If you haven’t heard, the latest release of WordPress (2.3.x) comes with built-in tag support. Now, instead of using a plug-in like SimpleTags or Ultimate Tag Warrior to insert tags, WordPress 2.3.x allows you to enter a list of comma separated tag words in a dedicated field at the bottom of the post. This new feature is great but what do I do with all of those tags in posts created prior to version 2.3.x?

WordPress Tag Migration Options

WordPress does provide a tag migration path for Bunny’s Technorati Tags, Simple Tagging, Jerome’s Keywords, and Ultimate Tag Warrior. Unfortunately, I didn’t use any of those tag plug-ins. Instead, I used SimpleTags, which has no built in migration tool. That prior decision leaves me now with two options:

1. Leave SimpleTags running and use WordPress tag support for future posts.
2. Go back through each post and manually remove the tag brackets and insert the old tags into the WordPress Tag field.

Call me crazy, but I elected to go with the manual solution.

The Benefit of the Manual Effort

The entire manual effort took me about 40 minutes. A tedious process but there were two big side effect benefits that came out of this manual effort: category consolidation and a previous post refresher.

Since I’m broadening the focus of TechTraction, I was able to tackle something on my to-do list and consolidate my categories while migrating my tags. Second, and this benefit I didn’t expect, having to manually edit every post I ever wrote reminded me of things I wrote that I had completely forgotten about. That reminder has given me a couple ideas for future posts.

So, if you’re finding yourself stuck for blog ideas, take a break and go through your older posts. You might be surprised how your creativity gets a kick start from seeing your work from the past.

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Filed under: Blogging Related