Hello WordPress!

I have just completed migrating to WordPress! Matt, I hope you are happy now.

Moving from TypePad to WP 1.5x gets a difficulty rating of moderate. The codex instructions explaining a Movable Type switch are solid, but I ran into a few glitches.

Before my notes, just a couple of thoughts on why I made the switch. TypePad is a great product but it sits in the middle of a continuum for self-publishing and I found myself increasingly appreciating the flexibility and very clean UI of WordPress (it doesn’t hurt that it is free!)

Notes:

• Some thought is required on a “zero down time” move when migrating your domain name. I migrated before pulling the DNS switch
• It took 4 attempts before the WP importer got all of my posts into the new system. There is a known issue with the process hanging. I just kept trying and it would import a bunch more at a time (I had ~30 entries.)
• If you have spent a lot of time devising a custom style sheet then you have some work cut out for you. I am somewhat new to CSS and basically upgraded my existing blog to a Kubrick derivative. The CSS in Kubrick isn’t the cleanest code particularly the scattered use of formatting (e.g. jamming margins in h2 descriptions). That said, it only took about 2 hours to get something I like better than my old version!
• The biggest pain is porting the permalinks. The methods described are primarily for MT users as TypePad is a hosted solution. I settled on a big .htaccess file with redirects. A lot of back and forth and typing. About 4 seconds after finishing, I managed to delete the file I had been working on and had to start over (Grrr…)
• With my individual posts, I had some line break issues in about 25% of them so I went through every entry to make sure it looked good.
• If you had any additional assets (e.g. photos) at TP, you need to migrate those over to the new site. I created a new filing structure but you could try to mimic the old one. I use WebDrive to mount my remote sites which made this very easy, a quick save as to the remote folder. Once you have the assets on the new server you need to edit any posts that reference them. The Kubrick template also defaults to excerpts on the index page which left me scratching my head for a while because my photoblog photos weren’t showing up there!

That’s it. Took 4-5 hours but I am also learning as I go.

Oh, and WordPress rocks.