Using STSADM to export and import site collection

Question

I'm having an issue when trying to import an existing export using stsadm.

Having succesfully exported the site collection, I then create a new blank site. When I run the import command, it runs for a while, then completes with the following error:

01/28/2009 13:04:28.84 STSADM.EXE (0x3F54) 0x1D74 Windows SharePoint Services General 72ju High stsadm: A duplicate name "Team" was found. Callstack: at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPFieldCollection.AddFieldToWeb(String strXml, Boolean checkDisplayName) at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPFieldCollection.AddFieldAsXmlInternal(String schemaXml, Boolean addToDefaultView, SPAddFieldOptions op) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.FieldTemplateSerializer.CreateField(SPWeb web, SerializationInfoHelper infoHelper) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.FieldTemplateSerializer.SetObjectData(Object obj, SerializationInfo info, StreamingContext context, ISurrogateSelector selector) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.XmlFormatter.ParseObject(Type objectType, Boolean isChildObject) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.XmlFormatter.DeserializeObject(Type objectType, Boolean isChildObject, Deployme...
01/28/2009 13:04:28.84* STSADM.EXE (0x3F54) 0x1D74 Windows SharePoint Services General 72ju High ...ntObject envelope) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.XmlFormatter.Deserialize(Stream serializationStream) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.ObjectSerializer.Deserialize(Stream serializationStream) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.ImportObjectManager.ProcessObject(XmlReader xmlReader) at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.SPImport.DeserializeObjects() at Microsoft.SharePoint.Deployment.SPImport.Run() at Microsoft.SharePoint.StsAdmin.SPImportOperation.Run(StringDictionary keyValues) at Microsoft.SharePoint.StsAdmin.SPStsAdmin.RunOperation(SPGlobalAdmin globalAdmin, String strOperation, StringDictionary keyValues, SPParamCollection pars)

When I then run the site, it seems to have just done half a job and stopped at the error.

Can anyone point me in the right direction for what might be causing this error?

Many Thanks

Kieran

Answer 1

Have you installed the December cumulative update? Microsoft has recently fixed a number of bugs in the content migration framework.

Answer 2

The stack trace tells us a lot about what is happening. The most important line is Microsoft.SharePoint.SPFieldCollection.AddFieldToWeb This means that the error is occurring when a field, not a list is being added to an SPWeb. If you add to an SPFieldCollection with an existing name, this will error.

You can use SharePointManager to have a peak at the site things are going into if you are curious.

The reason this is happening is you are restoring to a sub site and the main site still has all the fields there.

Your best bet is to make sure you have the latest patches etc (see Lars suggestion).

Walm3864 post is correct in that a new site collection will not have the same problem. A new site collection is usually a serious decision to make and has to be judged in light of your current information architecture.

This will not affect search as the new site collection can be added to the existing url using a managed path (e.g. http://intranet/sites/mynewsiteyay)

It will impact on your backup strategy as you will need to add the new database to that process.

It can be beneficial to add new site collections for some larger sub sites as it will improve the backup times if all databases are under 100GB. It is important to split out potentially large sites early as it is hard to do it after the fact.

Answer 3

One way to find this conflict is to open the CMP file (using Winrar for example) and then look at the manifest.xml file. In there, do a search for ="Team". You will likely find two NAME="Team" even if the Display Name is different... --> We had a similar problem and we had to fix the Source Site (collection) then re-export it before we could import it successfully.

Hope this helps.

Answer 4

It might be a conflict with list id's. Try this, create a new content db and then create a new site collection and make a import?