Wikibooks:Importers

Importer
An importer (known to the software as the  user group) can transwiki import from a limited group of external Wikimedia projects to English Wikibooks. They hold the 'import pages from other wikis' right and can also enable 2FA if they wish.

This is granted only to experienced users, as an import will overwrite and merge the page histories of any existing content at Wikibooks under the same name. For example, if a page named 'Foo' exist locally, it could be overwritten and merged by an article named 'Foo' at Wikipedia. Normally, imports are made to the Transwiki namespace to prevent this from happening, before moving content into an existing book or creating a new one with the imported content as a base. If you need to import large numbers of pages or import pages over a long period of time, you can request the flag at Requests for permissions.

Users who are not importers must make a request for import that will be handled by an existing importer or administrator.

Import uploader
An import uploader (known to the software as the  user group) has the same rights as an importer, but also holds the   right. This enables them to additionally 'upload import', that is import XML files exported from any MediaWiki installations, including those not hosted by the WMF. This is necessary if the wiki in question is not a Wikimedia Foundation public wiki.

This is a very sensitive permission, and hence access to this tool will be restricted to sysops by default. Other users can request it at requests for permissions, but should demonstrate sufficient trust and experience, which can be fulfilled by prior experience of  or at least being an importer, plus have a sufficiently valid reason (note that importupload is not necessary to satisfy licensing). Such users are also strongly encouraged to enable 2FA authentication. The request should be open for at least 5 days, and all members of the community are invited to support, oppose, comment, and/or ask questions. Access will be granted or revoked by a sysop, preferably for a temporary duration.

Users who are not import uploaders must make a request for upload import, that will be handled by an existing import uploader or administrator.

Upload import cautions
Do not select the  option unless you are absolutely sure that all the users that would be attributed exist and are the same—breach of this is a very serious problem and is grounds for revocation. This does not apply if you're not using importupload, or you're uploading from a WMF wiki.

With upload import, because of the simple readable file format of the XML file, it can easily be edited between exporting and importing. It may need to be edited, and this should be done with caution and integrity. Editing should include:


 * Adding a note to the edit summary about the importing.
 * Changing usernames to avoid conflicts (the username tags, and also in links and signatures). If you do not select the  option, username tags will not need altering.
 * Changing page names and namespace names to avoid conflicts (the title, namespace, and namespaces tags; and also in links and signatures). Namespaces can be converted into generic or applicable ones.

Also see merging histories and other complications (at Meta-Wiki). Note that if two versions of the page have the same timestamp (because one was uploaded with the same timestamp as a preexisting version), the later (imported) version will show up in the edit history but not in the page itself. See mw:Manual:XML Import file manipulation in CSharp for an example of working with these XML files in Visual Studio .NET C#.