bring it up first on search results.

You would just need to redirect your old pages to the new.

 

[Ottavius]

You would just need to redirect your old pages to the new.

Got it!, thanks again for your help