Meta Question

EgaoNoGenki's avatar

How do I import ALL of my questions from Answerbag in one fell swoop?

Asked by EgaoNoGenki (1164points) December 18th, 2009

You know that various blog-hosting sites have tools to “import” and “export” blogs from and to other blogsites?

Well, is there a similar function to “import” all of the questions I have ever asked from Answerbag, onto Fluther?

If I’m going to make a full Exodus from Answerbag, I would most appreciate it if I could take my work with me.

I have been on Answerbag for well over FIVE YEARS, and have amassed quite a number of contributions to that site! I wish it wouldn’t all be left behind.

Dear Site Staff, if Fluther doesn’t have an “import” function for our questions, could you please program one? I hope that’s not too much to ask.

Thanks in advance for the answers you’re about to give me.

Observing members: 0 Composing members: 0

80 Answers

mellow_girl's avatar

are you joking?

SABOTEUR's avatar

No disrespect intended, but why not simply submit new contributions to this glorious new site instead of dragging that old stuff here?

Sarcasm's avatar

Sounds like a terrible idea bro

Response moderated
gemiwing's avatar

Chances are good not all of them would meet the Fluther guidelines. This community is a bit different than ab in what they want.

I understand wanting to bring ‘your work’ with you. Perhaps you could try to view this as a new start and select a few of your best questions to bring here?

EgaoNoGenki's avatar

Hey, y’all. Thank you for your responses.

I can’t seem to find AB’s leaderboards anymore, and my Profile page no longer keeps count of my submissions.

However, I remember having submitted over ELEVEN THOUSAND questions during the whole course of my time there.

Here’s a list of my ”most liked” questions, which is but just a smattering of all my submissions ever given to the site:

http://www.answerbag.com/profile/1951/questions?sort=likes

How do they look to you?

Now, you see why I don’t like to leave them behind?

I would copy-&-paste them, if to complete the move in that manner wouldn’t take YEARS to finish.

JustPlainBarb's avatar

I think if we’re here now on Fluther, we start fresh and think of it as a new beginning.

Freedom_Issues's avatar

Are you kidding me ENG? No offense, but you only ask questions to win Most Inquisitive on Answerbag, not because you’re really looking for answers! I am dumbfounded you have the gall to even ask this question here!! You can get away with crap questions on Answerbag, but they have to be quality questions here!

jrpowell's avatar

I want all my questions and responses from ask.metafilter.com too.

http://nokogiri.org/

Response moderated
SABOTEUR's avatar

Oh boy…duck for cover…watch for flying debris…!

Sarcasm's avatar

I don’t know how to put this.
We don’t want questions like “What was Rainbow Brite’s FIRST episode”, or any of your other Rainbow Brite questions.

Any good question you have has already been asked. That’s really depressing that you’ve posted over ELEVEN THOUSAND questions.

As @ABJustPlainBarb and @Corporate_Avenger say, leave your baggage behind. It stinks like a raccoon anyway.

gemiwing's avatar

I need more coffee for this

engineeristerminatorisWOLV's avatar

@Freedom_Issues :Can’t say it any better.That was the flaw with AB that disgusted me the most.Stupid questions getting lauded while the serious and quality ones were flushed down the sink most of the time.

SABOTEUR's avatar

Coffee…good idea…this is gonna be quite entertaining…

Response moderated
EgaoNoGenki's avatar

@Freedom_Issues (Gee, I think all responses should be numbered, so we’ll know exactly what post one is responding to.)

I suppose then, since I won’t be able to import questions as fast as I’d like, that instead of trying to, I’ll just “start fresh” like several of you have said, and not even try to attain a “Most Inquisitive” award here (even if there even is one.)

I’ll just ask questions for the sake of satiating my curiosities and furthering my interests, and whatever etc. is not annoying like my old habits used to be.

SABOTEUR's avatar

How ‘bout inporting the “helpful, not helpful” feature while you’re at it…lmao!!!

EgaoNoGenki's avatar

@SABOTEUR I’ll agree with that response – it does give some sort of honest feedback, believe it or not. I believe it’s helped me lots of times, and will help everyone else too if something like “Helpful, Not Helpful” is implemented here.

jackm's avatar

Sounds like a jolly good idea. I think we should be able to import all the questions we’ve ever asked on the internet or in real life.

Benandrew, get on that!

Zen_Again's avatar

I disagree.

When I moved here from wis.dm I didn’t even copy anything for myself, let alone import questions. I’d like to think I am creative enough to think up new (crappy) ones.

Notwithstanding, this is a new site (for you) and your questions haven’t been asked here as yet. So I say: bring em on. The mods will decide what’s flurthy (fluther-worthy).

SABOTEUR's avatar

Folgers instant…yummm!

hiphiphopflipflapflop's avatar

When we ex-wis.dm’ers came here, we had plenty of suggestions to make Fluther better. Some of them actually got implemented eventually, in time (example: “browse all of user_x’s answers”) . The problem came from not so subtly demanding all of them, right away.

belakyre's avatar

My drama teacher always told us when we entered the classroom to leave everything outside of the room and become new people with a fresh start a new slate to write on when we are acting. Answer Bag stuff belongs in Answer Bag, and Fluther stuff belongs in Fluther, no where else.

SABOTEUR's avatar

How’d the mods get here so fast! Are these questions rigged with some kind of “flame war alarm?”

andrew's avatar

@hiphiphopflipflapflop Not that your feedback wasn’t useful, but most of the features implemented in the months after the wis.dm migration was in the queue for months already. We’re still implementing things that we thought of years ago.

We do, however, shift priorities around based on the userbase.

In general, we don’t usually listen to feature requests. We do, however, listen to problems that people are having or things that are confusing people.

andrew's avatar

[mod says]: Ok folks. Leave the personal vendettas behind. Seriously.

EgaoNoGenki's avatar

@belakyre (Really, I hope responses automatically get numbered one day. They are, in Askville.Amazon.com)

You’re right, Bela. I guess it is time to start with new habits and see if I’ll operate as a better Flutherman (if that’s the correct demonym) than an Answerbagger.

hiphiphopflipflapflop's avatar

@andrew Thanks for the clarification/correction.

SABOTEUR's avatar

That was fun! Off to work now…HAVE A GREAT DAY!

Sophief's avatar

@andrew This is what it was like at AB, there were loads of bitching, it’s great to come here and see virtually none of that and the mods are on it right away when there is.

EgaoNoGenki's avatar

@andrew If the staff doesn’t listen to feature requests, I trust that the staff themselves have (and have thought of/proposed) more than enough new features that they’re “waiting in a queue” to be implemented onto this site.

Even though an “import” feature doesn’t seem popular at this point, I hope for at least a “comment numbering” feature like users see on Askville’s question Discussion sections. AFAIK, I have reason to believe that nobody will object to having our comments automatically numbered.

SABOTEUR's avatar

@Dibley: Did you see how that Mod swooped in and bitch slapped the thread into submission? Talk about super-powers…DAMN!

andrew's avatar

@SABOTEUR We don’t sleep. Ever.

SABOTEUR's avatar

@andrew: I’m impressed. The White House should consult you guys on security.

YARNLADY's avatar

Easy, find 3,500 people who are willing to ask three questions each and have them join Fluther. I must say that several hundred, if not thousands of your questions are not really worth repeating anyway, so that should be enough.

I would also like to point out that your questions are all still alive on the Way Back Machine, as well as on the search boxes we all use.

mattbrowne's avatar

Wis.dm had an export feature before it shut down completely. I’ve kept my answers as text file which allows me to search.

hiphiphopflipflapflop's avatar

@SABOTEUR Welcome to the panopticon! Foucault would be screaming. Muhahahahahahaha…. cough cough ;)

andrew's avatar

@hiphiphopflipflapflop See, there’s a reason I studied semiology. Now I can apply it. ;)

stranger_in_a_strange_land's avatar

The quality standards for questions at Fluther are so much higher that you will have to rework almost every question. Just do it one-by-one and leave out the “toilet paper” questions.

Arisztid's avatar

Just a suggestion, @EgaoNoGenki

It is rude to try to change Fluther. Fluther has its rules, features, and its ways. Leave answerbag at the door and start anew here. Do not try to change the house that has allowed you to come. If you want your old questions, they are still active on answerbag. If you want answerbag’s features, some are being restored. If you are here, be here. If you are there, be there.

That is all I have to say.

Cotton101's avatar

time to move on…surprised they allowed you to post that comment. the mods told me we don’t need anymore Answerbag post. Tried to make a final post and put AB to rest, they would not allow it.

personally, like another AB person said here, it is time to move on and earn our own respect from the Fluther family!

Just threw my “old bag” in the garbage can!

PandoraBoxx's avatar

11,000 questions divided by 3 question per day posting limit = 10 years of questions, give or take a day or two…

stranger_in_a_strange_land's avatar

@Cotton101 Well said. Let us also leave all the in-fighting and social crap behind as well. Tabula rasa.

Sunshine2u's avatar

Right now everything that one Ex-ABer does reflexes on all of us and I would really be so Happy if we All could set a great example of each other!

Gossamer's avatar

Sometimes a fresh start is needed in order to understand why we started over in the first place!

CMaz's avatar

One good, indirect, point was brought up…

A way to take possession or your questions and answers.

We put some good thought into them. (sometimes) They tend to be a spark of inspiration, causing us to do it on the fly.
So we don’t make the effort to save at that moment. Basically cut and paste.

If not to re post on another site. It would be nice to have for posterity. :-)

PandoraBoxx's avatar

@ChazMaz, more permanent than this ?

CMaz's avatar

First… That is friggin cool!

Second… The internet is “forever”. But sifting through it can be daunting. Especially when accumulating all that you or I have banged out over the years. :-)

philosopher's avatar

I found my question list on AB and my answer list too. It would take a long time to transfer them all here .
I will continue to check there but I am happier here. That site is too complicated. It is not fun anymore .
I miss some of the freedom too be silly the old AB gave us.
To all my friends from AB I am happy every time you post here. You are what makes it fun.

Do you think it is wrong to check and see what is going on there? I think most people go many places on the INTERNET. I have always belonged to different groups for different reasons.
My Son is Autistic I belong to site that supports me . I do research too.
I am happy you are all here.
I hope everyone has a happy holiday.

PandoraBoxx's avatar

@ChazMaz, the beauty of google is that if you search @ChazMaz Fluther Beard, you only get the 4 instances that those terms appear together.

hiphiphopflipflapflop's avatar

@PandoraBoxx the thing is, if those pages were ever to be taken down, they would eventually not be retrievable by Google. Such has happened to everything I posted to Wis.dm.

stemnyjones's avatar

@hiphiphopflipflapflop I was wondering about that. How do you browse a certain users questions and answers?

Brian1946's avatar

Removed by Fluther moderators, the FCC, and the FBI!

justmesuzanne's avatar

Well, now! That would be kind of cool!

Simone_De_Beauvoir's avatar

11 000 questions? are you serious?
why did you ever ask that many?
and no no do not just import them here

when we migrated from wis.dm, I saved all my questions ( I looked through them, picked out a few patterns and created questions around those patterns)

Talimze's avatar

@Simone_De_Beauvoir In all honesty, many of those eleven-thousand questions were cookie cutter questions, basically the same one repeated several times with a slight variation. EgaoNoGenki kind of had a thing for having the most questions asked on Answerbag. I don’t think he would disagree with me on that.

Simone_De_Beauvoir's avatar

@Talimze well that sounds like quite a waste of time

trailsillustrated's avatar

har har har rainbo brite oh my…..

jerv's avatar

Umm… is there enough storage on Fluther’s servers for that?

Jeruba's avatar

REM to Fluthergods: Deep-six the ‘import all’ subroutine.

hiphiphopflipflapflop's avatar

@stemnyjones See how every instance of a username is underlined? They’re links. Click on one to go to that user’s profile page. Then scroll down past their bio information, awards, fluther and the field that’s open to take a message from you to them. Scroll past public comments left by other people. Voilà! That’s where a short list of recent questions and answers written by them are. Click on the links down there to browse all of their questions or answers. :)

shilolo's avatar

@hiphiphopflipflapflop Have you tried using the Wayback machine to find your old content? It might work.

Message to all ABers. We don’t really know who is who unless you decide to self-identify yourself. So, resentment of individuals is impossible if you don’t present yourself to be an ABer.

hiphiphopflipflapflop's avatar

@shilolo I tried that just now. It appears only wis.dm’s front page was archived (and it takes ages to come up, and the graphics are all broken). I had the option of downloading a file before they finally shut the server down just like @mattbrowne did, but I didn’t bother. Just felt like pointing out that Google is not omnipotent. ;)

Response moderated
stemnyjones's avatar

@hiphiphopflipflapflop Thanks.. I never scrolled down past someone’s fluther

Judi's avatar

This isn an alternative, not a merger.

Berserker's avatar

Plenty of the types of questions you asked probably wouldn’t be accepted here anyways, unless you highly tried to make them more complex, or at least, provided some motive to the answerers to type more than one sentence.
And eleven hundred questions well…there’s a limit of three here per day, so that’s gonna take you a damn long time. O_o

If you could think up that much before, I’m sure you can do it again. This place is quite different though, so it’s probbaly not a good idea to flood it with countless random questions just for the hell of it, and it’s also not Babelfish. (For the quarter of your questions that was asking us how to translate Japanese sentences to Russian or whatever.)

Explore and see what it’s like around here first, at least?

Freedom_Issues's avatar

@PandoraBoxx we were allowed to ask 5 questions every 15 minutes on Answerbag

Corporate_Avenger's avatar

I just do not understand the constant need for validation as an attention whore. I guess some people were weaned too early.

Sarcasm's avatar

@Freedom_Issues Sounds like Answerbag is a pretty sweet place. I think we should all go back there.

Corporate_Avenger's avatar

@Sarcasm – I believe @Freedom_Issues point was to show how someone could amass some 11,00 questions. While it might take a lifetime here, it was much easier to do so over at ‘Club Dead’. Ridiculously so, unfortunately.

justmesuzanne's avatar

Oh! Well, I think I asked 3 or 4 questions at AnswerBag! That’s different! :)

Eureka's avatar

@ Now, you see why I don’t like to leave them behind?

Actually, there is no way I would want to be associated with such a pile of meaningless inane garbage. I would change my user name so that no one would ever find out that I had actually asked such tripe, much less brag about wanting them to follow me wherever I went.

Corporate_Avenger's avatar

I would say…ummmm…you don’t.

philosopher's avatar

I think you should accept that you can not .

HungryGuy's avatar

To transfer your questions would not only require an import feature on Fluther, but it would also require an export feature implemented on AB. Very unlikely to happen, d00d…

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