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Working on Forum Upgrade (finally!)


Albert

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Not having a separate mobile theme is good news. The current mobile theme looks good, but lacks functionality compared to the desktop version.

 

Have you considered taking donations to offload some of the other tedious work (assuming that there's more that could be done by 3rd parties)? I'm sure there are many of us that would be happy to donate to help reduce your time and effort with this upgrade.

 

Yes, being able to use the same themes on phones, tablets, and desktop computers is ideal. This means that not only can people use the default AtariAge theme, but also the others that will be installed (such as a dark theme). And you don't lose any functionality.

 

I may completely drop support for Tapatalk, as it sounds like people still have issues with it and seems unnecessary now.

 

As for taking donations, I'd be happy if people purchased a forum subscription, which helps defray the costs of running the site. I may make the subscription options a bit more obvious than they are now once I get the site moved to the new server and everything settles down.

 

..Al

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This has been a bit of a trying week as far as the forum/server upgrade goes. I've made multiple attempts to do test upgrades of the forum this week and until today I had been unsuccessful. I ran into issues where the upgrader was running too slowly with the forum database on another physical server, as the amount of network traffic required for the upgrader is pretty intense. So, I'm now going to do the upgrade with a copy of the database on the same machine to speed it up and then copy the database to the remote database server once the upgrade is complete.

 

I also ran into an issue where I was getting an error a fair way through the upgrade process. Previously I successfully upgraded the forum to version 4.4.2, but a new version, 4.4.3, came out this week so I tried to use that one for my latest tests. No good, and when I opened another support ticket I started getting the runaround from Invision that I'm not doing a proper upgrade. Then this morning I got a message from someone in management that they are no longer going to support my "test installations" and they'd be happy to support me once again when I have the forum on 4.x. Which is a huge pile of bullshit and really pissed me off. They even had the gall to suggest I pay a third-party to help me get my forum upgraded to the current version. Good thing I've been paying their license fees for 15 years now and have rarely had to use their support.

 

How dare I want to make sure this complex, time consuming upgrade works properly in a test environment before I unleash it on the live forum! And it would actually be extremely difficult for me to upgrade the live forum on this existing server without having the forum down for an extended period of time, which is why I'm using a new server to do this. I explained this to Invision, and I don't think I'm being unreasonable at all, but whatever, I'll continue to forge ahead, even if it requires my having to modify their installer (which I did today, as it would not initially let me upgrade to 4.4.2 since it knows there's a newer version out there...)

 

Fortunately I kept a copy of 4.4.2 around (since you can only download the very latest version from the Invision website), and I was able to successfully update the forum to that version on the new server. I was then able to do the 4.4.2 to 4.4.3 upgrade within the Admin Control Panel without any issues. Invision seems to just be ignoring the comments I've been adding to a support ticket today.

 

Here's a screenshot of the Admin Control Panel (ACP)..

 

forum_admin_panel_443.jpg

 

It's now 9pm here, so I think I'm done with this for the day. I still have a lot to do, but it's inching along.

 

..Al

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  • 2 weeks later...

Been a bit since I've posted an update, so here's a brief one:

 

I'm still working on updating software for the main site, and I'm focusing on this before I continue with forum-related work. I have nearly all the database-driven pages complete (these take the most work), and the rest of them will go by pretty quickly (just have to make changes to the top and bottom of all the static pages). I'm also going through and fixing / removing broken links. Many of these pages were authored in the early 2000s, and as you can imagine, quite a few sites have come and gone during that time. Sometimes I can find an appropriate replacement link, but in other cases sites are simply gone entirely (especially personal websites) and I have to remove the link.

 

I hope to be done with all the pages on the main site this week, and this weekend I'll update the store software on the new site as that's something else that has to be done. That won't be too horrible, as the store isn't that far behind, but it still will require me to merge various changes in the custom theme I'm using for the store. Once I get that done, I can then get back to working on the forum--the main work there is continuing to tweak the forum skin and fine-tuning my rather long list of steps to get the site switched over to the new server and upgrade the forum.

 

Once the new server is online and things settle on the forum-end, I will be moving the store to entirely new software. Look forward to that, as the existing store is missing some features I'd like to have, and it's not very easy to modify.

 

I'll need some testers soon to pokey around on the main site as well as the upgraded test forum to help look for any issues and/or make suggestions on things that can be improved. Will make a post once I'm ready for that to happy (probably next week).

 

..A

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  • 4 weeks later...

All I'm hoping at this point, where the forum software is concerned, is that the design bug with PM notifications will be fixed.

 

I like the little red number that appears at the top of the forum page to let you know that you have unread PMs, and I hate the fact that this notification disappears entirely after reading just one PM. If you have other PMs waiting to be read, you have to remind yourself to check your personal PM board, which I find intensely annoying.

 

It's even more annoying when you send a PM to someone and you don't get a reply until much later, simply because the other person replied to another PM and then forgot to check his remaining unread PMs.

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All I'm hoping at this point, where the forum software is concerned, is that the design bug with PM notifications will be fixed.

 

I like the little red number that appears at the top of the forum page to let you know that you have unread PMs, and I hate the fact that this notification disappears entirely after reading just one PM. If you have other PMs waiting to be read, you have to remind yourself to check your personal PM board, which I find intensely annoying.

 

It's even more annoying when you send a PM to someone and you don't get a reply until much later, simply because the other person replied to another PM and then forgot to check his remaining unread PMs.

 

I don't think this is a bug, I think it's just the way they designed it. I believe it's intended to say, "Hey, there are new messages since last time you looked", not "These are the total number of unread messages you have." Not sure how it behaves with the new software, will have to test that out.

 

..Al

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  • 9 months later...

 

NoOneWantsNotificationRequestPrompts.thumb.JPG.c0331d960e0753ae8380ce08b879ead9.JPG

 

On 6/5/2019 at 8:22 AM, Albert said:

 

I don't think this is a bug, I think it's just the way they designed it. I believe it's intended to say, "Hey, there are new messages since last time you looked", not "These are the total number of unread messages you have." Not sure how it behaves with the new software, will have to test that out.

 

..Al

LOL Al I was posting this issue, and saw it was your last upgrade comment...  ?

 

In some browsers there's no way to turn off that request prompt asking if anyone actually wants more pop-up prompts, but the answer is that nobody ever does, please turn that feature off or make it user selectable; automatic brwoser pop-ups should never happen unless the Player actually clicks on something in the game/page.

 

https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/18/18716041/website-notification-prompts-pop-ups-how-to-stop

 

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