We have started to discover just what a pain FUDforum can be to run. We were already warned that it doesn't scale very well, so we were expecting to have to switch forums eventually. Recent problems have led us to seek support more often, and as FUDforum is an open source project the response was many times ''Yep, that's a problem, why don't you write a patch?''. Neither David nor I is any great shakes at programming, and we shouldn't have to be... This forum is already a serious part time job for the bits that are easy to fix.
Using funds donated via PayPal (thanks!), David and I purchased a full vBulletin license. We have already copied every post, user, private message, attachment, etc from this forum over to our test server. vBulletin includes a script to do it which is pretty comprehensive. We knew this was possible before we decided to go ahead and start this forum on FUD in the first place, so vB has always been our ''upgrade path''.
vBulletin 4.x is so much better than FUDforum it's incredible. First of all, their support is quick and top notch. There is a tremendous user community, and many well written and supported mods to allow us to customize the software to fit our needs. A lot of things that were a real pain in the ass in FUD (like changing ''alias'' to ''real name'' on the registration page) are simple in vB. The search function is much better. It integrates with our Wiki. The moderation tools are a lot more powerful as well. Video embedding is built in for almost every format. Interface is considerably slicker and more compact, less wasted space = more content. It may also allow integration with additional forums (hint hint). It has a really excellent tree view, sliced and diced to your preference. Advertising management is built in. Additionally, vB supports individual user blogs, Facebook integration, Tapatalk, and a dynamically generated front page for news and articles.
vBulletin will let us make SoundForums.net what we want it to be, the destination for pro audio news, information, and discussion. It will let us do that with even more user control and contribution, while helping us also cater to the person who wants more of a news site, or perhaps the person who wants to just read the blog of one or two contributors.
As a result of our ongoing experimentation, David and I have decided that shortly after 8:00 PM EST on Tuesday, February 8th we are going to switch the entire forum over to vBulletin.
What does this mean to you?
We picked this date and time as it is traditionally quiet, and David and I will both be largely available during and for several days after the transition. We should be able to handle concerns as they appear and get us all back on our feet as quickly and quietly as possible, so we can all enjoy this cleaner, neater, more featured and integrated software.
Thanks for being with us in this continuing time of transition. This is the best pro community on the planet and we hope to make it even more interesting in the months to come.
Using funds donated via PayPal (thanks!), David and I purchased a full vBulletin license. We have already copied every post, user, private message, attachment, etc from this forum over to our test server. vBulletin includes a script to do it which is pretty comprehensive. We knew this was possible before we decided to go ahead and start this forum on FUD in the first place, so vB has always been our ''upgrade path''.
vBulletin 4.x is so much better than FUDforum it's incredible. First of all, their support is quick and top notch. There is a tremendous user community, and many well written and supported mods to allow us to customize the software to fit our needs. A lot of things that were a real pain in the ass in FUD (like changing ''alias'' to ''real name'' on the registration page) are simple in vB. The search function is much better. It integrates with our Wiki. The moderation tools are a lot more powerful as well. Video embedding is built in for almost every format. Interface is considerably slicker and more compact, less wasted space = more content. It may also allow integration with additional forums (hint hint). It has a really excellent tree view, sliced and diced to your preference. Advertising management is built in. Additionally, vB supports individual user blogs, Facebook integration, Tapatalk, and a dynamically generated front page for news and articles.
vBulletin will let us make SoundForums.net what we want it to be, the destination for pro audio news, information, and discussion. It will let us do that with even more user control and contribution, while helping us also cater to the person who wants more of a news site, or perhaps the person who wants to just read the blog of one or two contributors.
As a result of our ongoing experimentation, David and I have decided that shortly after 8:00 PM EST on Tuesday, February 8th we are going to switch the entire forum over to vBulletin.
What does this mean to you?
- No posts, PMs, or other information will be lost.
- Your password will be lost, FUD and vB use different password encryption techniques. You will need to tell the new forum that you have forgotten it, and enter your email address. It will send you a new password which you may change after you log in with it. We will send an email before the transition with a link to the lost password page in it.
- You will need to change your login to your real name, there is no ''alias'' field in vB. There is no good way around this, and this is the one downside to the upgrade. We are working on a solution that will allow you to login with your email address as well.
- The front page as you know it will be news, articles, and aggregated content dynamically pulled from the forum, blogs, etc. The forums are just a click away, or you can add a bookmark directly to them easily, bypassing the new main page entirely.
- The interface will change slightly, but should be very easy to adapt to.
- There may be a few hours of down time (we're practicing the whole changeover repeatedly between now and then).
We picked this date and time as it is traditionally quiet, and David and I will both be largely available during and for several days after the transition. We should be able to handle concerns as they appear and get us all back on our feet as quickly and quietly as possible, so we can all enjoy this cleaner, neater, more featured and integrated software.
Thanks for being with us in this continuing time of transition. This is the best pro community on the planet and we hope to make it even more interesting in the months to come.
