New Forum

[MotherBear]

Ta very much but I think I've done more than my share of modding over the last couple of weeks with wrestling with editing out all the junk from the pre-Armageddon posts. This is exactly how I feel right now.

Let's face it. This forum doesn't like us.

What 'new design' (forum) were you on about in your email? Have you changed it again and lil ol' me in Oman isn't going to get to see it for several days, like the last time you changed forums?

[MotherBear]

This new forum doesn't need a moderator. ?It's doing things all by itself. ? Earlier I made a post regarding certain points to do with the forum, but somehow it ended up under Glenda's username (hence her previous post relating to this). ?Now I've just deleted said post and put a message on Glenda's post alerting her to the fact that I had copied my message and was intending posting it again, hopefully, under my own username this time. ?I had, luckily, copied and pasted my own message onto a Word document. So, opened message box and clicked 'paste' and what comes up is not only what I'd just added to Glenda's post (the alert), but the whole of her post as well. ?I did not copy any of that particular message so why did it appear in my message window? ?Don't tell me this forum isn't spooky. It's even encroached into my Yahoo email message box. What's that all about? ?

Anyway, original post coming up........

I can see you on here, Taffy, so I won't make any comment about clicking on a category and having only just the title come up rather than the list of contents. I have to click on a page number to get the index up. Perhaps you're working on something so I'll wait to see if that clears itself later.

Something does seem amiss about the forum since the change. ?It always takes time for folks to get used to a new format, but it seems as if part of the forum's 'soul' has disappeared this time. ? ?

Obviously, the hiccups with the change over cannot have helped. ?The days off-line and the disappearing posts. ?Members who lost their posting 'status' because they had to re-register after the change may have dampened enthusiasm. ? Many old posts are difficult to read, the smilies are duff, and there is a inch border along the right side of my screen which is annoying.

Must admit I cannot warm to the new format. ?

I find the 'grey' text a bit offputting. ?It seems to want to shrink into the background rather than having black which calls out to you to read it. ?I really liked the other forum and it drew a lot of positive comment, but, as it's been permanently laid to rest for a good reason, I guess we'll just have to try to bend this one to fit our requirements as closely as possible.

Appearance-wise, the previous forum was, IMO, very 'crisp' to look at, probably due to the colours i.e. red, blue and black and having the indexes partly in red was quite eyecatching. ?This forum is pleasant enough to the eye, but lacks that bit of zing.

Would agree with Glenda about the annoying strip down the right hand side which is a waste of space IMO.

Dear readers ?:-*, ignore this next bit as it's a load of rubbish as all my edited posts have since reverted to garbage. ?'Mastermind' is apparently attempting to unrevert them ?::).

I'm slowly working my way through the categories so that, at least, pages 1 and 2 of each one have been edited for easier reading. ?There have been major problems, as many of you will have noticed, with quotes, quotation marks and amphersands, which the new forum has taken exception to. ?Also the smileys have been shot to pieces ?>:(and I'm trying to match the old ones with the (somewhat lacking) new ones - quite a big job, especially with certain posters using them quite prolifically . ?Some of them that aren't encroaching too much on the body of the message have been left, due to lack of time, and I'll try to get back to them at a later date. ?The aim, at the moment, is to breathe some life and colour back into the forum, so we can carry on as before.

We'll also need to photo upload facility a.s.a.p. please, as I'm eagerly gearing up to watching the progress of Glenda's house build. ?

[Dawn]

Hey guys, I'm still finding it hard to feel comfortable with this new site. It just doesn't feel like home to me. I never get any notifications of any new posts and there doesn't seem to be many people posting at all except MB, Glenda, Selchie and me. Think I've seen Fisheress a few times and Pulsarblu but where's everyone else? Do you think they got dragged into cyber space with the old site? :-? And what's with these smileys? They are crumby! Where's MB's smiley for everything store? I know I'm just gonna have to get used to it but gang........I'm homesick :'(

AND I'M NOT A NEWBIE >:(

[MotherBear]

Commiserations, Dawn . ?I think several of us feel a bit lost on here. ?It's a totally different experience to when we last changed forums. ?

There have been extreme difficulties since the hacking (which is, obviously, the main object of the exercise) with Taffy's server being destroyed which housed, not only the forum and his other personal websites, but also his company's websites and those of their clients. ?This, in itself, has left Taffy with little time in which to put this new forum to rights, but, as you will read, he is working on it (whether to the good or the bad, I haven't quite worked out yet, after today's trials.). ?

I believe quite a few members found it very difficult to get back into the new forum, possibly, as I've said elsewhere, due to having a split username. ?I had to merge mine into one word to get in. ?Whether there are any other reasons for it, I don't know. ?Perhaps you could try signing in as Dawnmarron to see if it makes any difference. ?You wouldn't be a newbie any more then. ? ;)

I just hope we can overcome all this cr@p that's been thrown at us and, with a little work (well, quite a lot by the seem of it) by Taffy and myself and a bit of support from our valued members, we hope we can make the new forum (we should give it a name to make it easier to refer to ?;D) a better place to be. ?As with any act of 'terrorism' we shouldn't let it beat us. ?

Our forum will be what we make it. ?

[img]
http://www.smileypad.com/artists/fool/emoticons/bubu.gif[/img]

P.S. I'll have a word with Taffy about the smileys as I have access to the smiley screen now . ?Just don't know how to use it. ?Have tried, I must say but couldn't get it to accept my input. ?Perhaps Taffy will point me in the right direction (when he's sorted all the other stuff ?::)). ?You have tried clicking on View all smilies at the left side (well, it was at left, but, having just checked again, it's suddenly appeared next to the smilies over the message box ? Told you this forum is spooky). ?There's a few more in there, but nothing to wet yourself over. ? ;D

As for receiving notifications, there's a button at the top with that word on it. ?I assume you can specify which categories you wish to be notified on. ?I can't reset mine and it's stuck on General and Locations and Properties. ?Other than that I click the little box at the bottom of my messages. ?I am getting some notifications, but not for everything. ?

If you want to post smileys, you have to uncheck the other little box which is a right pain. ? >:(

Hello fellow sad forumites.

Tis true, this doesnt quite have the same zing about it as the old forum, but there is some light at the end of the tunnel.....

This forum was put in place as an attempt to get us back online as soon as possible, because someone kept targetting the old one. There is an update for the old one now which fixes the issue, so it's possible to convert it all back.

I, personally, don't really like this forum. It's causing problems and we're losing posts etc, which is very frustrating. I wont go in to the techincal details, but lets just say this forum, although secure, has big issues with file systems!!

So, the good news is, the old forum has been patched and, if required, can be brought back on line. So the question is... Do we want the old type forum back?

[MotherBear]

I was snooping around the YaBB support forum last night and wasn't very impressed either with the rather vague answers to forum hoster's problems and also there were many questions about things that had gone wrong, which raised deep concern in my mind. ?

You've answered one of my questions (from the poll thread) about security, so if it's not going to be a constant worry to us again, I'll probably go for reverting to the old one. ?I did feel 'at home' on there (not that anyone will have noticed, of course )

[Dawn]

Taffy, I was really sorry to read in MB's post that you had lost so much personal stuff on your server as well. I feel like I've been really selfish moaning about the forum when you've had so much other crap to deal with :-[ Please accept my apologies and I hope you didn't lose too much 'special' stuff. I'd feel violated if those bloody hackers broke into my files, b*!?!*!s

I will be patient and will try not to whinge.........for a few days ;)

[Glenda]

Taffy, I recall you put a post on here (probably one of the missing ones) that said the old forum was secure, out of ten, 2/10 (?) and the new one 8/10 (?). With this new update, does the security improve much?
:-?

[MotherBear]

I?m still very concerned about stuff going missing. I?m sure it?s still happening and freaks me out. At my age I have enough ?blank? spots to contend with, where my memory lets me down, without the forum adding to my problems.

I guess, if we continue to run with the new forum, we?re (I?m) going to be stuck with a tremendous heap of corrupted posts that will need editing (again!). ::)

The major issue is the security one. I don?t think we could risk having this sort of thing happening again. It?s going to be a struggle to get credibility back as it is, after all the knocks the forum has suffered.

Meanwhile, I'm still working on my Wish List.

Hi,

Don't worry Dawn, it's good to know what people think about things as otherwise I'd wander blindly on thinking everything was ok, and then the website dies a death because people hate it!

There wont be any more posts going missing on this new forum now, all the stuff causing that is finished with, so everything is now safe. The site also now gets backed up daily, instead of weekly as it used to, so if anything major like another hack does happen, we might only loose a few of the very latest things only.

Glenda, although they've patched this hole in security, it's only a matter of time before they find the next hole. Just do a search for 'phpbb hacked' on Google, and it returns 1.7 million results.

For future security, i'd much prefer to work on this forum and make it look and feel better, than risk all this happening again at some point down the line. But in the same token, the new release of the old forum may well never see another issue either. It's difficult to know.