Joomla Transfer Tutorial

How to transfer Joomla

In this tutorial we'll show you how to transfer your Joomla site. The process is the same no matter whether you move Joomla to a new host or to a different hosting account with the same hosting provider.

To migrate your Joomla site you have to:

• transfer the Joomla files and folders
  
  
• export the database used by the application and import it into a database on the hosting account to which you want to transfer your site
  
  
• edit the configuration.php file of the application and change the database information in it, as well as the paths to the logs and tmp folders

The first two steps are the same for any web application. The third one is Joomla-specific.

These steps also apply if you want to move your Joomla from one folder to another within the same hosting account. In this case however you don't have to export/import the database and you don't have to edit the database information in the configuration.php file. You still have to correct the paths to the logs and tmp folders that are specified in the configuration.php file.

Transfer the Joomla Files and Folders

You need to transfer the files and folders of the Joomla application from the account from which you want to remove the site to the new account. You can do this with an FTP client (e.g. FileZilla). You have to download the files and folders from the old account to your local computer and then upload them from your local computer to your new account.

To save some time for the downloading and uploading, you can pack the Joomla files and folders into an archive, then transfer it to the new account and unpack it there.

For more details check out the section on file transfers in the tutorial on how to transfer your website.

Transfer the Database

You also have to transfer the MySQL database used by the application. To do this, first you have to export it from the old hosting account. Then you have to import it into a database on the new hosting account. These export/import transfers can be performed with phpMyAdmin.

For more details check out the sections on database export and database import in the tutorial on how to transfer your website.

Edit configuration.php

In order for the transferred application to work you also have to make a few changes to the configration.php file. You can do this either before uploading the files to the new hosting account or you can also do it after you transfer the files and folders to the account to which you want to move Joomla.

The configuration.php file is located in the root Joomla folder. So, for example, if your Joomla is uploaded directly in the public_html folder on your account (meaning the site's frontend is accessible at yourdomain.com), then the path to the file will be public_html/configuration.php.

Once you upload the files and folders on your HostKnox hosting account you can edit the file directly on the hosting account from the Files section of the HostKnox control panel. Just click on the file's name and you'll see its content. Another way to do it is to edit it on your local computer with a text editor (e.g. Notepad, Wordpad) and then upload it on the account replacing the old file.

In the file itself you have to update the database information. Find the following lines:

public $user = 'username';
public $password = 'user_pass';
public $db = 'database_name';

Replace username with the actual username of the user that you created for the database; replace user_pass with the password for that user and database_name with the actual name of the database. When you create a database into which to import the exported database you can add a user to it. In the above mentioned lines of the configuration.php file you have to put the username and password of that user. If you don't add a user to the new database, you have to use the username and password of the master user. The password of the master user can be changed from the Databases section of the HostKnox control panel. There you can also add/remove users to each of the databases you've created.

In the configuration.php file you also have to change the paths to the logs and tmp folders so that they correspond to their location on the new hosting account. The folders logs and tmp are in the root Joomla directory. You need to edit the paths in the following two lines of the configuration.php file:

public $log_path = '/home/username/public_html/logs';
public $tmp_path = '/home/username/public_html/tmp';

The exact path structure depends on the hosting provider and on the folder on the hosting account in which Joomla is installed. The path to the public_html folder (the main web-accessible folder) on every HostKnox account is /home/username/public_html. So provided that your Joomla is uploaded directly in the public_html folder you have to put the paths /home/username/public_html/logs and /home/username/public_html/tmp for the logs and tmp folders respectively. Of course, you have to replace username with the actual username of your hosting account.

After that you can test your site's frontend and admin panel on the new location.