Help:Extension:FileImporter/en



The FileImporter and FileExporter extensions aim to make moving files from a local wiki to Wikimedia Commons easier. The new functionality allows to move files with all their original data intact, while documenting the move in the version history.

The FileExporter provides a link to Wikimedia Commons on the local wiki and hands over a URL to the extension FileImporter. The FileImporter is a Wikimedia Commons extension which imports the file including all data when all prerequisites are met. Technically, the files won't be "moved", but "copied".

FileImporter has been deployed to Wikimedia Commons in June 2018. To make use of it, you need to activate the FileExporter as a beta feature in your local wiki.

Background
FileImporter and FileExporter aim to fulfil a request from the German-speaking community's Technical Wishlist and are developed by WMDE's tech team. More information can be found on the main project page on Meta.

Step by step
You need to be logged in in order to use the feature.

How imported files can be found

 * In the revision history of a file, the import is shown as a null revision (i.e. an entry in the revision list that doesn’t actually change the page).
 * For the import, an upload log entry and an import log entry are created and associated with the null revision and with the importing user, and timestamped with the import date. Having both the null revision and the upload log entry is the default for uploads, although it leads to "doubled" entries on the history page, see this example file and its log entries.
 * For (old) imported file revisions, upload log entries  are created with the date and user of the original upload to make all file revisions appear in Commons' upload log.
 * Imports are tagged with the tag, so you can filter them in Recent Changes.

Deployment roadmap

 * 2018-06-12: Export to test.wikipedia.org
 * FileExporter as a beta feature on mediawiki.org and [//test2.wikipedia.org/ test2.wikipedia.org].
 * (To test the export, you also need to be an auto-confirmed user on these wikis.)
 * FileImporter on [//test.wikipedia.org/ test.wikipedia.org]


 * 2018-06-25: Export to Wikimedia Commons
 * FileExporter as a beta feature on de.WP, fa.WP, ar.WP
 * exporting from mediawiki.org now to Wikimedia Commons
 * FileImporter on Wikimedia Commons
 * 2018-07-11:
 * FileExporter as a beta feature on [//wikisource.org/ wikisource]
 * 2019-01-16 (planned)
 * Deployment of the FileExporter beta feature to other wikis

Links

 * Main project page on Meta
 * FileImporter extension manual
 * FileImporter configurations
 * FileExporter extension manual
 * Phabricator project
 * overview: How templates are matched with the FileImporter extension