Comments (constructive) on the New Forum Software

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

[ PostScript ]

For info, I have just changed my ‘cover image’ to a square crop of what was there before … the system accepts it, but then crops the height to make it fit the letterbox.

MichaelG.

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[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

It’s the same with other things like Facebook that have the wide image they just take a slice of it whatever shape it is uploaded as

The crop on the site is really just to best position the square that your avatar will display, eg if your head is off to one side you alter the crop to get most of your head in.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

I am now reverting to the original wide ‘cover-image’ which was 1020×255 px

which you will find in the usual way [ unless and until I replace it ]

MichaelG.

[Nicholas Farr]

On Nicholas Farr said

Hi, I don’t know if anyone else has, but I’ve discovered how to view my own profile instead of the message that you can’t. If you click on profile and then on settings, you should see Profile visibility, click on that, and then you can see who can see what about your profile, and you have to put a new password into a box and repeat it into a second box, and then click update. So now any members should be able see the about me, that I had on the old forum.

Regards Nick.

Hi, don’t put a new password into the boxes, as this will change your log in password. It seems to be a little bit confusing what you should do to make your about me that you had on the old forum, visible to other members, but I have changed to the visibility to my about me, to members, so I don’t know why anyone else can’t see it.

Regards Nick.

[Phil WhitleyParticipant @philwhitley94135]

XENFORO!!

[Howard LewisParticipant @howardlewis46836]

Have just tried to open my profile, and adjust the settings and the password.

The password change has been implemented.

If my profile changes have taken place, I “Do not have the role tom view them”

I know that itb is earky days, and that the moderators have putb in a huge amount of time getting the Forum up and running again, but being an old dog, and a lifetime Luddite, my patience is running out, very rapidly.

If Admin don’t get things sorted, very soon, there will be another member resigning!

Howard

[Phil Whitley]

On Phil Whitley said

XENFORO!!

The RCME forum  (also a Mortons one) is powered by Invision Community. That seems to work quite well.

John

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Apparently developers that did that went AWOL so that is why Mortons had to look elsewhere

[JourneymanParticipant @journeyman]

I think if I were a company I would choose to standardise my software. There is surely more than one suitable developer in the UK. (Probably comes down to money though. I doubt the forums are exactly money spinners)

John

[Howard Lewis]

On Howard Lewis Said:

Have just tried to open my profile, and adjust the settings and the password.

The password change has been implemented.

If my profile changes have taken place, I “Do not have the role tom view them”

I know that itb is earky days, and that the moderators have putb in a huge amount of time getting the Forum up and running again, but being an old dog, and a lifetime Luddite, my patience is running out, very rapidly.

If Admin don’t get things sorted, very soon, there will be another member resigning!

Howard

Just trying to report this bug on the new system.

“Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.”
― Aristotle

 

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Font and Background improved

[Brian WoodParticipant @brianwood45127]

Has the Wanted category got ‘lost’ in the Classified section?

Brian

[Stuart Smith 5]

On Stuart Smith 5 Said:

Jason/Dave

I know it’s unlikely, but could an archived copy of the old forum be made available?

I for one, used the site for information as much on old posts as new ones.

I can’t even find my own posts from the old site or posts I bookmarked as useful.

Thanks for your efforts though – I had similar issues when working and user testing new software and trying to tell management that there were issues, but not being listened to.

 

Stuart

Stuart, all the old forum posts are still available on this forum.

Posts you started and posts you responded to (engagements) are all accessible through your profile.

Neil

[Brian WoodParticipant @brianwood45127]

Has the Wanted section in the classified category got ‘lost’ in the change?

Brian

[Brian Wood]

On Brian Wood Said:

Has the Wanted category got ‘lost’ in the Classified section?

Brian

Ads are no longer split into ‘for sale’ and ‘wanted’. Just choose ‘wanted’ as the category when placing an ad.

Neil

Correct answer here, not lost just not uploaded

[David JuppParticipant @davidjupp51506]

Only a fraction of my previous posts are found on the re-vamped site.  Haven’t bothered to try to work out if the posts have disappeared, or if it’s just a search/indexing issue.  Not critical as nothing of huge significance, and now mainly outdated.

Do we really have to have the subscribe today advert after the first post on every page?

The new site seems particularly bad when viewed on computer screen, actually looks better (less repeated items, and less wasted space) when viewed on a tablet.

I’m hoping things will improve over time…

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

See my reply on the separtate thread about wanted adds someone forgot to load them and are being chased up not as Neil says.

 

David I have posted where to find them in a separate thread, all 10500 of the threads I posted in are there.

Profile- Forums – Engagements

[ZanParticipant @zan]

Getting rid of email alert fir the 5 th time. Think I have to post first

[Journeyman]

On Journeyman Said:

In reply to Dave’s personal view:-

I think not helped by a poor choice of software. WordPress isn’t a bulletin board (forum) software. To make it work as such needs 3rd party add-ons. Whilst it is free to use it is evident that you get what you pay for. WordPress is a number one target for hackers, spambots and all manner of other problems due to it’s wide use.

I fear though things will not change much it will now be impossible to revert to the old software and ‘proper’ bulletin board software is unlikely to be implemented any time soon due in no small part to the costs. This is a ‘big’ site so any changes are complicated and costly. We will have to make do with what we have and hope that all the gremlins can be kicked out but don’t hold your breath.

John

There are good forum-based packages around – I am a member of 2 forums that make use of the Xeoforo software. I’ve no idea what the cost implications of its use are – I just know that on those forums it seems to work very well.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

https://xenforo.com/purchase/

https://xenforo.com/solutions/#xf

 

MichaelG.

[JasonB]

On JasonB Said:

 

David I have posted where to find them in a separate thread, all 10500 of the threads I posted in are there.

Profile- Forums – Engagements

Thanks Jason – that works, totally non-obvious.

– but until this afternoon when things do seem to have speeded up a bit, wading through all the comments about the re-vamped site was totally impractical, which may explain why I either didn’t see it, or didn’t recognise it as linked to something I’d just noticed.

[Neil Wyatt]

On Neil Wyatt Said:

On Brian Wood Said:

Has the Wanted category got ‘lost’ in the Classified section?

Brian

Ads are no longer split into ‘for sale’ and ‘wanted’. Just choose ‘wanted’ as the category when placing an ad.

Neil

Correct answer here, not lost just not uploaded

I think both answers are ‘correct’ the new ‘wanted’ category’ just hasn’t got old ads in it.

[Journeyman]

On Journeyman Said:

On Phil Whitley said

XENFORO!!

The RCME forum  (also a Mortons one) is powered by Invision Community. That seems to work quite well.

John

You boys do love a Brand Name!  If ‘X’ doesn’t work out of the box, try a different one.  If only it were that easy!

Wordpress is a respectable platform, probably the most common web base on the internet. It works.

Trouble is, WordPress has to be configured to do the needful.   Much is done by a Forum plugin, but that also has to be configured, and it too is supported by several more configurable plugins. Under the bonnet the old forum was heavily bespoke, unusually complicated, and supports many thousands of accounts.

Imitating the old forum with any of the available packages is a significant professional challenge, not for the faint-hearted.  Switching to something else isn’t an easy alternative.  Not a matter of reading a quick start guide and pressing a few buttons. Think rather of making sure a few thousand cross-coupled settings all work together correctly, and don’t overload the server or network, or compromise security.

I was certain I had the most difficult job in the world, and that everyone else was incompetently messing up their trivial job.  Wrong of course – most jobs are difficult: it’s only not understanding the detail that makes them look easy to outsiders.

Patience!  Or kick the cat.

Dave

 

[David Jupp]

On David Jupp Said:

Only a fraction of my previous posts are found on the re-vamped site.  Haven’t bothered to try to work out if the posts have disappeared, or if it’s just a search/indexing issue.  Not critical as nothing of huge significance, and now mainly outdated.

Do we really have to have the subscribe today advert after the first post on every page?

The new site seems particularly bad when viewed on computer screen, actually looks better (less repeated items, and less wasted space) when viewed on a tablet.

I’m hoping things will improve over time…

They are all there David, you just need to know where to look; see this thread.
The same method allows you to find others’ posts if you view their profile.

How to find ALL your old posts

Bill

[David Jupp]

On David Jupp Said:

On JasonB Said:

 

David I have posted where to find them in a separate thread, all 10500 of the threads I posted in are there.

Profile- Forums – Engagements

Thanks Jason – that works, totally non-obvious.

– but until this afternoon when things do seem to have speeded up a bit, wading through all the comments about the re-vamped site was totally impractical, which may explain why I either didn’t see it, or didn’t recognise it as linked to something I’d just noticed.

 

Wordpress uses different terminology, so this is an ‘engagement’ not a ‘reply’ and the whole ‘thread’ is called a ‘topic’ and what were ‘topics’ are now ‘forums’.

Getting used to these multiple minor changes is getting in the way of identifying actual bugs, but it should be apparent that things like font choices and other visual improvements are coming through.

The big change will be when they can switch off the regular Cloudflare checks (which are stopping bots crashing the site, as they were last week).

Neil

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