Mastodon Topics

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#MoveAccount test procedure

The old account was setup on one server and the new account setup on another server.
About 10 toots were sent from the old account, 8 using a specific hashtag.
The old account had three followers, the new account and two other accounts.
The new account had zero followers but followed the old account.

After the move the old account should display a redirect notice and have one follower while the new account should have two followers.

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#MoveAccount test procedure

An alias to the old account was added from the new account.

Navigation:
- (from top left in web browser under the user name) click "edit profile"
- click "Account Settings"
- on the right, near bottom, under "Moving from a different account" click the "create an account alias" link

The display should be similar to the sample screen shot:
https://github.com/mastodon/documentation/blob/master/static/assets/account-aliases.jpg

Similar to step 2 from
https://fedi.tips/transferring-your-mastodon-account-to-another-server/

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#MoveAccount test procedure

Skipped step 4 of the following document (move followers) for now and went to Step 5 export data
https://fedi.tips/transferring-your-mastodon-account-to-another-server/

The move operation (step 4) was completed later on.
It is a good idea to obtain an archive of the old account before the followers are moved.

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#MoveAccount test procedure

To navigate to display the csv lists that can be exported from the old account:
- from top left part of web browser display, click "edit profile"
- click "Import and export"
- click "Data export".

The "following" list from the old account was downloaded in csv file format so that it could be imported into the new account.
See "You follow" in the following sample screen shot
https://github.com/mastodon/documentation/blob/master/static/assets/export.jpg

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#MoveAccount test procedure

Now with all of the csv files from the old account saved somewhere the next step was to import all of the csv files into the new account.

Navigation from main page after logging into new account
- click "edit profile"
- click "Import and export"
- click "Import"

The web browser screen should look similar to
https://postimg.cc/QFv4Ps0F

All of the csv files were imported using "merge" one file at a time.

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#MoveAccount test procedure

From the old account the followers were moved as specified in step 4 of
https://fedi.tips/transferring-your-mastodon-account-to-another-server/

Navigation
- click "edit profile"
- click "Account"
- under "Move to a different account" click "configure it here"

The display should look like:
https://github.com/mastodon/documentation/blob/master/static/assets/account-move.jpg

Enter the user_name@new_server and current password of old account and then click the "MOVE FOLLOWERS" button
It might take some time to move all the followers.

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#MoveAccount test results

Screen shot of old account profile before the move
https://postimg.cc/fkvFFD1V

Screen shots old account profile after move
(upper) https://postimg.cc/Hrn4bBMp
(lower) https://postimg.cc/ThcrSZqd

As expected the followers were reduced from 3 to 1.
The old account also displayed a redirect notice and the profile was "grayed-out".

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#MoveAccount test results

Screen shot of new account before move
https://postimg.cc/SXrC414f

Screen shot of new account after move
https://postimg.cc/cKKvD39G

As expected the number of followers went from zero to two.

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#MoveAccount test results

The only major difference observed between a "redirect" of an account and a "move" is that the followers were migrated with a move.

Screen shot of old account with a redirect before the followers were moved.
https://postimg.cc/MvNnNKj2

Screen shots old account profile after move
(upper) https://postimg.cc/Hrn4bBMp

If the new account follows the old account then all the old toots can be easily viewed from the home timeline.

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#MoveAccount old toots

For this experiment there were only 8 of 10 toots that could be considered candidates for moving.
Using a hashtag to organize the toots was really useful.

Since the old server seems unlikely to disappear anytime soon then the old toots can always be viewed using the link
https://mastodon.social/tags/mstdnSocialTopics20230518

If the old server was being shutdown then the old toots could have been archived in a blog post like
https://edfosswrites.wordpress.com/2023/05/23/toots_topics_20230518/

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#MoveAccount old toots

If the old server is not being shutdown then consider
- following the old account from the new account so the old toots can be easily viewed from the "Home" timeline of the new account
- sending a toot from the new account reminding users who wish to view the old toots that they can do so by either following the old account or by visiting the old account at some_old_server_name/@some_old_user.