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Forums Using DNN Platform Administration and Configuration

Merging and Splitting Individual Portals to/from one database

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RichardHowells
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3/6/2024 12:40 PM

I have a few DNN sites that are very lightly used.  Currently they run in their own installations with their own databases.

I'd like to consider consolidating them into one site with multiple portals. 

Imagine the simplest case.  Install A with its own IIS Site and DB; and Install B with its own IIS Site and DB

Superficially this seems simple (hah!) most tables in the database contain a portal ID, so presumably to merge Install B's database into Install A's database requires...

  • Allocate a portal ID for each site in Install B that is unused in Install A
  • Copy all the tables in Install B into Install A - overwriting portal IDs as appropriate

...And in the file system..

  • Copy all the portal specific directories from B to A, again overwriting portal ID's as appropriate
  • Install any modules that were in B but not in A

Has anyone tried this in the past?  Are there any scripts/programs to do the job - even partial would be a helpful start

Of course the moment I thought about this I started to conside that I might want to do the reverse at some point in the future and extract a single portal from a multiportal site.  Are there any tools for that?

Am I just replicating what site import/export is intended to do?  Does site import/export actually work?

Daniel Valadas
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3/6/2024 3:16 PM
For separating sites, it is kinda simple, you copy the whole instance somewhere else and delete all the portals you don't want. For merging (I never did it) but in theory you could export a whole site and import it in another instance assuming all of your extensions implement import/export properly.
Will Strohl
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3/6/2024 3:48 PM
Oh, wow... That's a great question. I know I've done this before, but it was very tricky to do the last time I did it. The biggest pain is when a module doesn't export/import the way you intend. That will always require some manual work, and there will be plenty of SQL cleanup involved.
Michael Tobisch
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3/8/2024 5:19 AM
Separation is simple, as Daniel said. Merging never worked for me (Export/Import), but the sites always were too small and it was easier to set up a new site in the other protal and transfering the content manually. For a site with a lot of users I sent out an email that they have to "re-register".

Happy DNNing!
Michael

Michael Tobisch
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