WPXML Data Import Producing Error Messages

[Robert]

Hello,

We are migrating all events from one WordPress instance to another. Everything is at the latest version (WP and EC plugins). Because the WPXML data files are quite large, and because we need a single-command solution to cut over to the new site, we are using wp-cli, which generates WPXML.

On a vanilla instance, with just EC and wp-importer plugins active, and the 2014 theme, when we run the import on a WPXML file that contains only tribe_event, tribe_venue, and tribe_organizer content types, we often see this error:

Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /path/to/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/events-calendar-pro/src/functions/template-tags/general.php on line 64

It shows up during calendar view display after the import.

Looking at the code, it would appear that some of the metadata for recurrence is not coming back as arrays. Perhaps the old and new format of metadata for repeating events has some incompatibility? In any case, the month view on the target site now takes a long to load as well, whereas the source site month view does not.

Apart from the recurrence of this error message, the events (including recurring events) seem to have come across correctly otherwise.

Please could you verify if you have seen this before, and what steps we might take to be able to eliminate the error messages? I would be happy to attach a zipped version of the WPXML file if that helps.

Thanks in advance!

Best wishes,
Robert

[George]

Hey @Robert,

I’m sorry for the trouble here – I have not seen this myself at this time and can’t reproduce the sort of problem you describe, but there are number of specific steps we can take here to get started with some deeper investigation:

1. Can you share your system information with us? Here’s how → https://theeventscalendar.com/knowledgebase/sharing-sys-info/

2. You mention being able to share zips of the XML files – this would indeed be quite helpful! If possible, can you upload these .zips to a site like http://ge.tt, and then share the link there so that we can download the files?

3. Can you clarify, to the best of your knowledge, what versions of The Events Calendar and WordPress and such were on the site you are exporting from? In other words – above, I requested the System Information for the site you are importing into, and here for #3 I’m requesting as much of the same sort of information as possible from the old site that is being exported from. Heck, if this old site being exported from is still up and running, then you can even share the System Information from it! 🙂 If not, though, to the best of your knowledge what were the versions of WordPress, The Events Calendar, and Events Calendar Pro specifically?

—

These three things will give us a great start for looking into this. Thank you in advance for as much of this information as you can provide!

Sincerely,
George

[Robert]

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[Robert]

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[Robert]

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[Robert]

Hi @George,

Thanks for your reply. I have posted a few private replies with system information and a link to download the WPXML file.

Note that stage.msia.org is the server we want to import to (target), and http://www.msia.org is the server we are getting the live events from (source). The system information for stage.msia.org that I sent shows all plugins active and our custom theme, but to reproduce this we also disabled all but EC and wp-importer plugins, and ran the 2014 theme. We still get the error messages in that case as well.

Looking forward to your thoughts! Thanks again.

Best,
Robert

[George]

Hey Robert,

Thanks for providing all of this information!

In the information for the first site, I see a listing like this:

The MSIA Events Calendar Plugin version 0.1 by Modern Tribe, Inc. AND MSIA

1. What is this plugin?

2. The error message you get is related to recurring-event rules that are generated within event meta. I’m wondering if anything improves if you make sure that Events Calendar Pro is totally deactivated on the site you are importing into – this might allow the import to run successfully, then you can try activating Events Calendar Pro after the fact and see if anything is improved…

Cheers! And thank you so much for your patience with this 🙂

— George

[Robert]

Hi @George,

Thanks for your quick reply.

1. This is a customised version of the-events-calendar-filterbar. We actually found that this approach was a bad idea, because we can’t get future updates to the-events-calendar-filterbar without clobbering custom code. So, we are going to refactor this completely and use a standalone plugin that leverages filters/hooks where possible to achieve the same effect.

2. Are you saying deactivate just the PRO plugin before doing the import? I don’t think we can safely deactivate the free plugin, or the custom post types defined there won’t exist and the import will fail.

Let me know if this is what you mean, in #2 above, and I’ll try deactivating both PRO and the custom filterbar and see if we can get a clean error-free import that way.

Thanks again for your help!

Best,
Robert

[George]

Hey Robert,

For number 2 I definitely mean to just deactivate the PRO plugin. Do NOT deactivate The Events Calendar – just Events Calendar Pro.

Then try performing the import.

Let me know how it goes!

—

PS

You mention not wanting to deactivate Events Calendar Pro for concern of lack of post types and such. Just for reference, The Events Calendar is the “core” plugin, where event post types are defined and venues, organizers, and taxonomies too.

Events Calendar Pro, Community Events, our ticketing plugins, and any other plugin we sell is just an add-on to those core features from The Events Calendar 🙂

Just thought it might be helpful to share some of this info!

[Robert]

Hi @George,

I’m happy to say I’m not seeing any errors on the import or the calendar page now. Thanks for your help!

Best,
Robert

[George]

Awesome Robert. Part one down! 🙂

Once imported, I would recommend trying to activate Events Calendar Pro again. If errors arise, come back and open a new thread about them.

You MIGHT have an option in Events > Settings in your wp-admin to regenerate Recurrence Information – if you see this in your admin, use it and that should help with things. 🙂

For now I will close up this thread – best of luck with your project!

Cheers,
George

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