Importing and exporting
There are several methods for importing to, or exporting from, an Omeka Classic site. Third-party plugins may add more functionality; we are only documenting Omeka-team-supported methods here.
Connect to another Omeka site
You cannot currently export from an Omeka S installation to a Classic site.
Import from Classic to S
See the instructions in the Omeka S user manual for using the Omeka S module to import from a Classic site to an S installation.
Import from Classic to Classic
Access data using the API
You can use your own Classic site's API to crawl data as required, or export a spreadsheet. You can request different formats through the API, including jsonld and rdfxml.
For more information on the API, see the developer documentation section..
There are example scripts for using the API to output information in the developer documentation.
The easiest way to confirm what can be exported is to go to your source installation and view the "API" tab in the Settings. This table will help you assess what information can be exported. Any data not displayed there cannot be accessed.
Once you have exported from your original installation using the API, you can import the dataset using the CSV Import plugin.
Use the Classic plugin
You can use the Omeka API Import plugin to import items & collections from a Classic site. This plugin imports some of the material accessible from the API: items and their metadata (including tags), attached files, collections, users, comments and contributions, Simple Pages, and Exhibit Builder content.
If equivalent plugins are installed on both the source site and the target site, Omeka API Import can import plugin-specific metadata. For example, geolocation data facilitated by the Geolocation plugin will automatically be imported; PDF Text elements can be imported.
An API key is required to access private installation data, such as users and their profiles, and private items and collections.
This plugin will not import all possible data accessible by the API (see the above section). For example, some plugins may generate data accessible by the API as output but not be able to import that same data to your new installation. We recommend you generate a dataset using the API to capture all possible information.
The instructions on how to move your Omeka Classic site from one server to another may be of use.
Access item data
Alongside the methods above, such as creating a dataset from the API, you can access datasets directly from the public site. Every Omeka Classic browse page, search result page, and item view page has links to output the data contained in the results set: see the Output Formats page for more information on how these formats can be used to export your collections.
Copy over settings
You cannot directly import all installation settings and theme configuration, nor plugin information that can impact your installation, such as the CSS Editor content. We recommend that after an import is performed, you compare both installations side-by-side to confirm that all settings match.
Copy vocabularies
You cannot export or import Simple Vocab vocabularies at this time. Vocabularies are saved in a text field, one entry per line, and are easily copied and pasted between installations.
Import or export plugin data
The API offers data from the following (Omeka-team-authored) plugins: Simple Pages, Exhibits, Contribution, Geolocation, Comments, Item Relations, User Profiles.
Note that this does not include Timelines, Collection Tree, Simple Vocab, the CSS Editor, Posters, and Reports, among others.
The easiest way to confirm what can be exported is to go to your source installation and view the "API" tab in the Settings (see the image above).
Connect to non-Omeka platforms
Omeka Classic connectors
Omeka Classic has plugins for connecting directly to:
Import from a spreadsheet
Omeka Classic can take data in any spreadsheet (tabular) form, whether a CSV, an Excel file, or an ODS. Use the CSV Import plugin to add items and media to your Omeka Classic site from a spreadsheet. This includes data exported from many different databases and platforms. Export the data from your source platform into a spreadsheet. This may require some modification or cleanup of the data before importing into Omeka Classic.
You cannot create collections en masse using CSV Import.
Back up your Omeka Classic site
Back up your database
See the instructions on backing up your database on this page.