HappenBoard → Settings → Tools holds two round trips: your events as a CSV spreadsheet, and your settings as a JSON file. Both are administrator-only.
Exporting your events
Click Export events (CSV). Your browser downloads a file named after your site and the current date. Every event that is published, a draft, scheduled, pending review or private is included. Trashed events are left out on purpose, so restoring a backup never resurrects something you deleted.
There is one row per event. A repeating event exports once, carrying its repeat rule, rather than once per date.
The columns
The header order is fixed and the importer expects the same names:
titlestatusstart_utcend_utcall_dayrrulevenue_namevenue_addressorganizer_nameorganizer_emailcapacitycategoriestagsexcerptcontent
Two details worth knowing. The categories and tags cells hold term names separated by a vertical bar character, not commas, because commas inside a spreadsheet cell cause more trouble than they solve. And the two date columns are in UTC, not your local time.
The venue and organizer columns are plain text. They do not point at your venue records, so an export followed by an import gives you the text but not the links.
Cells that start with a character a spreadsheet would read as a formula are prefixed with an apostrophe on the way out. The apostrophe is hidden when you open the file and exists only to stop a spreadsheet executing text someone typed into an event title.
Importing events
Click Import events (CSV) and pick your file. A header row is required. Only title, start_utc and end_utc have to be present; the rest are optional, and columns HappenBoard does not recognise are ignored.
The importer only ever creates. It never matches, updates or overwrites an existing event. Importing the same file twice gives you two copies of everything, so treat the CSV as a way to add events in bulk rather than a way to sync them.
- A row with no title, or missing either date, is skipped and reported with its row number.
- An unrecognised or missing status becomes a draft.
- Categories and tags that do not exist yet are created.
- An organizer email is only stored when it is a valid address.
You get a Created and Skipped count when it finishes, with the first ten row errors listed underneath. Check the results on the Events screen before you tell anyone the calendar is live.
Attendees are not part of this file. Bringing sign-ups in is a separate job, covered in the attendee CSV guide.
Backing up your settings
Click Export settings (JSON) for a small file holding your General settings, along with the plugin version, your site address and the export date. Use it to move a configuration to a staging site or a second install.
Secret credentials such as API keys and webhook secrets are deliberately left out. They stay on the site where you entered them, and you re-enter them by hand after an import.
Import settings (JSON) reads a file back in. HappenBoard checks that it is genuinely a HappenBoard export and that the format version is one it understands, then applies the settings and tells you what it restored. A file that fails either check is refused rather than half-applied.
What’s next
- Migrate from another plugin instead, if your events are still in one.
- Manage the people who sign up.
- Set up categories and tags before a large import.
- Check who can reach these tools.