Have you ever noticed how, when you’ve got some kind of computer-related problem, the kind of problem that makes you thump the desk with your big meaty fist, that makes you cry out with unsavoury language, that drives you up the flippin’ wall, that at least 95% of the time the solution to the entire horrible time-consuming bother proves to be a single check-box that either needs checking, or unchecking, or some similar piddling fix?

I have. I’ve noticed this on many occasions. Which, no doubt, suggests I have poor attention to detail. However, all of my ranting in the previous post about the miseries of WordPress as a blogging tool should be disregarded.

You see, I spent a good portion of last night and today trying to import the backup file I made of the previous version of this blog–without success. I kept getting an error message asking if I had write permission for the directory into which all that material would be uploaded. I checked said permissions. I checked them many many times. And at each check, the permissions appeared entirely suitable. Yet blog would not go.

Just now, I checked some more online WordPress documentation, and came across the advice that when setting the write permissions on the directory in question, you might need to go for the big “777″ or “rwx-rwx-rwx”. I had not taken the permissions quite that far, thinking all was sufficient. Nonetheless, I tried applying the recommended settings.

And then I started thinking. Hmm, thought I, what if, what if, now that I had changed the write permissions for that directory so much, I tried one last time to upload that backup file? What might happen? So I tried it. I found the file, got the system going uploading it, all the time thinking that I don’t have to proceed with the actual importation of the backup file. I just want to see if the upload thing would work.

It did work. Oh, my, but it worked. Presently, I had a big long list of posts, the great majority of them with the phrase “post already exists” appended. See, I had been concerned about having a blog chock full of doubled posts, but WordPress had me covered there, too! It would only import the new posts, or the ones that weren’t already here!

I think my poor head exploded in shock and wonder.

This means that I could have not only all of the posts from good old Modem Noise (RIP), but even those from the original, pre-WordPress version of Little Known Author , and the posts from this new-fangled new version of the blog. All in one place! Something that had bothered me all along.

So. Let the word go forth from this place at this time that I am all wrong about WordPress. It is a fine blogging tool. It is the dog’s bollocks! It cocks its hind leg and wees all over Movable Type’s cowering, shivering, pale form.

However, just remember, if you’re a WordPress user and you’re trying to import your backed up WP posts into your new installation, and you’re wondering why you keep getting that annoying error message asking whether you have write permission for the directory you’re trying to upload your backup thingy into, MAX OUT THE PERMISSIONS FOR THE WP-CONTENT DIRECTORY.

Now, if I could just figure out how to get pictures going as well, I’d be very chuffed indeed. Even repulsively smug, quite possibly.

UPDATE: A Few Hours Later: Houston, we have smugness!