What the hell happened there?

[RET]

Our hosts (aussiehosts.com.au) shut the old YaBB forum down, due to excessive bandwidth usage and server load problems.

That was a rather nasty surprise

The good news was I was able to port the old forum across into this marvellous looking modern forum by "Simple Machines", and was very surprised that it worked first time. Hats off to the guys at SMF who wrote the YABB to SMF converter. You're all worth more money.

So have at it guys!  You should find everything you had at the old board works here - UNLESS you've posted links to specific boards/threads on our websites. They're toast, unfortunately.

Sorry for the disruption, but it looked like it could have been for a lot longer...

cheers
RET

[Glenn 'Stinky' Stankevicius]

So does that mean this is our "permanent" home now?

[RET]

It sure does. This is the new reality.

All the threads/boards/PMs and everything else seemed to transfer across without a problem. (I still can't believe it, to be honest).

I'm still figuring out all the new features and functions, but so far I haven't found very much that I could do with YaBB that I can't do here (although I haven't come across how I can force Preview before post yet...)

cheers
RET

[minifcvan]

WOW what a shock this morning at 7am NO FE FC forum..THIS one is very pretty.WELL DONE RET and everyone else who got it up and running again so quickly well done.. Cheers Mark

[NO NAME]

huh, so its not tnat i am banned and my ip got blocked, they hole forum was cactus, cool.
 I had to sign in again, dont remember my passwords and ended up with my old username, i might sort that out when i am real bored.

[TTV6FC]

Well done all,I would guess that was a task and a half but it looks like you pulled it off no problems.I had trouble with my login but it was a simple "upper case" problem.I see some users have lost their pictures,is that a fault with the change over or problems with the image hosting sites?Cheers,Jamie

[RET]

OK,

I've had some dinner, put the kids to bed etc. Now I can look into this a bit further, and see what's new, what's changed etc. Good to know, all linked images etc seem to work, except a few problems with avatars. Will look into that.

New:
-much nicer reply/post screen - honours adding text formatting to selected text etc.
- themes/skins. Check it out here

Broken:
- polls - leave it with me
- chat room - might have to install something else for that.
- home pages - not that they were used to any great extent...

All in all though, looks like a successful migration. I'm happy. The administration options available in SMF are just a world apart from YaBB.

UPDATE 20/07 23:50 - I think the major problem with avatars is resolved.

cheers
RET

[RET]

Thank you to all the club members who contacted me to let me know they couldn't access all the options they thought they should be able to.

It turns out the default configuration for all the "club" profiles was missing a few vital check-boxes.

It should be OK now. Thanks for your patience.

cheers
RET

[MISTERPC]

A big thanks to Richard for the research and work involved, he did all the work, there was only 1 of him, no helpers.

[RET]

Thanks Brenden. You don't want to be hassled by aussiehosts any more than I do!

A couple of other new features people might be interested in...

If you start a new topic, you are its "owner". This means you have the privilege to:
- lock it (useful in for sale/wanted threads)
- move it to a different board (if you realise you've put it in the wrong spot)

I've configured the calendar function, that allows you to add an event to the calendar and at the same time, generate a thread in the "Events Board". This will make both much more useful. (The old board had a calendar, but I don't think it was used very much, since it was pretty much independent of the main forum, apart from birthdays.)

cheers
RET

[MISTERPC]

I was going to edit my post to say "The server thanks Richard as well" but couldn't fin the edit post link.

[RET]

Brenden,

It isn't there. A few too many occasions where people have "rewritten history" in arguments with others.

There is a short grace period to correct a post, but once someone else replies, that's it. I was too quick for you.

cheers
RET

[Geoff_K]

Hi RET,
Congratulations, on getting new/revised forum up and running. Still getting used to format, and making the necessary changes to my bookmarks etc.
Just noticed new "Insert Image" button, so might give it a try.
Image "Anybodies guess"now pressing button
[/img](well thats interesting"[/img]" but I have no idea what to do with it!
Cheers.
Geoff_K

[Glenn 'Stinky' Stankevicius]

This new forum software gets slicker all the time, it also seems to be a lot faster than the old forum. The search function is a lot easier to use, no more excuses for repeat topics hey? 

Dunno about the "total time logged on" feature though 

[customFC]

Hey Stinky.
In the top box on the top right you will see a button with a "-" in it, click on that and it will contract that section and you won't have to look at the clock again.
Regards
Alex

[RET]

This new forum software gets slicker all the time, it also seems to be a lot faster than the old forum. The search function is a lot easier to use, no more excuses for repeat topics hey? 

Dunno about the "total time logged on" feature though 

It's definitely a lot faster, and once I completely decommission the old forum it will free up some disk space to index the search function, which will improve that feature out of sight.

I still haven't been around every nook and cranny of the admin interface, either.

I agree with you about the total time logged on - before long we'll all be like minivan's "You've been logged on for one year" sig-line

As for the image link button, it seems to function exactly the same as the previous version: it generates a [ img ] URL [ /img ] pair, and you replace "URL" with the URL of the image.

cheers
RET

[Geoff_K]

Hi RET,
I could not fathom the old board process for including images, so I am still none the wiser when you say......
"As for the image link button, it seems to function exactly the same as the previous version: it generates a [ img ] URL [ /img ] pair, and you replace "URL" with the URL of the image."

I maybe backward on this front, but for most other programs I use, when I want to attach something (zip, doc, dwg etc) the software (when you click on the button) lets you go find the attachment and select it.
If this is not the case here, can I be directed as to how/where I go, to get a low level, step by step set of instructions of how to do it. ( AND I mean, step by step, for the dummies, with no level of experience assumed) as this process is looking like BMW's Idrive to me.
When I get placing images in posts working, I will add the detail to an updated version of how to use the forum for NSW members.
Geoff_K

[KFH]

Congratulations to all concerned in the rapid relocation of the forum to this site.  I am still getting used to it but it seems better and quicker. I, like Geoff K, would like a "dummies" version on how to add images to the forum.  Must be too old or just thick.javascript:javascript:void(0);
Cry


Keith

[KFH]

Gotta be thick, can't even add a smiley correctly!

[Jonno]

Geoff,Keith,

An easy way to add images is to connect to Tinypic (http://www.tinypic.com) and you will see:



There is a button in there called 'choose file' which then allows you to navigate to the one you want to use on your hard disk (I'm assuming you have already made your picture a reasonable size in an image editing program). Once you have found it, hit 'upload now' and you will see something like this:



Your image is now stored on the Tinypic servers for you to use wherever you wish. To use this image the URL you need is the second box down, 'IMG code for forums and message boards' the bit of code bounded by two [IMG] tags. Copy the whole line including the two [IMG] tags

Paste this line into your posting on the FEFC forum and the image should appear when you preview. Note the original file name you used for your photo does not appear in the Tinypic tag.

hope this helps, Jonno