Okay, I have my forums here www.mommysplaceforums.net and they were hosted on someone elses account. I paid someone to move them for me. She said there was something wrong with the script and she reinstalled it...well she deleted all the posts! I still have my members but none of the posts. There were thousands. The gal who had them hosted on her account has, what she thinks is an older backup of it with most of the posts. but we can't figure out how to open it or anything. I've since removed much of the catagories so if we can just reinstall the old one I dont think it would work because I don't have all the old catagories. I need someone to help me. If there is a charge please email me with your quote....I really just want to be able to go in and pick through the posts I want to keep...is there even a way to do that?
You should be able to do that like this:
First, create a board that only you can see called "Old Posts".
Next, put your board in Maintenance Mode (Admin -> Edit Server Settings)
Next, take the sql file and upload it via phpMyAdmin
After that, run these queries in phpMyAdmin, replacing "smf_" with your database prefix and "{board_id}" with the ID number of the "Old Posts" board you just created:
UPDATE smf_messages SET ID_BOARD = '{board_id}';
UPDATE smf_topics SET ID_BOARD = '{board_id}';
Finally, go into your admin center and "recount" everything (Admin -> Forum Maintenance -> Recount all totals and statistics) to update all the latest posts data, etc.
At this point, all the topics will be in your "Old Posts" board, so you can go through and do whatever you want with them. Just remember to take your forum out of Maintenance Mode when you're done.
Board is YabbSE Oldie: http://www.mommysplaceforums.net/
nellers, YabbSE is no longer supported, please upgarde to SMF. And if you pay someone to do something, next time make sure that she/he knows what she/he is doing :P Why she didnt backup everything before this? Its rule #1 ;)
The instructions I gave you should still work for YaBB SE, although the admin options are in a different spot (Maintenance Mode is under "Preferences and Settings", and the "Recount" option is a main link in the admin center). After you import the posts, you definitely need to upgrade to SMF.
Thanks for the help with this. I'm also trying to help Nellers get her old files uploaded. I have SMF 1.0, so her situation has been a bit of a challenge for me.
I've already created a new board (Old Posts) for her, but I'm stuck on phpMyAdmin. Where exactly does she need to go to upload the sql file? Does she need to go into her website software (FrontPage)?
Also, where can we aquire the board ID number of the Old Posts board?