I have recently moved the website Hsenag.info to howtopfy.com due to some undisclosed reasons and i would like to share my experience in doing so.
Firstly, Like any other users of wordpress who wants to change the domain, i planned to setup a domain and test the migration first and then redirect. When i migrated the database first, it migrated well with some issues, then i cleaned up the code in SQL backup and reinstalled again and like a charm it worked pretty well. So here is a glance of Transfering my website from old domain to new domain.
Step by step process of Migrating a WordPress blog to New Domain:
1. Take the backup of your database using PHPMyAdmin of your webhost.This is very important step as we are going to use this backup.
2. Now backup your existing wp-contents folder as this is going to be used all through the life time of your blog.
3. Since the wp-contents folder and SQL file are backed up we are ready to install the same on the new domain.
4. Now, create a domain and make it ready to get installed with wordpress on it. (Note: you have assign it seperately like a new web domain on your host and the name servers should be pointing the same. Hoping you know how to assign a new domain, i m moving forward here.)
5. As the domain is ready, extract a brand new version of the wordpress by downloading it from the wordpress.org to the root directory or sub directory of the New domain as is on the previous domain.
6. After extracting dont hurry to install the new version, we dont require it, because we are installing our old website’s sql dump.
7. Now, open the backed up SQL dump file our old website and do the following corrections.
- Open the file in text editor and find (Ctrl + H) and Replace “olddomainname.com” to “newdomainname.com“.
- If your webhost or web root changes then you might require to change the “/home/account name/” folder. Here account name is the accont name of your webhost in most cases.
- If you have any other changes to be done in posts with old domain, replace them. “olddomainname” to “newdomainname“.Here in my case, i have to replace many a time, hsenag to Howtopfy.
- Change the database table name and remove the headers of PHPMyAdmin present in the top of the sql dump file. Or else you will find your self with errors in creating database.
7. Now goto the New website host and in the PHPMyAdmin of the new webhost, Import the SQL dump file.
8. If installed well, you are ready to go to next step, else, you have to go to step 6 again and make sure everything went right.
9. Since the database is cleanly installed, you need to update it with the new database format, if any. So Migrate to the new website at the follwing address. “ http://yournewdomain.com/wordpress-installation-folder/wp-admin/“.
10. If you get update database option since your wordpress is brand New, please go ahead and click on the option to do so.
11. Now, your installation is ready and the Website or Blog is Moved to your new domain successfully.
Note: Don’t forget to transfer your Wp-contents folder that is backed up before installing your SQL DUMP inthe PHPMyAdmin. Failing in doing so, may break your theme and plugins. If you failed, don’t worry, you can restore all the plugins and themes back just by activating them. 
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