Petition to reboot Amibay

[tbtorro]

I would like to start a petition to either roll back the recent botched 'upgrade' of Amibay or at least start over with a new database and forum sw that works. If other forum sites can do it so can Amibay.

This is not intended to be a discussion thread - only polling. So please post only if you support the idea. It's only a poll.

Where we are right now:

- Error messages and bugs galore
- EVERY - SINGLE - CLICK takes 8 seconds or so to load a page
- No feedback system - this is not a trade site anymore just a forum (roll the dice)
- Overall usability is very bad
- Simple things take several more clicks to do than before
- Several unnecessary features
- Bad layout, giant empty spaces, lack of compactness
- No search, managing own threads is very bad, let alone finding anything else
- No Tapatalk support at least to be able to message compact and quick
- Mobile page doesn't even load
- Post layout is very bad images load in giant full size

What we need:

- COMPACT and QUICK layout and simple features that makes trading easy and quick to manage.
(This should be the core concern, we don't need blogs, fb sharing buttons other bells and whistles. Let's get back to basics where we can trade, that's what made Amibay great)
- Start over with new database to avoid bugs
- Feedback system
- Search
- Import all users with current feedback count and status
- Import forum topics only
- Tapatalk support
- Archive old content somewhere else
- Done

p.s. IMHO 'end of life' or 'end of support' doesn't mean a piece of sw is unusable. I always detested the idea of being forced to upgrade to the 'latest and greatest' where a system would fulfill my needs perfectly as it is. These days, more often than not the 'updates' serve the developers/administrators more instead of the users. And usability is getting pushed in the background with the rationale: they'll get used to it. And people unfortunately must do due to lack of choice. Again: IMHO maybe I'm just an old timer on a retro trading forum.

 

[Watson]

The site is not botched, it's the result of vBulletin 5. We will be migrating to Xenforo in the coming new year - have some patience.

 

[fille1976]

i can't even reach the forum,only new topics,why i don't know,and this for 2weeks

 

[Acill]

Site it completely broken for me. I can only click on New Posts to see things, so I am all for getting a new system up. Rolling back would be better than this current situation.

 

[miggymad]

The easiest way is to change the URL to www.amibay.com/forum

It's a known problem, one that seems to be hard-coded into the vB5 software. Harrison is aware and trying to find a solution.

 

[Sardine]

I vote ( if possible and not reliant on too much time / work ) roll back to VB4 from the backup , see if the hosting company would allow the required code to allow this so business as usual until Xenforo is ready.

if not then waiting for Xenforo after xmas would be the only other option and could put the nail in Amibay if registrations are closed until after xmas, we also need to change it somehow so it defaults to /forum otherwise Amibay to a new member or a member that doesn't realise looks like we are closed / broken.

I would be happy to help again if rolled back to VB4.

 

[Harrison]

I can categorically state we will never roll back to vBulletin 4. It cannot run on this new server, because it only supports versions of PHP and MySQL that are too new and the old server is now closed down.

We are already initiating the plan to move to Xenforo so this thread is pointless.

IMHO 'end of life' or 'end of support' doesn't mean a piece of sw is unusable. I always detested the idea of being forced to upgrade to the 'latest and greatest' where a system would fulfill my needs perfectly as it is. These days, more often than not the 'updates' serve the developers/administrators more instead of the users.

I needed to comment on this.

If, like most of us, we run a home computer on an old OS, with old software then no problem. It's a standalone system and yes it's software might still be all you need. And if you want to use the Internet from an old laptop running XP then it's out of date, and has no up to date security patches, but it's only you putting your OS and data at risk.

By contrast a server hosting a public website is very different. It's connected online and open to security threats. With recent legal changes, such as the EU privacy laws, the responsibility is on a website to keep its members and their data as secure as possible. This means it needs to support current versions of server software that has up to date security measures in place. This is especially true for the version of a programming language a site is using and how it connects to a database.

If a newer website platform exists, but an older insecure version is instead being used, and if the site is hacked and data stolen, it would be the site that can be liable. And as Amibay is a trading site this is a very important thing to understand. And I know for a fact that if an out of date site is hacked the hosting company will disable the server until the admin of that site has rectified that situation by replacing it with an up to date secure version of that software.

Hence I do not want to risk continuing to run a trading site on vBulletin 4, even if I could run the software.

 

[Sardine]

Totally agree with the above but had to ask if it was possible


in the meantime can we enable registration and possibly as a temp fix point amibay to default “/forum” ?

 

[Harrison]

It's not that simple because /forum doesn't exist as a physical location on the server so you can't point a domain to it. It's a modrewrite that just creates user friendly urls. The virtual /forum link is the root of the forums. Something is crashing to site root page from loading content into the central content module but I'm not sure why as its set to just load the same forum root content. I haven't yet had time to investigate it further.

Registrations can't be activated yet until these bugs are fixed. And also the new registration system tested.

 

[Sardine]

Ok thanks

 

[davideo]

Harrison

Can we add a manual link to the error message with something like - To access the Forums please click here

 

[Sardine]

Harrison There is a difference between .com & .com/forum

.com loads ( when it works ) who’s online all those tiles at the bottom of the page and possibly a couple of other plugins

the above doesn’t show with .com/forum

could be a starting point to look at

 

[Merlin]

Sardine is right about this. Just using .com, I get the headers but no forums show up at all. Using .com/forum shows the headers and the forums.

@tbtorro

I can't speak for what went on over at Vbulletin, but some of the software authors jumped ship and set up Xenforo. A lot of the plugin developers gave up on VB5 and went over to Xenforo too, so it looks like VBulletin 5 will wither on the vine.

 

[tbtorro]

Sardine is right about this. Just using .com, I get the headers but no forums show up at all. Using .com/forum shows the headers and the forums.

@tbtorro

I can't speak for what went on over at Vbulletin, but some of the software authors jumped ship and set up Xenforo. A lot of the plugin developers gave up on VB5 and went over to Xenforo too, so it looks like VBulletin 5 will wither on the vine.

This thread meant to be a polling thread only but I can't help answering this. I have read ALL the posts about the woes of vB5 so I'm very aware of all the 'explanations'. But did vB5 held a gun to our head to upgrade and choose them? No, but it was a human decision. Frankly, I find it utmost frustrating and unfair that we keep pointing at vbulletin 5 as a 'source of all evil'. Let us not forget what the reason of change was: THE SITE WAS SLOW and we needed faster hardware. That's it. As a minimum, this should have been done incrementally, say try with faster hw. first, before all other messing around. My mantra is: If other forums can run happily and fast on vB4 (or even vB3) how come Amibay cannott? At least for a few months? And perhaps introduce other changes/upgrades gradually after all is clear?

And to fix THAT, (sluggish site) should have been the No. 1. priority before rolling out ANY other update, sw, hw whatever. Not arcane 'better support', 'end of life', 'security this' 'security that'. No matter how secure, supported, etc a site is, if it's UNUSABLE for the members. So any changes should have been EXTENSIVELY tested before committing to the changes, and if unsure, we should have had an escape route to roll back.

I find it VERY difficult to believe that all these bugs, errors, anomalies couldn't have been discovered (and hence stayed far-far away for vB5 in good time) if the testing was sufficient. My feeling is, this was more of pull the trigger and hope for the best plan. If the site could function for years with the previous setup, few months of more testing wouldn't have made a difference security, support, whatever wise, there MUST have been a way to avoid locking us into a unusable solution with no way back for months on end.

End of rant. Forgive me but I'm hugely disappointed and frustrated about the whole site, and just about ready to throw in the towel after ten years, numerous projects and thousands of trades in this wonderful community. I think I have said all I had in mind - I won't 'troll' more - I just hope the mod team takes this into consideration moving forward. I really REALLY hope this mess can be cleared up soon, please, PLEASE - there is plenty of resources (money) and pro competence (IT hosting) in the community, draw on them for proper results, no need to struggle around and get overloaded. Hoping for a better future. /Tbtorro

 

[miggymad]

tbtorro

I know you wanted this to be a poll but it's gone way beyond that now lol

We all understand the frustration that you are experiencing, most of us are experiencing similar problems. However, now that Xenforo is a real possibility with other Amibay members onboard helping Harrison out, the switch over to it should be a whole lot easier when it happens in the New Year. Plus we will get the ability to leave feedback once again AND have an absolute treasure trove of extra add-ons at Admin's fingertips which should last us for years.

All we can do for now is soldier on (or Navy on of you're timtheloon ) and bear with things for now. Don't give up just because of bad forum software in the form of vB5, please stick with it for just a few more weeks

 

[Timtheloon]

All we can do for now is soldier on (or Navy on of you're timtheloon ) and bear with things for now. Don't give up just because of bad forum software in the form of vB5, please stick with it for just a few more weeks

Senior Service, Why Thank you

 

[Harrison]

That's because it's a different page on the site. The homepage has the content modules for site statistics, and the sidebar modules for latest posts, staff online etc. The /forum page is just the root of the forum tree, so just shows that. This is the content that is often falling to load into the body content container on the homepage.

 

[Harrison]

I will see if I can edit the error to add a link.

 

[Harrison]

I feel you have completely missed the explaination and reasons, so will try to make a final comment about it and you keep going over things that are not possible, so I need to outline them.

1, The old Amibay server I hosted was built in 2012 so was very out of date. Hence the site slowdown.

2, A new server was required to make the site faster. However due to previous staff issues I was unwilling to continue hosting servers as all admins needed access to the server, but the existing server was hosted within a business account so I could not offer this.

3, so all admins could manage the site hosting it had to be a managed server. This means the server OS and software is managed by the data centre, including updates and backups, and you just get on with setting up sites and configuring.

4, due to server budget limitations because of limited donations and needing to keep to a realistic price that can be maintained, there was not a large budget for a new managed server. Because of this we were limited on the managed server we could buy.

5, A managed server will only ever have recent versions of a server OS and software installed. This is out of the hands of the site owner. When a data centre decides a version of the OS, PHP, MySQL are out of date it will update them to newer versions. This means anything hosted on them that will only work on an older version will instantly break.

We were about to reach that point, even on the old managed server. Come January 2022, Ionos who host our server were going to upgrade both the minimum versions of both PHP and MySQL to one far newer than any compatible with vBulletin 4. For that reason come next year on the old server and this new one vBulletin 4 would juat suddenly not work.

6, The only way to continue running an older version of vBulletin is to also be running older versions of both PHP and MySQL. To do this you need a root server, so you can install it all manually and keep daily backups in case these less secure installs get hacked. As I mentioned above, I have been the only one with any server experience, and dunt have time to maintain a roit server for Amibay. Their needing a managed server completely removes the ability to run an older server build and therefore removed the ability to continue using vBulletin 4.

7, We knew this was coming about a year ago, but due to real world things I had no time to devote to Amibay at all, and hardly any other staff did either. We utilised a sale promotion in the past to buy the vBulletin 5 upgrade so had this in place ready for a future upgrade.

This year we hunted for a managed server based on the limited budget, but there is really not much available in the £50 a month range we have. If you want a server with up to date hardware you are looking at £80+ per month. Thr server we have now got was luckily in a sale offer. A Hexicore with 16GB ram.

8, vBulletin 5 was the focus of our efforts because we had been using vBulletin for many years since version 3. All have served us well, so they was no reason to change software.

We created a test site to test it out, get familier with it, and explore the 3rd party plugins available.

This is where we hit issues because the feedback developer had left vBulletin and alternative feedback systems really don't exist.

I discovered they had no moved the feedback system to Xenforo, but as that is a commercially licensed forum it was decided to stick with vBulletin 5 and look at different feedback solutions after the upgrade.

9, We had tested out vBulletin 5. It worked fine, other than some missing plugins that we could kive without. Obviously the big omission bring a feedback system. I highlighted this many times but it was still decided to stick with vBulletin as we owned the license.

10, Upgrade of real site seemed to work fine. The whole site was working fine. This included the homepage loading perfectly. And test user accounts were even working fibe, including pms.

As anyone who develops software, games or websites know, it's only when the final release is handed to users that bugs you never encountered appear. This includes the homepage not always loading all content. Blank pms etc.

These as I said never happened in testing.

11 , Time. This is the most important one. We all volenteer in spare time. I used over a week to move to the new server, migrate and upgrade the site. Using holiday days from one of my jobs. I dunt have any more free days until thr new year. Therefore bug fixes will only be investigated when there is some spare time. Thankfully I will be welcoming a new site dev to Amibay this coming weekend who can help out.

But my point is. You can post big lists of site issues, or moan about the site not being as good as the old site. We all know this. We have already reached the decision to ditch this vBulletin 5 upgrade and move to Xenforo. But as I just said, due to time and no spare days until the new year it won't happen until then.

We just need to try and fix the issues existing with this current site until we have the time to move to Xenforo.

12, But, and this is a very important one, come the new year I want to make Amibay on Xenforo better then it ever was in terms of speed and features for both staff and members.

For this reason as soon as we own Xenforo I will be installing a default vanilla install before the new year. We can use this to test drive the feedback system and get up to speed with is registration system options, and how its features work. Plus how moderation and admin would for staff. I would like to invite any members ingesting in helping to develop the future of the site into the test site I've it's working to try it out, offer feedback, suggestions and question anything.

We can therefore be up to speed on the way is setup, and the list of third party plugins we think we will offer a similar feature set to the old site.

 

[tbtorro]

I think this thread is now very far from serving it's intended purpose. I give up. Thanks to all who understood and supported my points in the OP.