Backup script for typo blogs

14 Feb 2007 • Technology

Ruby script for backing up blogs is here. Feedback from testers is appreciated.

Your blog is saved into a YAML file and can either be uploaded back to the original blog or a different one.

Backup or Restore the content of a blog to/from YAML whose host server supports the MetaWebLog API. (Currently supports typo wordpress blogger)

Script was originally created by Derek Mahar for migrating posts between blogs and then changed extensively to serve as a backup/restore utility by Pete McBreen

Sample command lines (program prompts for blog password)

ruby backup\_blog.rb username improvingwetware.com backup.yaml 25 typo backup
ruby backup\_blog.rb username improvingwetware.com backup.yaml num\_posts typo restore

(the num_posts argument is unused on restore)

Note: typo has bug whereby it ignores createdDate when creating URL, but does show correctly posted x days ago. Clicking on the link on the home page fails but it generates feed OK — puzzling — not fixed yet.

Code uses the metaweblog API

source_posts = blog_client.call(
      "metaWeblog.getRecentPosts",
      blog_id,
      username,
      password,
      post_count)

and then saves the posts to a YAML file

f = File.new(backup_filename, "w")
f.puts source_posts.to_yaml
f.close
 2007