Thread

We are looking at EE as an excellent way to transfer our large website that has been built up over 12 years using Dreamweaver but which has a few problems - the main ones that come to mind are:

1. It is built using frames
2. It has inconsistent appearance and datatype presentation - as each new section has been added new rules have been used. We need to rebuild with consistency
3. We need to improve search facilities & most data is stored in mySQL tables (about 2000 pages are not)
4. We have an image catalogue that needs to be imported - 3000 images
4. Resistance to using a CMS - we still want to edit in Dreamweaver!

The obstacles to us using EE are:

LOTS of moving data - but I have found some import add - ons to help with this

I cannot yet find clear indication that EE can ‘out of the box’ use our current data stored in database tables to create dynamic pages.

I cannot yet verify that EE search module will search mySQL databases as well as other site content - am I going to have to write php to generate dynamic pages (for our mySQL data) in much the same way I currently do? This will then allow the search module to index pages rather than our database data directly.

No sign of any way to import images other than do it one by one! Is there anything for this?

I would like there to be modules available to do this work rather than me have to start re-writing our php code - what is available?

Many thanks for any help

Hello GAtherton,

I see that this is your first post. Welcome to the forums! I appreciate your interest in ExpressionEngine for this project.

I will do my best to answer your questions.

I cannot yet find clear indication that EE can ‘out of the box’ use our current data stored in database tables to create dynamic pages.

You will need to migrate your data into ExpressionEngine’s database. Our Channels and templates are used to present the data in the database. After the data is in the database you would still need to create channels and templates to display the data.

I cannot yet verify that EE search module will search mySQL databases as well as other site content - am I going to have to write php to generate dynamic pages (for our mySQL data) in much the same way I currently do? This will then allow the search module to index pages rather than our database data directly.

The simple search that comes with ExpressionEngine will search through the database as it searches through titles, entries, and such. There are also several Add-Ons that make the search more robust.

No sign of any way to import images other than do it one by one! Is there anything for this?

When you say import images. Do you mean get them to your server so they can be called with an imgage tag? You can just FTP them to the server. Or do you mean upload them so that ExpressionEngine’s database has a record of them? datagrab might be helpful here.

I would like there to be modules available to do this work rather than me have to start re-writing our php code - what is available?

Which work are you referring to? There are quite a few modules available for ExpressionEngine, Devot://ee is one place that has many of them listed. The search engine there works very well, if there is something in particular that you are thinking about, try a search and see what comes up.

I hope this helps. If you have more questions I would be more than happy to answer them.

Thank you,

You will need to migrate your data into ExpressionEngine’s database. Our Channels and templates are used to present the data in the database. After the data is in the database you would still need to create channels and templates to display the data.

I understood I could use php files and Dreamweaver to edit as an alternative to using the cms interface? I was hoping to use a hybrid approach - EE to look after templates & design and DW to edit content/add php coding.

I cannot yet verify that EE search module will search mySQL databases as well as other site content - am I going to have to write php to generate dynamic pages (for our mySQL data) in much the same way I currently do? This will then allow the search module to index pages rather than our database data directly.

The simple search that comes with ExpressionEngine will search through the database as it searches through titles, entries, and such. There are also several Add-Ons that make the search more robust.

By this you mean the EE database tables rather than those we have currently in use to provide dynamic content? This I would still need to import all of my database tables into EE database? How is this done?

No sign of any way to import images other than do it one by one! Is there anything for this?

When you say import images. Do you mean get them to your server so they can be called with an imgage tag? You can just FTP them to the server. Or do you mean upload them so that ExpressionEngine’s database has a record of them? datagrab might be helpful here.

OK thanks - I suspect there will still no alternative to labelling images one by one as we upload them into EE?

I would like there to be modules available to do this work rather than me have to start re-writing our php code - what is available?

Which work are you referring to? There are quite a few modules available for ExpressionEngine, Devot://ee is one place that has many of them listed. The search engine there works very well, if there is something in particular that you are thinking about, try a search and see what comes up.

Importing our 50 000 php website pages - it is going to be a big problem cutting and pasting all of those into the EE CMS frontend! 45000 of these are based on content in database tables, 2000 are static pages, 2000 images - all need reassembling in EE. It doesn’t look do-able unless we can automate a lot of that.

Hello GAtherton,

I understood I could use php files and Dreamweaver to edit as an alternative to using the cms interface? I was hoping to use a hybrid approach - EE to look after templates & design and DW to edit content/add php coding.

What you would do in that case is use the “Save template as file” option and then use dreamweaver to edit the files. That allows you to use DW as an editor.

By this you mean the EE database tables rather than those we have currently in use to provide dynamic content? This I would still need to import all of my database tables into EE database? How is this done?

That is correct, the search we include searches our database. You would not be importing your tables into the database, you would need to import your data, which of course means exporting it out of the current database and then structuring it so it can be imported into the new database. There are a few tools out there that help, but depending on the complexity of the job, you may want to consider hiring a DBA to help with the transition.

Going back to your images question. A better utility might be Channel Images

Importing our 50 000 php website pages - it is going to be a big problem cutting and pasting all of those into the EE CMS frontend! 45000 of these are based on content in database tables, 2000 are static pages, 2000 images - all need reassembling in EE. It doesn’t look do-able unless we can automate a lot of that.

Unfortunately, there is no way to automate these tasks. This will be a sizable job to make it happen. But I guarantee that it will be worth it. ExpressionEngine will allow you to continue to grow and manage your site better as growth continues.

Let me know your thoughts and we can go from there.

Cheers,