hi all

i have some questions concerning the installation of EE core. i have a weblog running on pM (2.2.1) for more than three years now. but due to the amount of spaming in my comments and the unavailability to have more than one weblog, i decided to upgrade to pM 2.4.  my attempt failed (see more on this unsolved issue here) and at the moment i see no chance to re-produce a stable, functioning version of the pM weblog. so i have decided to migrate to EE core somehow, as this seems to be the best solution for future blogging.
my questions:

- how do i start? i have a messed mysql database that might not be importable to EE, as some tables/columns which are necessary for a clean import are probably missing. i have a dump file of my mysql db, but i do not want to import my former entries (around 250 with images, links etc) via copy/paste (that should be the last solution). does anyone know a routine for importing time- and nerve-saving?

- what about the images in my entries? i didn’t find a clue where they are stored in EE? in the online control panel demo it seems that you have to provide an absolute path to your images not a relative one as in pM. or am i wrong? do i really need to attach them manually in the imported entry bodies?

- should i re-use my existing mysql database or start from the scratch with a new one?

- i do not want to change the simple look of my weblog, so can i use weblog.php as it is (if it still is used in this form in EE) or if not, what do i have to consider when using it in EE?

- can i use my weblog.css file as it is now, or do i have to alter anything, and if yes, what?

thx for any advice
eva_susa

how do i start?

You should probably get pM Pro back in working order before attempting to upgrade. Sue gave you some valuable advice there already.

i have a messed mysql database that might not be importable to EE

It’s not. You need to be on pm Pro 2.3, or higher, if memory serves.

i didn’t find a clue where [images] are stored in EE?

Anywhere, really, on the server. Both relative and absolute links work for this.

should i re-use my existing mysql database or start from the scratch with a new one?

It doesn’t matter, since the tables have different names.

i do not want to change the simple look of my weblog, so can i use weblog.php as it is (if it still is used in this form in EE)

No, it is not. EE’s templating system is different.

can i use my weblog.css file as it is now, or do i have to alter anything, and if yes, what?

You can certainly reuse it to some extent, yes.

I’m making the switch from pM Pro (2.4) to EE Core too.  I’ve already got EE Core installed and have been getting my templates set up, and once I figured out the templating system, I really love it!  I’m planning to spring for the Personal license in the near future.  But meanwhile:  I’m ready to “go live” with the new site this weekend, and the big worry for me is migrating over all my old pMachine weblog entries.  I have read the docs, and just have a couple of clarification questions to ask before I get started:

First:  I’m currently running pM Pro for two separate weblogs on the same site—a movie review blog, and a regular daily weblog.  My plan is to migrate the movie blog into a similar movie blog in EE Core, and the same for the daily blog.  Do I need to run the import utility twice—once on each blog?  Seems like that’s the way it will make the most sense, but not having dug into it yet, I’m not sure how the process will go.

From the user guide:

If you have files or images which you have uploaded using pMachine you will need to move those over to ExpressionEngine yourself.

Brings me to my second question—how much of my old pmachine data do I need to leave on the server, if any?  I will copy over all my image files to the EE Core directories, that’s easy enough, but do I need to keep any of my old pmachine folders and files there?  Again, I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this (no), but I feel better checking first.

Thanks in advance.