Manual:importImages.php

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MediaWiki file: importImages.php
Location:	maintenance/
Source code:	master • 1.42.3 • 1.41.4 • 1.39.10
Classes:	ImportImages

importImages.php is a script which uploads images to MediaWiki from the same computer where the wiki is configured. It does a remote upload if configuration parameter $wgForeignFileRepos is configured correctly, or if you are using an extension that correctly configures it, such as the AWS (S3) extension.

If you plan on importing the file descriptions on the image pages too, then you should do that before you run importImages.php. Otherwise, those file descriptions will be buried underneath the import in the page history. If you make this mistake, then you can fix it with a bot script such as FixFileDescriptionPagesBot.php.

Examples

Upload with default comment "Importing file" and default user "Maintenance script":

php maintenance/importImages.php /path/to/images/directory

Upload with custom comment "Importing files from local file repository" and default user "Maintenance script":

php maintenance/importImages.php /path/to/images/directory --comment="Importing files from local file repository"

Upload with custom comment "Importing files from local file repository" and custom user "Upload admin" (which must already exist, or an error will occur):

php maintenance/importImages.php /path/to/images/directory --comment="Importing files from local file repository" --user="Upload admin"

importImages.php will not search and upload images in sub-directories (directory recursion) by default. Therefore upload with custom comment "Importing files from local file repository", custom user "Upload admin" and recursively search for files in subdirectories:

php maintenance/importImages.php /path/to/images/directory --comment="Importing files from local file repository" --user="Upload admin" --search-recursively

Warning: If this script is being used to import files from a MediaWiki installation's file directory with the --search-recursively option, be careful to skip any subdirectories other than \0–\9 and \a–\f (in particular, any \archive or \deleted subdirectories will be for deleted files, and the \thumb subdirectory has generated thumbnails).

importImages.php will not overwrite images if an image with the same name already exists on the wiki. Therefore upload with custom comment "Importing files from local file repository", custom user "Upload admin" and overwrite existing images:

php maintenance/importImages.php /path/to/images/directory --comment="Importing files from local file repository" --user="Upload admin" --overwrite

The same as above but only overwriting the given image types, e.g. pdf:

php maintenance/importImages.php /path/to/images/directory --comment="Importing files from local file repository" --user="Upload admin" --overwrite --extensions=pdf

An example of what a successful import of one image (Foo.jpg) looks like:

root@f345:/home/t/public_html/mywikisite/public/w/maintenance# php importImages.php /home/t/public_html/import --extensions=svg,png,jpg,jpeg,gif,bmp,SVG,PNG,JPG,JPEG,GIF,BMP

Import Images

Importing Foo.jpg...done.

Found: 1

Added: 1

root@f345:/home/t/public_html/mywikisite/public/w/maintenance#

It is probably a good idea to run this script as the apache user (Commonly either apache or www-data). Otherwise the uploaded files will be owned by the person who ran the script, which may prevent MediaWiki from being able to move, delete, or otherwise manipulate the files later on.

Arguments

MediaWiki version:

≥ 1.21

$ php importImages.php
Import Images

Imports images and other media files into the wiki
USAGE: php importImages.php [options] <dir>

<dir> : Path to the directory containing images to be imported

Option	Description	Default	Required?
--dir	Path to the directory containing images to be imported		Optional
--extensions=<exts>	Comma-separated list of allowable extensions, defaults to $wgFileExtensions		Optional
--overwrite	Overwrite existing images with the same name (default is to skip them)		Optional
--limit=<name>	Limit the number of images to process. Ignored or skipped images are not counted		Optional
--from=<name>	Ignore all files until the one with the given name. Useful for resuming aborted imports. The name should be the file's canonical database form.		Optional
--skip-dupes	Skip images that were already uploaded under a different name (check SHA1)		Optional
--search-recursively	Search recursively for files in subdirectories		Optional
--sleep=<sec>	Sleep between files. Useful mostly for debugging		Optional
--user=<username>	Set username of uploader	`'Maintenance script'`	Optional
--check-userblock	Check if the user got blocked during import		Optional
--comment=<text>	Set file description	`'Importing file'`	Optional
--comment-file=<file>	Set description to the content of this file		Optional
--comment-ext=<ext>	Causes the description for each file to be loaded from a file with the same name, but the extension provided. If a global description is also given, it is appended.		Optional
--summary=<sumary>	Upload summary, description will be used if not provided		Optional
--license	Use an optional license template		Optional
--timestamp=<timestamp>	Override upload time/date, all MediaWiki timestamp formats are accepted	`false`	Optional
--protect=<protect>	Specify the protect value (autoconfirmed, sysop)		Optional
--unprotect	Unprotects all uploaded images		Optional
--source-wiki-url	If specified, take User and Comment data for each imported file from this URL. For example, `--source-wiki-url="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/`		Optional
--dry	Dry run, don't import anything		Optional

--comment-ext defines a file extension like .meta that contains the file comment, i.e. the content of the wiki-metadata-page associated with each imported file. This supports per-file metadata, whereas the --comment option supports only per-import metadata. The value of --comment-ext works with or without a leading dot (.meta as well as meta), the value may be quoted or not. The associated file is searched both as appended and substituted extension. Thus, importing x.jpg and setting --comment-ext meta or --comment-ext=meta either of x.meta or x.jpg.meta will be used to set the initial metadata page (i.e. the page shown for File:x.jpg).

The "canonical database form" required by --from is obtained from the file name by capitalizing the first letter, replacing all spaces with underscores, and then replacing multiple consecutive underscores with one underscore. For example, to start with the file someFile with __weird_ spaces.png, the correct argument would be --from=SomeFile_with_weird_spaces.png

Troubleshooting

Could not open lock file

Try chmod -R 777 images (even if it was already set to 755, sometimes it needs to be set to 777)

Does not find the picture to upload

Example where the script does not find any picture to upload:

vi-notebook:/var/lib/mediawiki1.7# php maintenance/importImages.php /store/wiki/absurd_pic jpg
Import Images

Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /usr/share/mediawiki1.7/maintenance/importImages.php on line 34

Incorrect folder path

t@f66677:~/public_html/dead.com/public/w/maintenance$ php importImages.php /m gif bmp PNG JPG GIF BMP
Import Images

No suitable files could be found for import.

Usually this is because the path to the folder is incorrect.

Upload failed error

login as: ideakwty
ideakwty@164.413.451.184's password:
[ideakwty@server98 ~]$ cd public_html/youareapuppet.com/mw/maintenance
[ideakwty@server98 maintenance]$ php importImages.php /public_html/TO svg png jpg jpeg gif bmp SVG PNG JPG JPEG GIF BMP
Import Images

No suitable files could be found for import.
[ideakwty@server98 maintenance]$

When user does not have the privileges to upload the pictures

The following error can be caused by two issues:

Directory permissions needs to be changed, and/or
User does not have the privileges to upload the pictures

Problem 1 - Directory permissions needs to be changed

Solution - Change directory's mode

chmod the following four folders to 777:
1. images
2. images/temp
3. images/thumb
4. images/archive
If it hasn't already been done, in LocalSettings.php, uncomment the line $wgHashedUploadDirectory = false; by removing the # in front of the line.

Problem 2 - user does not have the privileges to upload the pictures

Solution - switch users or change user upload privileges.