Albert Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 As some of you may have noticed, I upgraded the forum software yesterday (Sunday, April 29th). Took the better part of a day, including the preparations made before I even took the forum down (started at noon, ended about midnight!), but it's generally a good idea to be running the latest version of the forum software. Most of the changes are under the hood and are either performance related or SEO related. The forum skin isn't quite back to where it was before, but I'll spend some time tweaking it over the next few days, as well as fixing any issues people point out (such as not being able to switch from the Mobile Skin back to the regular skins, which I fixed a few minutes ago). My primary impetus in upgrading the forum was to eliminate the "Server Too Busy" messages everyone was seeing. Looks like this was related to a bug in the Reputation System. There's one table in particular that has grown as large as the posts table (over 1.5GB!), which is a bit ridiculous for tracking something as small (relative to posts) as reputation points. I've disabled the reputation system until I hear back from Invision on how to fix the issue. If you do continue to see this "Server Too Busy" message, please let me know and I'll investigate. I'll be keeping an eye on the server load and slow queries as well. One big change with this new version is the ability to archive topics "in place". This means I can specify that (for instance) topics whose last activity was three years or older are to be "archived". These threads will then be moved from the primary "posts" table into a new table, greatly reducing the size of the "posts" table. The only difference from a user standpoint will be that threads which have been archived cannot be replied to. If I archive all threads three years or older (again, date of last activity, not when the thread was created), this will result in a 70% reduction in the size of the posts table. The net gain from this is a large improvement in speed when visiting active topics, posting new messages, and reading archived topics (you won't know a topic is archived except the reply button is not available). I can easily "unarchive" any threads and make them active again, so this isn't a one way street. If you do spot an archived thread you want to respond to, and have good reason to, please let me know and I'll re-open the thread. And finally, I'm working on solving the problem where the forum is non-responsive every day at 4am (CST). Hope to resolve this soon! Thanks for your patience, ..Al 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedRaider Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 Thanks for the heads up, but I am still unable to switch to the "deflections" skin on my iPhone 4S. It automatically kicks me to that "mobile skin". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sloopy Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 Al, your doing a good job! My sub money well spent :') sloopy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted April 30, 2012 Author Share Posted April 30, 2012 Thanks for the heads up, but I am still unable to switch to the "deflections" skin on my iPhone 4S. It automatically kicks me to that "mobile skin". I'm seeing the same behavior. Let me see if there's a way around it. Thanks, ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zylon Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 looks good so far. The only problem I'm having with the upgrade is that locking/unlocking and pin/unpin of threads isn't working yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted April 30, 2012 Author Share Posted April 30, 2012 looks good so far. The only problem I'm having with the upgrade is that locking/unlocking and pin/unpin of threads isn't working yet. I'll investigate, thanks for the report. ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PFL Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 I don't know if it's a deliberate change but people's registration dates no longer show up beside their avatar. Also, when I'm online reading through threads I've posted in my status says I'm offline. Good work fixing the 'Server too busy' thing though! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Random Terrain Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 Between 7:54 a.m. and 7:58 a.m. Eastern time, I got this more than once: Oops! Something went wrong! [#2001] Sorry, the server is too busy to handle your request, please try again in a moment Need Help? Our help documentation Contact the community administrator Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted May 1, 2012 Author Share Posted May 1, 2012 Between 7:54 a.m. and 7:58 a.m. Eastern time, I got this more than once: I just saw that myself. It's settled back down, but I'm watching. ..Al 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nathan Strum Posted May 2, 2012 Share Posted May 2, 2012 Were the blogs updated? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted May 2, 2012 Author Share Posted May 2, 2012 Were the blogs updated? Yes. I haven't looked at them for problems yet. ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted May 2, 2012 Share Posted May 2, 2012 I see Nathan is still hoping for the best Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nathan Strum Posted May 2, 2012 Share Posted May 2, 2012 No, I'm just hoping for adequate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bomberpunk Posted May 2, 2012 Share Posted May 2, 2012 (edited) let me know when i can go back to the charcoal (i think that's what it was called) skin color scheme. all this white is burning my retinas. p.s. - i'm glad you didn't run into any problems during the upgrade and lose important data. great job! and thanks! EDIT: nevermind, i found it on accident. i was looking at the right page but in the wrong place (you have to scroll all the way down and click Select Theme) Edited May 2, 2012 by bomberpunk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lucky Man Posted May 2, 2012 Share Posted May 2, 2012 (edited) I thought this upgrade would finally fix the problem, but the Tracker link is still messed up on some screens: Presentation1.ppt Sorry about the attached screenshot. I can't seem to figure out how to paste a screenshot here. Edited May 2, 2012 by Lucky Man Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted May 2, 2012 Share Posted May 2, 2012 Just wanted to say since the forum upgrade I can now view the last post when I am on my Blackberry. Great job!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shadow460 Posted May 3, 2012 Share Posted May 3, 2012 I stopped by to look up some game strategy. The forums look great! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nathan Strum Posted May 3, 2012 Share Posted May 3, 2012 Blog tags appear to work again. It would be nice if the list was sorted properly, rather than all jumbly. Not: Game Sprites Photoshop Tutorials Stupid Game Ideas! Video Game Reviews Animation Stella at 20-something Label Artwork Movies Cars Video Game Ramblings Music To-Do Lists Comic Strips But: Animation Cars Comic Strips Game Sprites Label Artwork Movies Music Photoshop Tutorials Stella at 20-something Stupid Game Ideas! To-Do Lists Video Game Ramblings Video Game Reviews Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atarilovesyou Posted May 3, 2012 Share Posted May 3, 2012 I thought something was different, I like the changes. The only thing I'm still noticing is the 'quick reply' often hangs up, forcing me to copy it, and paste it into a 'reply to this thread' at the top of the topic. Quite annoying, but even that seems to happen a bit less frequently lately. *there, it just happened again as I tried to make this post, lol. Gah! I feel it has something to do with the 'autosave' feature...it's usually after I see that message that I get the problem. Perhaps there's a way to turn off autosave? Thanks for the upgrades! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Random Terrain Posted May 3, 2012 Share Posted May 3, 2012 I feel it has something to do with the 'autosave' feature...it's usually after I see that message that I get the problem. Perhaps there's a way to turn off autosave? I don't even know what auto save is supposed to do. Where and how is it saving? I hit the back button by mistake one day, came right back and my text was gone. Doesn't seem to be saving anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roland p Posted May 3, 2012 Share Posted May 3, 2012 My primary impetus in upgrading the forum was to eliminate the "Server Too Busy" messages everyone was seeing. Looks like this was related to a bug in the Reputation System. There's one table in particular that has grown as large as the posts table (over 1.5GB!), which is a bit ridiculous for tracking something as small (relative to posts) as reputation points. I've disabled the reputation system until I hear back from Invision on how to fix the issue. If you do continue to see this "Server Too Busy" message, please let me know and I'll investigate. I'll be keeping an eye on the server load and slow queries as well. That reputation bug has probably something to do with that guy who has 8676339 reputation points Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nathan Strum Posted May 6, 2012 Share Posted May 6, 2012 Is there a reasonably painless way to convert blog tags to categories? I like the way categories return results much better than tags. Plus, the list is sorted properly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpendTooMuchOnAtari Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Were user's site registration dates deleted for good? They used to be shown under people's avatar and number of posts. I found it informative and sometimes helpful. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted May 25, 2012 Author Share Posted May 25, 2012 Were user's site registration dates deleted for good? They used to be shown under people's avatar and number of posts. I found it informative and sometimes helpful. The information is still stored, just not displayed under your avatar. You can find it a member's profile page. I'll add it back to the topic view. ..Al 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted May 26, 2012 Share Posted May 26, 2012 Were user's site registration dates deleted for good? Just point at the user's name. A pop-up will appear, it contains that and other information. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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