New Thorn Forums! what do you think?

[att21]

Hi,

We are planning to move this forum into a 'new house' - a fully functional, a real forum including these features:

- Gallery for members
- Avatars / Signature (express your self thingy)
- More secured and more stable database system
- More information to share with your fellows: install messenger IDs, Private Messaging system, flash / image / music embedding feature,...
- Events / Birthday / Bike release date calendar
- More smilies
- A better Search system
- Choices of low-fi (mostly text) and hi-fi (fully featured) versions of the forums / different forum skins for you to choose.
- Ranking, user groups, moderators/admins system - so you can really manage the community yourself.
- A "What you see is what you get - WYSIWYG" typing/reply system.
- Better anti spam options.
- And a lot more potential features that can be easily installed - I don't have enough space to list them all here. []

-- possible negative point --

We are not sure that we can transfer all the data that we've got here on this forum to the new one.

Meaning you probably will be asked to re-register in the new forum, a brand new start! If that is the case then we will retain this forum as an archive and there will be a link in the new forum so you can go back anytime.

I'm trying to convert the old data at the moment but it seems quite hard.
-----------------------------

FYI, the new forum we want to install is Simple Machine Forums

Since you - the members of this community - are the main users of the forum, we want to listen to your ideas. Please let us know what you think?

Best regards,
att21

[john28july]

I do not suppose it makes any difference? To me anyhow as I do not really get into technical things as such on the Internet. Just bikes.
John.

quote:Originally posted by att21

Hi,

We are planning to move this forum into a 'new house' - a fully functional, a real forum including these features:

- Gallery for members
- Avatars / Signature (express your self thingy)
- More secured and more stable database system
- More information to share with your fellows: install messenger IDs, Private Messaging system, flash / image / music embedding feature,...
- Events / Birthday / Bike release date calendar
- More smilies
- A better Search system
- Choices of low-fi (mostly text) and hi-fi (fully featured) versions of the forums / different forum skins for you to choose.
- Ranking, user groups, moderators/admins system - so you can really manage the community yourself.
- A "What you see is what you get - WYSIWYG" typing/reply system.
- Better anti spam options.
- And a lot more potential features that can be easily installed - I don't have enough space to list them all here. []

-- possible negative point --

We are not sure that we can transfer all the data that we've got here on this forum to the new one.

Meaning you probably will be asked to re-register in the new forum, a brand new start! If that is the case then we will retain this forum as an archive and there will be a link in the new forum so you can go back anytime.

I'm trying to convert the old data at the moment but it seems quite hard.
-----------------------------

FYI, the new forum we want to install is Simple Machine Forums

Since you - the members of this community - are the main users of the forum, we want to listen to your ideas. Please let us know what you think?

Best regards,
att21

[jags]

yes i agree with that comment,im new to this computer thingy,
so ill just keep tuneing in ,best of irish luck anyhow

[Grumbler]

I´m rather illiterate and clumsy myself about all this computer/internet stuff, but I think we should always look and move forward and any initiative meant to provide any added features/improvements to this most useful forum should be encouraged and welcomed.
             Cheers from Spain to everybody and keep up the good work att21

[Joatamon]

Avatars / Signature (express your self thingy).  Oh gawd I hope not.  Well, maybe, avatars, but signatures just serve to drive you nuts when you re-read the same one over and over again.  They're only of interest or amusement to the author.  But if you really really insist make sure they're in a different colour, or separated by a line, or better still, give an option to never display them.  
 
  Does the proposed forum have one of those pictograms on registration to eliminate automated registration and offers of sex toys we've had recently?
 
  Did I mention don't permit signatures ?
 
  Oh, avatars.  I forgot to say.  Make sure they're just the static, non-blinking, non-dancing, variety.
 
  I just had a look at the proposed board.  Click on one of the "latest news" entries and see if you can see any actual forum posts amongst all the surplus junk.

[Joatamon]

An edit facility would be useful, I had to put another post in to link this:

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=196380.0

Is this what other forum members would really like to see ?  (I presume simplemachines.org are using their own board software !)

[julk]

I for one will look forward to a new forum engine with a gallery for members and an improved search mechanism.

Will the improved search mechanism work on the archived entries or only on the new ones?

[att21]

Thanks john28july, jags and Grumbler for your ideas. There will be a testing period where you can try to play around with the new forums and I want to hear your comments after that too!

@Joatamon: static or animated avatars is totally in control, same with signature, we can enable it or disable it any time.
The new forum will eliminate about 90% of all spam posts that we've seen recently - not all community using SMF know how to prevent them but I do so this is a promise.

At the end of the day, SJSC doesn't really 'monitor' this forum, setting up a new forums system is as simple as providing you - the users - of this forum with a new house with more options and higher security, what you do with it (e.g what avatar you want to show, what signature you want other members to read) is totally depended on you.

Regards,
att21.

[att21]

@julk:
'Will the improved search mechanism work on the archived entries or only on the new ones?'

For the new entries, absolutely yes.
For the old entries, if I can transfer all of them to the new forum successfully then another 'yes'.

I would suggest you to search within this forum using google:

example, if you want to search for the Audax MK3 on google, you enter the (whole) line below into the search box:

site:www.sjscycles.com/forum + audax mk3

and then press enter, you'll see the results. Hope it'll help you in the mean time

Regards,
att21.

[julk]

att21,

Thanks - I just tried that but still get many more topics found searching the forum by the internal search using the word with a space on its end! Why is this happening?

Forum search :-
With solidlights - 2 topics hit.
Solidlights with a space on the end - 8 hits.
Google search :-
With solidlights - 2 topics hit, 3 with omitted results included.

[stutho]

Hi att21,
I have got very mixed feelings about a potential move. There IS some justification for change but I see BIG drawbacks as well.

• Gallery for members -  Great no problems with this. But is this really a problem.  Those that want to post an image don't have an isue once they have set up a photobucket account or similar


• Avatars / Signature - Avatars are ok in small doses  but signature are a pain they dilute the content of the page substantially - we have the facility to use signature in this forum - thankfully it is disabled.  There is also a MOD on http://www.snitzbitz.com/ to allow Avatars in this forum if they are required


• More secured and more stable database system - Don’t have any info on any problems so cant comment


• More information to share with your fellows - not sure me really need to be able to embed music into our posts, we can already PM other users. ICQ, MSN, AIM and Yahoo identifies are all features of this forum - they are currently disabled (no bad thing in my option)


• Events / Birthday / Bike release date calendar - sorry but this sort of stuff I find total irrelevant in other forums and I am sure it would be irrelevant here too.


• More smilies - Not really my thing but I don't have any objections.  I believe there is are mods for this forum that will allow more smilies / different smilies on the snitz web site.


• A better Search system - this would be good news indeed.  The search system on the forum is very poor


• Choices of low-fi (mostly text) and hi-fi (fully featured)
- excellent especially if the low-fi version automatically removes signatures.  Currently most posts are pretty low bandwidth

• Ranking, user groups, moderators/admins system – don’t we already have all of these features?


• WYSIWYG - This would be a big bonus but be careful about this.  I am writing this post on a 22" wide screen monitor.  I know that when it is sent it will look different in from the way it was written.  I also know that it will look VERY different on a 14" monitor.  My point is that while the new forum might be WYSIWYG I bet it isn't WYSIWTOPG - what you see is what the other person gets.


• Better anti Spam options - we have some options available to us  on this forum that may work see http://forum.snitz.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=65057&SearchTerms=spam most promising is a mod for a CAPTCHA.  i.e. at time of registration you are asked a simple question like "How many wheels has a bicycle" a BOT has no way to answer such a question. It wont stop spam attacks from humans (nothing can) but it would help

The 2 issues that concern me most about a move are :

• Signal to Noise – we have a very low level of irrelevant noise.  Most posts are on topic and are to the point.  Other forums sometimes become difficult to read there is just so much junk.  Signatures especially are a bugbear.
• Possible loss of old posts -  There is some EXCELENT high quality information in some 4 year old post. Of course it can be difficult to find with our current search engine but it is there.  I for one would not be in favour of any move that involves sacrificing old posts. [/*]

Maybe I am out of step, however I am a member of several Internet forums / lists.  To my mind the ones with the best info are also the ones with the least distraction. If change is required I would suggest that the best course of action would me to review some of the mods available for snitz before switching to a new engine

Sorry to go on for so long but as you have realised I have very strong options on the subject.  I would hate to see this forum deteriorate into the state of some of the other forums out there.

Stuart

[john28july]

Signatures especially are a bugbear.


Are they? Why in your opinion? Is it because you do not have one yourself?
I think its fine myself and I am a ratty git at times!
John.
www.pbase.com/john28july

[john28july]

Sorry to go on for so long but as you have realised I have very strong options on the subject. I would hate to see this forum deteriorate into the state of some of the other forums out there.




Hello,
This is indeed not one of the better Forums-it is the best, and for one reason alone. The inhabitents are true enthusiasts of the Thorn 'marque' and have nowhere to hide. Most Forums are full of people wasting time whilst at work , trying to wind up other timewasters. This Forum is for true Cyclists with brains.
John.
www.pbase.com/john28july

[stutho]

Hi John,

What you have there is not much of a problem as it only one line but take a look at this http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=196380.0 from simplemachines own forum - there are lines and lines and lines of meaningless signature. You almost don't know what is post and what is signature.  NB this was the first page I tried! I have seen far worse examples before now. Personally I am just not interested in reading about other peoples favourite sites etc over and over and over again.

[john28july]

quote:Originally posted by stutho

Hi John,

What you have there is not much of a problem as it only one line but take a look at this http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=196380.0 from simplemachines own forum - there are lines and lines and lines of meaningless signature. You almost don't know what is post and what is signature.  NB this was the first page I tried! I have seen far worse examples before now. Personally I am just not interested in reading about other peoples favourite sites etc over and over and over again.

Glad to get that point sorted out before the new setup.
John.