WordCamp Toronto 2016 took place August 6 and 7, 2016, at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University. Our founder, Brian Messenlehner, had two spots on the schedule: a business panel called Running A Successful Business With WordPress, and a session in the community track called Move All The Things To WordPress!
The business panel
At 2:15 pm, Brian joined Cory Miller, Rebecca Gill, John Eckman and Tom Auger for a panel on running a successful business with WordPress. It was a strong lineup of people who had built agencies, products and consultancies on the platform. Panels like this are valuable because they show how many different business models WordPress supports, from product companies to consulting firms to agencies serving enterprise clients.
Move All The Things To WordPress
At 3:00 pm, Brian gave the migration talk. The session description set the tone: as WordPress becomes more popular, more people and companies using something else will want to move their websites into it. The talk covered how to migrate data from open source and proprietary web applications into WordPress:
- When the source has a well architected database, the migration is mostly careful mapping.
- When you only get CSV, XML, JSON or HTML files and feeds, you clean and import them in batches.
- In extreme cases with no data access at all, you may have to collect the content from the live site page by page.
The talk showcased large scale WordPress migrations Brian had led for organizations including Microsoft, DrugFree.org, Newark Public Schools, Campbell's Soup and H-E-B. It was aimed at intermediate and advanced developers comfortable with WordPress, databases and PHP.
What Toronto added
The slides included a section on identifying data sources, which is still the first step of every migration we run. Before writing a line of import code, we list every place content lives: the main CMS, attached files, user accounts, form submissions, embedded media, and the integrations nobody remembers until they break.
The conclusion of the talk is one we repeat to every client: there can be many technical challenges when migrating into WordPress, but nothing that cannot be solved with planning and code.
From Toronto to today
Migrations remain one of AlphaWeb's core services. We plan the content model, write repeatable import scripts, preserve dates and authors, map every URL to a 301 redirect and test on staging until the numbers match. The enterprise names from the Toronto talk are part of the experience Brian brings to every project.
If you are planning a move to WordPress, AlphaWeb has a proven playbook.
At a glance
- Event: WordCamp Toronto 2016
- Dates: August 6 and 7, 2016
- Venue: Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University
- Panel: Running A Successful Business With WordPress, 2:15 pm
- Session: Move All The Things To WordPress!, community track, 3:00 pm
Related: WordCamp Miami 2015: Move All the Things to WordPress, Consolidating Your Web Platforms: How We Plan a WordPress Migration and PressNomics 4: The Business of WordPress in Tempe, Arizona.
Have a question about this event or a project like the ones mentioned here? Reach out to AlphaWeb and Brian will be glad to talk it through. We are always happy to compare notes on WordPress, mobile apps and migrations.
