Fluorescent Dreams Wax Cylinders - How to back up your LiveJournal

Any idea if it's possible to back up a community? I don't think that LJ Book will do it.

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jbackup.pl is what I use on Linux.

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However, everyone and their dog, cat, mouse, and bird is using it now; the site is terribly slow.

I'll wait till the panic dies down. I have faith LJ will be around a little while longer.

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It will. Bad PR and the shock value aside, the latest sacking spree wasn't nice but it was good business sense.

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Isn't this being a little reactionary? They laid off their development staff. This doesn't seem like "the world is ending" kind of thing.

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I think that having a backup is good policy, no matter whether LiveJournal lasts one month or one century.

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Well, generally I agree, but the timing... why do humans always do things when their life is in the middle of a crisis?

"We should do something about global warming"
"Oh, that's a long way off."
"Hey, Gas Prices are 6 bucks a gallon. Oh, and British Columbia fell into the Arctic Ocean."
"OMG, we gotta do something now!"

So, yeah... it's just a timing issue. :)

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I've been wanting to backup my LJ for some time but just didn't know how to do it. I hate the LJ archiving system they have here (CSV and XML look like crap) and didn't know about LJBook until now. So in a way I'm glad the panic happened so that I learned about a good way to get a hard copy of my LJ.

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Having a backup is also good for those of us who are faint of memory. "Hmm, did I post about X? *greps* Oh yeah, I did."

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Probably it is, but the writing's also on the wall. SUP has looked at LJ from a business standpoint, and the business is the Russian portion. That's a solid money-maker. The parts outside of Russia, the bulk of the users just don't want to pay and the advertising isn't a reliable revenue stream (plus the fact that while the advertisers really love the demographic, they're uncomfortable with what that desirable demographic really likes). I expect sooner or later SUP will start pruning out the non-paid accounts and shift the non-Russian paid accounts to "We'll take your money, but we're not developing anything that doesn't support the core Russian business.". I'd be planning to get out before that happens, so I don't have to panic at the last minute.

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I heard about ljmigrate which is a python script (works on Mac OS X out of the box, Linux with python, and Windows with python) that captures comments, user pics, and makes a static HTML version that you can browse locally.

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I was just trying to create a local copy and not migrate. Tried using this tool, and it spammed errors because it didn't have a destination to write to. Also the stuff it did archive didn't look correct in the XML. It removed pretty much all the line wraps and formatting... and images... and everything. :/

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I found LJMigrate (Python) worked admirably on OSX. Command-line based, but there are tutorials. I don't think how it backs up is optimal (eg your posts are stored as nnnnn.html using different numbers than LJ post numbers, you don't get calendar views, etc) but it took under ten minutes to get it up and running. It also has an "update if changed" mode for recurring backups.

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I have NEVER been able to get XJournal's history feature or the LJbook.com thing to work. :( I'd donate to LJbook... if it ever WORKED. It never has.

Edited at 2009-01-06 10:52 pm (UTC)

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It took me a while to get it to work, but I finally figure it out. The big problem I had was if you made a backup before 2006, before they made the switchover in URL format (www.livejournal.com/user/wbwolf vs wbwolf.livejournal.com), the history function won't be able to append to an existing backup.

First of all, make sure that ~/Library/Application Support/Xjournal/History.plist is writable. Also, you may want to upgrade to the latest version. (version 1.06b6 just came out a couple weeks ago) If you have an old version there, delete it. Then download your history. It will do a fresh download in XML format. You can tell an archived version from a live version because it'll be just the black and white text, none of your normal layout view.

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So, how do you actually get the history started? The interface isn't all that clear to me. When I open the history window and click download it tells me I'm downloading 0 of 0. And, thanks advance for whatever help you reply with.

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Well, you are following the correct steps, so it sounds like something else is up. Make sure that you are logged into your account first before hitting the history button. Before you do the download, you should see the years your account has been active in the window below. Who knows, maybe you're already updated and there is nothing else to add to the archive?

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Wonder if it's due to my journal's age. I apparently started in 2002. I don't see any information when I start the window up and I know that's a problem now. Thanks for pointing me in a direction.

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Thanks to the wbwolf for making me think a little. If you have an old journal with a lot of activity, you might need to open the history window and let it settle a few minutes before doing any operation. I did that while spacing out on what to say next on a cover letter and then kicked off a history update. Hasn't completed yet, but I do have a progress bar that's ticking off numbers and that's, well, progress.

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Hrm.

It Just Worked for me.

I am not sure why it didn't work for you.

And I couldn't find a community here to point to you.

I'm sorry.

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xjournal seems to work

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I did get it to work simply by letting the history window sit a few minutes before doing anything with it. I dunno what's going on, but I got a couple of kernel errors after the app quit on the first couple of trys. I think I've got a combination of old OS and long journal.

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A friend, ghewgill, wrote ljdump which was written specifically to make a local HTML backup of entries and comments and, the reason he wrote his own rather than go with an existing tool, to be easier to navigate, like when you're later looking in the archive for a post by topic or date. An example of what it generates is here. There's even a community ljdump to discuss the program.

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I have used LJ Archive to back up my journal previously and recommend it. It downloads posts and comments, and has a search function.

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anyone know if there is a way to backup someone else's journal? a loved one passed away and LJ was kind enough to save the journal as a friends only memorial for me but i would really like to save it.

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Do you have the password for the account? If so, then try any of the above solutions.

If you don't have the password, and you're on a Unix system, then PLJBackup might possibly work. (I have not tested it!)

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My only question is: what the fuck do I have on my journal that's worth saving?

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Why, my scintillating comments, of course!

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Thanks for the advice, Chip! I'm not leaving LJ, but I will be taking precautions in case LJ goes toes-up.

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I have tried using XJournal to back everything up using "download history" but it only shows up in XJournal when I'm connected to the internet and logged in to LJ.. which tells me it isn't actually downloading much of anything. *sigh*

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I just tried LJ Archive.
It works really nice and incredible fast.

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Glad this article could help!

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Y'know, I'd forgotten all about the panic back in January and you making this post. But this post is the #5 hit on Google for 'backup livejournal' (with no quotes). It actually ought to rank higher, since it was more useful than hits 1-4. :) Lj Archive is a splendid thing indeed.

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*grin*

Thank you.

I recently got a comment, thanking me for this entry. I'm glad that people find it useful.

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