WordPress: Importing Tweets to WordPress with DsgnWrks Twitter Importer Plugin

WordPress: Importing Tweets to WordPress with DsgnWrks Twitter Importer Plugin

I joined Twitter in April of 2008. I have participated mostly as a lurker but have contributed 3,589 tweets. Since I have been introduced to the IndieWeb concept, one of my goals has been to find a way to import my tweets into WordPress.

DsgnWrks Twitter Importer Plugin

I found a plugin, DsgnWrks Twitter Importer, which was not tested with my version of WordPress, but I thought I would try it out. I first tried it on my sandbox and then on this site.

Setup

After activating the plugin, the Settings link appears beside the plugin name. Alternately you can access the settings from TOOLS > TWITTER IMPORTER.

Setup the user by adding the Twitter username and clicking the SAVE button.

Once the user has been saved additional options are presented that are specific to the import.

I selected the following: Status = Private, Post-Type = A custom post type, Category = Tweet, Tag = Tweet. (As I setup my IndieWeb setup, I am still deciding on my Categories and Tags.) As I learned during a few uh ohs, it is good to set attributes that can be filtered and a Private Status or specific category or tag will help with this.

At the conclusion I clicked the SAVE button. Well actually, I clicked the IMPORT button the first time and learned from that lesson that I should have clicked SAVE first. Be careful to not click IMPORT before you click the SAVE to save the options or they will default to the original . 🙂

The Import

Number of Tweets Imported

I did not set the Import From This Date field. The plugin imported Tweets back to 2018 and not to 2008.

Import from This Date

I went back to my Sandbox and tried to change the import date to 2008-04 to see if all of them would import. I could only select 2010-01, which I did. I saved that selection and tried again. It appears that only 199 tweets are imported because the same number imported as when I did the original import with no date.

Results

  • 199 tweets imported.
    • I could not import all of the tweets dated back to 2008.
  • The tweets were placed into the custom post type I selected.
  • The status was the one I selected.
  • The tweet was categorized as I specified.
  • The tweet tags were placed into the tag field.
  • No images were imported.

Screenshots

Screenshots of the process are below.

Conclusion

If I were a more prolific Twitter user, I reach out to the developer and ask if there is a way to import all Tweets, all Tweets from 2008, or a way to have a beginning and end date so that tweets could be imported in batches. I am not sure if that would be successful due to the dates shown in the Support site and the Github repository.

I believe the most important thing that I did was to download my archive of Tweets from Twitter which included images. My Twitter archive is important but based on the type of user I was, it’s not that important. If someone creates a way to import my downloaded archive, I will be able to import the rest. I have all of the images already. But it would be nice to have all of the shared articles.


Comments

21 responses to “WordPress: Importing Tweets to WordPress with DsgnWrks Twitter Importer Plugin”

  1. @tmichellemoore I keep debating on firing up a #WordPress install to import all my old #tweets into, but also, since I am slowly making the switch over to #mastodon, part of me wants to import all my old #tweets here for archival instead. But also know that would likely be frowned upon.
    mastodon
    tweets
    wordpress

  2. This Article was mentioned on brid.gy

  3. @tmichellemoore is it possible that the limit of 199 tweets are forced from Twitter side? I am not sure how the plugin works (if it’s an authenticated app, or just making search API calls with your username). best option as you mentioned is to download your data archive

  4. @hszakher I definitely don’t know that as I am more user than developer. 😊 But your observation seems very feasible based on what’s going on over there.

  5. @shelby Download the archive and place them on your own site for archiving. Do you have your own Mastodon server? How would you move them to Mastodon?

  6. @hszakher The plugin is not authenticated.

  7. @tmichellemoore I was going to store the archive file there for safekeeping (On my site). And yes, I do run my own #mastodon instance, as for how to import them if possible; I honestly have not looked into it … but I would imagine it could be done via a CLI script + Postgres ¯_(ツ)_/¯
    mastodon

  8. @tmichellemoore I should say its all still on my project list of things to eventually look into lol

  9. @tmichellemoore @shawnhooper was working on a WP-CLI plugin to do this as well.

  10. @shelby After my MySQL exploration the other day, I was thinking I could probably just import the export in some way. But THEN I was thinking, well, I don’t know how to do that and attach the images etc. So I will just wait for the plugin or just be happy in the knowledge that I have the archive. 😊

  11. @tim @shawnhooper I learned how to use the WP-CLI a few days ago. (Though learned is a very big word, let’s just say I know where to open it and know where to find the commands, and could follow instructions. ) I would be happy to experiment with it when it’s ready!

  12. @shelby @tmichellemoore ooh, I hadn’t thought about importing my Tweets archive into a new #WordPress instance, I was thinking I might import into my main WordPress site, however after thinking about it, given that I shared from my WordPress site to Twitter, I don’t think I want to pollute my WordPress blog with Twitter posts. 🤔
    wordpress

  13. @tim @shelby I put mine into a custom post type. It’s going to be the future home of my short form status updates.

  14. @tmichellemoore Haha yeah, I mean, with my knowledge of scripting and MySQL, I briefly thought, “This shouldn’t be that hard outside of media” … and that’s about where I stopped and again thought, someone will release a complete fledge plugin soon enough that handles it all … so now I wait ha!

  15. @Tim@mastodon.timnolte.com recommended and introduced me to @shawnhooper@fosstodon.org on Mastodon who created a plugin called Twitter Archive to WP. This plugin uses the Twitter Archive. Previously, I was experimenting with a plugin to import my tweets. There appeared to be a limit of 199 tweets and I have 3,590 tweets, I tried the Twitter Archive to […]

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  • 💬 Michelle Moore

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