Researching new software/hosting solutions for the site.

[Oberst Hajj]

As some of you already know, this site is ran on an old version of vBulletin that is no longer supported. It is also hosted with a provider that has "gone down hill" over the last several years. Both of these things have lead to many of the issues we currently have with the site. In additions to those issues, I personally no longer have the time to proactively administer the site and servers that it runs on. I continue to react to issues as needed, but if something really bad happens I may not have the time or skills to fix it. In this type of situation, the site would most likely be shut down permanently.

I will be researching options to migrate the software away from vB and to find a new hosting site. Our current site uses quite a few modified or custom modules to give it it's unique feel and function. As such, most free community software packages will not work for our needs. Right now the two packages I am looking at are XenForo and Invision Community. I personally am on several other forums that are ran on XenForo. It appears to be a very capable and easy to use software that would allow for a lot of modifications and customization.

I have not used any forums that I know of that run off of Invision. Do we have any members that are familar with it and can give some feedback on it?

[Paukenschlager]

I barely have the computer literacy not to embarrass myself in front of a PC, so I definitely can't help on the IT side, but I'd gladly back a Kickstarter or similar to cover any costs.

[Aardvark1430]

I barely have the computer literacy not to embarrass myself in front of a PC, so I definitely can't help on the IT side, but I'd gladly back a Kickstarter or similar to cover any costs.

Sounds just like me, I will not hesitate to help finance the conversion to a new and stable platform for the aerodrome to run on.

cheers,
Guus

[driph]

I have not used any forums that I know of that run off of Invision. Do we have any members that are familar with it and can give some feedback on it?

AtariAge [https://forums.atariage.com] runs on Invision. It's a large community, and the site has been rock solid with a nice feature set, though I dunno if that has more to do with the software or with Albert, who manages it.

[Baxter]

Hmm how about we switch to boardgamegeek?

[Hedeby]

How do we switch and not lose everything?

[Ken at Sunrise]

BGG has a large staff, maybe contact them and see if they are interested. Keeping the content might be time consuming (pricey) but possible.

I used to manage few websites and forum, I don't envy anyone upgrading and migrating.

[Flying Officer Kyte]

Backing a Kickstarter seems a good idea.

Rob.

[Diamondback]

Hmm how about we switch to boardgamegeek?

There was a split in the community many years ago, many who didn't like how things turned out here went back to BGG. They chose to no longer associate with us (though ironically most of the folks they beefed with haven't been seen in years either), and shouldn't be forced into unwilling re-association.

[Ken at Sunrise]

There was a split in the community many years ago, many who didn't like how things turned out here went back to BGG. They chose to no longer associate with us (though ironically most of the folks they beefed with haven't been seen in years either), and shouldn't be forced into unwilling re-association.

That may be so. I hope that just a few individuals would cause us to limit our choices of what best for all. Forgetting the personalities, BGG is very popular and a main source for many gamers. I personally play a lot of other games beside WOG.

Having a site for a product line for a single publisher takes a lot of work as we are seeing. Plus now were are relying on just a couple of individuals, their costs, hosting, etc. BGG would handle the overhead of all that with a larger staff and full time individuals.

I would hate to lose this forum. But I have to ask, even with this migration will we be in the same situation is a couple of years? What would be the best long term solution with the least amount of work and long term cost?

[Oberst Hajj]

Hmm how about we switch to boardgamegeek?

I don't use BGG very often at all, but from what I see, each product has it's own forum setup for it. Personally I never liked that as it seemed to break things up too much. However, that could just be my ignorance about how things are setup over there.

How do we switch and not lose everything?

The only way to not lose everything is do a migration to another dedicated forum software/platform. It will also cost a decent amount of money.

That may be so. I hope that just a few individuals would cause us to limit our choices of what best for all. Forgetting the personalities, BGG is very popular and a main source for many gamers. I personally play a lot of other games beside WOG.

Having a site for a product line for a single publisher takes a lot of work as we are seeing. Plus now were are relying on just a couple of individuals, their costs, hosting, etc. BGG would handle the overhead of all that with a larger staff and full time individuals.

I would hate to lose this forum. But I have to ask, even with this migration will we be in the same situation is a couple of years? What would be the best long term solution with the least amount of work and long term cost?

I've not reached out to BGG, but I do not think they would care to put in the time and expense to move all of our historical data to their system. They already have years of Wings posts over there and our system/organization of forums and posts does not easily fit into their system.

[Oberst Hajj]

Right now, I’m talking with Invision in detail about a possible migration to their cloud-based forum solution. Moving the site to a hosting platform like this would remove the system admin job requirements for just running and maintaining the servers. That would be a huge workload and risk removed. My latest question to them was how upgrades to their forum software are handled. Since you do not actually purchase the software on their cloud-based plans and I did not see anything on their sales page that mentioned upgrades, I am thinking that they upgrade everything as they release new versions. If that is the case, migrating to them might solve 99% of our current issues.

For those suggesting a Kickstarter to fund the move, I am open to that idea. I would expect the migration to cost somewhere between $1500 and $2500.

[Oberst Hajj]

AtariAge [https://forums.atariage.com] runs on Invision. It's a large community, and the site has been rock solid with a nice feature set, though I dunno if that has more to do with the software or with Albert, who manages it.

Thanks Chris. I'll go have a poke around that site.

[Oberst Hajj]

I will be setting up a free 30 trial on the Invision Community platform in the next serval days. I'm looking for a few people to test out the user interface and functionality of this software. If you are interested in helping with this please post up in this thread.

[flash]

I'll have a stab at it, Boss.

[predhead]

Happy to help!

[Guntruck]

I'm in!

[Paukenschlager]

I'd gladly put the layman point of view in the trial,Keith

[camelbeagle]

I will like to help give it a try.

[Baz]

Happy to give it a go

[Flying Officer Kyte]

I will also have a look at it Keith.
Rob.

[malachi]

I'd welcome the chance to take a look

[Teaticket]

I'll gladly give it a look.

[Diamondback]

I'm game. However, I'm obligated to note that my inbox is full... unsure if it's an issue with my Gold status (it has a limit of 500) or the last Restore from Backup bringing every message I ever received back from the dead.

[Stumptonian]

I'm in if you need any more.

[Hedeby]

I'm in

[Diamondback]

Keith, aas an aside I also notice my Black Widow custom "Gold Member" avatar isn't displaying. Did my check bounce or something?

[camel crew]

Wish you well with your endeavours Keith

[flash]

Keith, aas an aside I also notice my Black Widow custom "Gold Member" avatar isn't displaying. Did my check bounce or something?

DB. The Black Widow is restored ..

I'll let you sort the Gold membership issue with Keith though.

[tikkifriend]

I will be setting up a free 30 trial on the Invision Community platform in the next serval days. I'm looking for a few people to test out the user interface and functionality of this software. If you are interested in helping with this please post up in this thread.

I m in. Got Fibre now so no 2bps downloads and .2 uploads any more

[Dan-Sam]

Report for duty, sir

[Oberst Hajj]

Thanks everyone. I've got family coming into town starting today, so I'll try and get the test site up and running next week sometime. I'll post here with the details when I have them.

[Teaticket]

Thanks Keith. We'll be here to push all the buttons.

[Oberst Hajj]

Okay, I have a bare bones site setup that we can start testing out. I've not messed with the look/theme of it, so it is not pretty. Quite a few of the features seem to function differently, but they should be similar enough to figure out. You can find it here and will need to create a new account on it.

Anything you post or create on this test site will get blown away once the free trail ends, so don't post anything you care about. That said, please try and post (or copy and paste posts from here) things that will test how you would use the new site if we were to migrate to it.

[predhead]

I've added a few things there...seems similar in many aspects.

[Paukenschlager]

Signed up and testing! Seems pretty sleek

[malachi]

Where should we post feedback?

[Teaticket]

Just re-posted an AAR as a test. Very smooth.

[Flying Officer Kyte]

Only tried an edit of a post so far but that works fine.
Will try some photos as soon as I get a moment.

Rob.

[Diamondback]

Posted the draft YB-36 "unofficial plane" as a test. The one caveat about Invision is you create a third-party dependency, and we live in a time where third-party providers actively look for excuses to deplatform people over anything they might deem objectionable.

Other than that and figuring out how to integrate our other "outside the forum" resources like blogs and file repository, certainly seems to be a viable contender so far.

[Oberst Hajj]

Where should we post feedback?

Post it up on the test site please so I don't have to bounce back and forth between the two to sort things out.

Posted the draft YB-36 "unofficial plane" as a test. The one caveat about Invision is you create a third-party dependency, and we live in a time where third-party providers actively look for excuses to deplatform people over anything they might deem objectionable.

Other than that and figuring out how to integrate our other "outside the forum" resources like blogs and file repository, certainly seems to be a viable contender so far.

I believe that the blog and files from our current site would be part of the migration that they offer.

[mikeemagnus]

Well, I logged on to the new test site today and partially downloaded Mission 11 AAR from the OTT EYM campaign.
OK, so posting this was easy. A few things to do to aclimatise and a few changes to be adapted to, but the photos, in particular, were far easier to load, especially as I could load four at a time. I suspect, although I haven't tried it yet, that I could load all of the photos at once then write the AAR arouind them. If that is what I can do then I'll like it very much.
Haven't yet explored other aspects of the site e.g. accessing files, posting on different threads, sending pm messages etc, but all in good time. This was a positive start so far as I am concerned.
Happy to make a financial contribution to a migration, if other members also like this site. I'm assuming security would not be an issue and I am also assuming there may be dozens of teething issues. But better them than losing the site altogether.

Feedback duplicated on new test site.

Have accessed a file posted by Oberst Hajj (Some rules) - I only found it possible by downloading the file to my computer rather than the file opening up on the web page.
Tried the albums section - posted a pic easily enough but its a Forum Gallery where everyone's albums appear. Initial thoughts - could get overcrowded and difficult to navigate. But I do understand this is only a test sight.

[malachi]

I suspect, although I haven't tried it yet, that I could load all of the photos at once then write the AAR arouind them. If that is what I can do then I'll like it very much.

Yes, sir, this is possible (my sample AAR thread on test site). It loads the images into the lower window, then you can place your cursor in the text of the AAR and choose "insert" on the image to display it in the location. Streamlined quite a bit compared to the current situation.

[flash]

I found there is a limit to the time you can edit a post which doesn't bode well as you won't be able to correct/add/alter, go back to anything once it's done.

[mikeemagnus]

Yes, sir, this is possible (my sample AAR thread on test site). It loads the images into the lower window, then you can place your cursor in the text of the AAR and choose "insert" on the image to display it in the location. Streamlined quite a bit compared to the current situation.

Yep. Got that

[mikeemagnus]

I found there is a limit to the time you can edit a post which doesn't bode well as you won't be able to correct/add/alter, go back to anything once it's done.

Yes, I got the impression that at this stage of the proceedings we would need to be far more careful to get things right before posting. Should prove interesting for you Dave What are the chances?

[flash]

Yes, I got the impression that at this stage of the proceedings we would need to be far more careful to get things right before posting. Should prove interesting for you Dave What are the chances?

Scratch my last, Keith has fixed it, must be a settings thing he can control

[camelbeagle]

Been playing around with this test site. Some nice features. I like the separate sections for Clubs and Events.

[mikeemagnus]

OK So trial over. Have I missed anything? What happens next? Sorry, but I've been away for a short while so may have missed more information already given out, on another thread, about the Aerodrome's future.

[Oberst Hajj]

OK So trial over. Have I missed anything? What happens next? Sorry, but I've been away for a short while so may have missed more information already given out, on another thread, about the Aerodrome's future.

You've not missed anything Mike. The trail showed that we could use that software, but will lose some functionality. Several of the things we will lose are the important visuals of this site. Right now there is not a good way to display the awards/medals, the rank/grade icons and current avatars. I have also not come up with a good solution to the book review section we have here on the site.