Lemmy should implement the ability to clone a community from one instance to another (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 1 year ago by greensky@sh.itjust.works to c/lemmyworld@lemmy.world

39 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I think this feature will help keep communities alive if something goes wrong. I hope Lemmy implements this feature.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] Grimpen@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 year ago

I think it's more or less as you describe. I think what OP is suggesting would be more like a way to migrate a community. Export everything from !example@oldserver.ded and import everything to !example@newserver.liv

I think something like this exists for Mastodon users, but I've never played with it. You could use this to migrate communities from an instance that was going down or otherwise no longer suitable. Even if all old conversations are "frozen" or locked, it would still be useful upon occasion.

[-] Jamie@jamie.moe 2 points 1 year ago

Could probably be doable with database fuckery. Make a second community locally with an identical name, then in the backend swap some IDs around and make it think the posts were actually in the new one all along.

Granted, I haven't looked at the DB structure, so I don't know how plausible it is. If someone tries it, don't blame me if the instance breaks, do at your own risk.

[-] Czele@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

But that creates a problem with potential duplicate name, but there is even bigger problem. By export I assume You mean taking ownership so adopting this community into the new server, who decides that? First come first served does not look good in my eyes as a good solution. Since that community is stored as a copy in other instances it should maybe just go into read only mode for eternity