Is there a way to change the creator of a page on Confluence Cloud?
Asked by Alan Oehler:

I've just used a add-on to import a couple of hundred HTML files from another CMS to Confluence. The author of the pages was set by the add-on to be "Confluence Pandoc Connect." I would really like to be able to set these to the name of the person that actually created them, but there doesn't seem to be a straightforward way to do this. Am I missing something?


Answers:
author: Shannon S
body: Hi Alan,

This is not currently possible, but we have this feature request for it:

* [CONFCLOUD-7247](https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/CONFCLOUD-7247)

[The workaround listed](https://confluence.atlassian.com/confkb/how-to-change-the-creator-of-a-page-720830744.html) is not available for Cloud, but you may be able to do it first on a Server instance.

1. Setup a [Server instance of Confluence](https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/confluence-installation-guide-135681.html).
2. Import your HTML files there.
3. Perform the change in the database per the above article.
4. [Export the site](https://confluence.atlassian.com/confcloud/migrate-from-confluence-server-to-cloud-724765529.html#MigratefromConfluenceServertoCloud-Step3.ExportthesitecontentfromthesourceConfluencesite) from Confluence Server
5. Import the site [into Confluence Cloud.](https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/migrate-from-confluence-cloud-to-server-298979321.html)

If you have any questions, please let me know.

Regards,

Shannon

comments: author: Alan Oehler
body: Thanks, Shannon. We have a server instance we use for internal docs. The problem now is: the article with the workaround says simply "Run this SQL query against your database..." How does one do that? A Google Search turns up a bunch of different approaches, some of which involve buying an add-on, which I'd rather not do.  


author: Nic Brough -Adaptavist-
body: Most databases come with a command line tool for direct access, and there are visual/gui database tools for most of them available as well. What database is it?


author: Alan Oehler
body: Well, that's the issue, Nic; I don't know. I was not involved with the Confluence installation so I don't really know where it is so that I can address the DB.


author: Nic Brough -Adaptavist-
body: Have a look at the system information page, that will give you everything but the password to connect to it!


author: Alan Oehler
body: Thanks, Nic, I'll give that a look.


author: Shannon S
body: Alan,

As Nic said, you can find the server info minus the password to connect. You may have luck asking your server administration team and they may have access to the database to connect.

If you have any trouble do let us know and we can advise you.

Regards,

Shannon


author: Barry Flower
body: Copy the page and then rename. Delete the original.

comments: author: LM
body: Then links to the original page are broken! Not an acceptable solution.


author: Iain Davidson
body: I agree with the above statement of "links to the original page .. not an acceptable solution" along with "the editing history" is also lost on a page copy.


author: Chris Wellington
body: You can change in bulk the creator of a page with the use of the export/import space feature by editing the entities.xml file. Modify the atlassianAccountId.

\<property name="atlassianAccountId"\>\<!\[CDATA\[10f362f6dd1f700072420abc\]\]\>\</property\>

comments: author: Carry Megens
body: Nice workaround (there is no Like for your to the point solution) Yet, hacking XML is not for the faint at heart and to export and import a space is also rather heavy for just changing one author on one page. Make it more easy possible Atlassian. Long standing request.


author: Lee Rahn
body: Has there been any UI changes that allow this to be done yet?

comments: author: Shannon S
body: Hi Lee,

At this time, it's not yet possible.

My recommendation would be to follow the request below for updates:

* [CONFCLOUD-7247](https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/CONFCLOUD-7247)

Thank you for your understanding!

Regards,

Shannon


author: Alan Oehler
body: Yikes, this whole workaround just gets nastier and nastier. I can easily export the space from my cloud instance, but can't seem to import it into the on-premise instance. From looking at the docs, there's this:

<https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/restoring-a-space-152036.html>

I tried to do what it described but I get this message after a couple of minutes:

Import failed. Check your server logs for more information. Error putting scheduler on standby just prior to backup restore. Please wait a few minutes before trying again. If this error persists, please try restarting the server.

comments: author: Shannon S
body: Hi Alan,

Can you clarify what you've done so far? It's unclear which step you're on as there wasn't a step to import a space into Server:

1. Import HTML Files into Server instance
2. Edit the creator in the database
3. Export the entire site or space from Server (space import is necessary if your Cloud instance also includes Jira)
4. Import into Cloud

Could you let me know where in this process you are?

Regards,

Shannon


author: Alan Oehler
body: Well, I had already imported the original source files into the cloud instance, as you may recall from my initial post here, and had already been arranging and organizing them. I assumed that the step "Import HTML Files into Server instance" could be accomplished by exporting the files from the cloud instance and importing them into the on-prem server instance. But I could not get the import step to work, so that's where I'm stuck.


author: Shannon S
body: I see. Thank you for clarifying, Alan! I think that should work, too.

Have you seen this article?

* [Confluence Space XML Import procedure fails with timeout](https://confluence.atlassian.com/confkb/confluence-space-xml-import-procedure-fails-with-timeout-884357177.html)

It has a way to fix the issue but if it doesn't apply to your case, could you have a look at your Confluence Server logs in your Confluence home directory: /logs/atlassian-confluence.log? You should see further error details about what exactly is failing in the import.

Please feel free to provide the relevant lines here.

Regards,

Shannon


Tags: confluence-cloud