Site Update - July 3 2011

[Bob Hubbard]

If everything goes as planned, I'll be kicking off the long delayed upgrade to vB4 tonight. I honestly have no idea how long it'll take as test runs have varied. Site may be down a few hours, or a couple days. Lots of new features, lots of things moving around, and a new look are coming. No idea when I'll kick it off as I'm working through several other sites right now. But, the holiday weekend combined with expected low traffic makes this weekend a good time for a little down time.

Yes, full backups taken prior to starting, so worst case, I just roll back to current config.

 

[Namii]

cool Im looking forward to it

 

[rlobrecht]

Thanks for the heads up.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Updating the time line. Gonna start this in the morning on Sunday. Had a long day updating other sites, want to hit this one fresh and I really don't feel like staying up another 24 hours right now.

 

[Sukerkin]

Slacker! {raises Spock-like eyebrow in disdain at such human weakness }

Oh and as a complete aside, I've been meaning to say, since you changed to it, that the shot of the F016 you use for your avatar now is awesome :bows:

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Ok, MT is back, mostly. Some functions are still impacted, and the search is broken at the moment. With the exception of the "Thanks" database, everything looks like it came in intact. (Sorry folks, thanks got reset).

Lots of things are different, and the current look sucks (default), which I'll be working on the rest of the day.

Be aware the site may shut down without notice as I continue to patch hiccups. I'll put a full write up in soon.

 

[jks9199]

Yeah, current look needs help! I can't find stuff... Hope you can get back to something closer to the "old" way!

Seems to have lost a lot of smilies, too...

 

[Bob Hubbard]

ok, working on the smilie issue. Please keep me posted.Thanks

 

[Bob Hubbard]

testing

You should see some smilies on the side if you use the Advanced Editor. There is a MORE button there that should help.

 

[Namii]

Thanks for your hard work. im not a fan of the new layout either, hope you get something closer to what we had before. Yep the smilies work now.

 

[StudentCarl]

Disappointing to lose the 'Thanks' database, as that was a good at-a-glance indicator of the quality of the contributor. Oh well, it'll re-emerge.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

I had to rip out all of the old add ins to get this to go through. Probably lost some high scores in the arcade too I'm afraid. (I'll readd that when I am sure things are stable and after I chuck the ugly white look).

The editor here is totally new. It's got some minor 'crash recovery' aspects, so hopefully those 'ah crap I lost my post' days are past.

Videos are now easy to add, just use the little film strip button and past the link in. It works with most popular video sites like Youtube.

Smilies are an issue. Use the Advanced option for now. Might take a few weeks for that one to work out in later updates I'm afraid.

Reputation looks to be intact.

So far, all attachments look to have come in, and all threads look to be in as well.

The search engine is currently broken. I have to run a reindexing of ALL 1.3Million posts, which will take about a day or 2 to run I expect.

Other than that, most functions are here, though things have moved around a bit and you may have to hunt initially until I can streamline again.

 

[Aiki Lee]

it will take some getting used to, but overall I like the layout. Too bad the thanks got reset. How are people supposed to know how awesome I am now? :uhyeah:

 

[Bob Hubbard]

ok, I roughed in some colors to feel them out. Not the final look, I'm still figuring the backend editor out (I hate it btw), but wanted to get rid of the white.

I'm going to kick off the post reindexing, so expect hiccups over the next day or so.

Errors, likes and dislikes and 'where the frack did X go' notes, tack em on here or on the Facebook page and I will work through things over the next week to resolve them.

Thanks for the patience and continued support.

I'm taking a break. 9 hrs in and it's time to relax for a bit before tackling the next massive phase.

 

[Xue Sheng]

WHAT!!!!

MY THANKS ARE GONE!!!!

of course you realize... this means war

I will have to look at it for a bit to see what I truly feel, not that it matters actually.

The new layout will take some getting use to for me. so far it appears harder to read


EDIT!
It is a PIA to post with IE9

 

[Bob Hubbard]

clear your cache. It's fixed a few other issues, though I don't have access to IE9 to test.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

ok, so far, testing looks ok on Android 3 tablet (regular browser), OSX Firefox and Safari.

Can the IE users give me some extra feedback and include your browser versions please.
Thanks.

If things look funky, try clearing the cache, and restarting the browser in case any of the old files or bits are cached.

Thanks

 

[jks9199]

WHAT!!!!

MY THANKS ARE GONE!!!!

of course you realize... this means war

I will have to look at it for a bit to see what I truly feel, not that it matters actually.

The new layout will take some getting use to for me. so far it appears harder to read


EDIT!
It is a PIA to post with IE9

There... You have some more Thanks back. Making you happier?

 

[Bob Hubbard]

If you are having issues with the new editor, you can try switching to a simpler one.

Goto the top-right of the screen.
Click on SETTINGS
Look down the left column for General Settings.
Click on it.
Look down the page until you find the editor options and select "Standard Editor - Extra formatting controls" or "Standard Editor - Extra formatting controls"
Select and save.

You lose a lot of the whistles n bells but it might fix some of the issues.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Main forum page has some extra info feeds. Check em out.

Profiles are member modifiable.

Also, check out the enhanced blogging features.