WordPress.com Import File too big

You can edit the file.

First, save a copy of it somewhere in case you muck up. ??

Open up the file in something like Ultraedit. It may open in Notepad but it may not since it’s fairly large. See those opening and closing item tags? Within each pair of those is a post, including the comments. What you can do is cut out say half of your posts, save it in UTF-8 format (Make sure there’s not formatting), and import that much smaller file. When it goes through, open up the copy that you saved and, this time edit out the item pairs that made it in.

Hope this helps,
-drmike

The importer doesn’t have a file size limit, as far as I know. Your host may have configured it to only allow you to upload files up to 2 meg though. You may be able to increase this amount though. Look through your host’s documentation and help and such. Or ask them.

Ah, don’t you love answers that just say, “You’re doing it wrong”?

Yes, there is a file size limit. It says so right there on the “Import” screen. Try to upload your posts, anyway, and you’ll end up getting an error message, or, timing out, or worse.

As DrMike says, you need to break up the file into pieces.

1) Export your file, this will create one mega-file.
>> Manage >> Export

2) Open the file with Notepad.

3) Highlight a bunch of posts.

4) Copy those posts into a new Notepad file, and save as .rss file. (Make sure you don’t save it as a “.rss.txt” file by accident.

You’ll have to guess as to how many posts to put into each smaller file. I found it better to err on the side of caution. I had an 11.4mb file, but I ended up with over 20 smaller files, but I had no idea how big each file was. Overkill? A bit, but I didn’t want to have to keep recreating the files, over and over again.

5) The important part you’ll need in each of the smaller files is the “header” and “footer” of the original file, for lack of a better term. As MrMike said, each entry begins with <item> and ends with </item>.

In the “master” .rss file, you’ll see a bunch of entries at the beginning. Copy all of this and put it into each of your smaller files. Copy all the way from the first <xml> tag all the way until right before the first <item> tag.

(This information seems to be necessary in each of the smaller files, even though it may seem redundant. This information includes categories, etc., so you’d think that after your first upload, you wouldn’t need to include it in subsequent uploads. I guess you do, because I didn’t, first time, and ended up with blank categories on all my posts. If this confuses you, just ignore it. All you need to remember is to make sure each smaller file has the beginning part and ending part of the original file.)

After the end of the last </item> you’ll see two more tags – </channel> and </rss>. You’ll need to enter this at the tail end of each of your smaller files.

Save each file, again, making sure it ends in .rss.

6) Go to your new blog.
>> Manage >> Import >> WordPress

7) Browse to the first of your smaller files (ah, now you realize, you need to label them in such a way as to remember which ones you’ve uploaded and which ones you haven’t …)

8) If the new file is small enough, WordPress will prompt you to set up new “authors”. If it’s too big, you’ll get some sort of error message. I suggest going to your Manage Posts page to make sure none of the files have uploaded, but you can always do that later.

(There seems to be a control to keep you from uploading the same entries more than once; this is good.)

9) WordPress will upload the files and tell you they are all set, by showing the words “Importing …” with the name of each blog entry.

Voila! You can go on to the next file.

JohnAKeith wrote : “Ah, don’t you love answers that just say, “You’re doing it wrong”?

Yes, there is a file size limit. It says so right there on the “Import” screen. Try to upload your posts, anyway, and you’ll end up getting an error message, or, timing out, or worse.”

Sorry dude, but you are wrong.

The import option doesn’t have a maximum file size limit by itself.

The number you read on that page is taken from the php configuration of your host, the upload_max_filesize configured in the core php settings on the server you use.

By default, this upload_max_filesize is set to 2 megs… This is why you see “maximum size 2M” on the upload page. If you change your upload_max_filesize settings in the php configuration, let’s say to 4 megs, you will read 4 megs.

So, no, the import fuction doesn’t have a maximum size limit… All you have to do, is to ask your host to change the php settings in upload_max_filesize to the size you want…

Maybe they will not agree, but the fact is that there is no limit…

S.

Where is this file found to change the upload limit for file sizes over 2MB?

“upload_max_filesize”

Thanks in advance!

On most hosts you can NOT change that – you need to contact them and ask to change that parameter, at least temporarily.

On most hosts you can NOT change that – you need to contact them and ask to change that parameter, at least temporarily.

You could also just ask your host if they could import the file for you – I know my host has done that for me when I’ve had huge databases/backups/etc that exceed their set parameters.

Ah right, thanks for that.

I’ve fired off an email to them asking them to amend it for me.

I was under the impression it could be changed from the FTP and associated files.

Your help is greatly appreciated. Thank you.

>>>The number you read on that page is taken from the php configuration of your host, the upload_max_filesize configured in the core php settings on the server you use.<<<

I don’t think this is correct. I have this setting in my php.ini file set to 20M and I’m still getting a 15000K limit error.

Is it possible that there IS a limit coded in to the application somewhere?