Okay, so this was on has "anyone else seen this?" thread, and I figured it probably should have it's own thread, I have copy-pastad my response to that motion that was made by LT Crow

The following is my argument for Option #2, but final decision, obviously, is up to those leaders who control the web server.

Quote:Here's why SMF should be ditched:
It has outdated and clunky admin interface
It limits the user groups
User group assignments in the users table is godawful and stupid (this comes from me working to make this work: http://www.brbuninstalling.com/minecraft), what I WANTED to do was add a new profile field that let people input their Minecraft name, well that profile field winds up in some weird other table that triggers nothing when entered so it can't be handled that way, so I have to have people register on the forums then register their MC name... anyway next items.

Reasons to keep SMF:
As long as your web server has the proper access set up, it has a one click updater for both the forum itself, and any plugins
SMF's included SSI (this runs the web posts, and my minecraft registration script above).
Open Source (and free)

Options:
Alternate Free Options:
There are a TON of alternate free options, it's crazy, many of which are significantly better developed than SMF, SMF came from a bunch of guys who use to work on YaBB and YaBB SE and didn't like it's development process in-house, so they started SMF, and they did a good job but it's getting dated, it needs a complete rewrite from the ground up.

Licensed Paid Versions: IPB (out of the question IMO, their licensing costs are stupid especially to get similar features)
vBulletin (I have a license I need to renew, but it has an existing large community and vB5 was a complete rewrite with a drastic change to the way it works, it does have tapatalk support).
XenForo, I have a currently active license to XenForo, it is easy to write plugins for, and modify, and skin. Those of us who have used the PS2 forums have seen XenForo in action, if you have seen a good 2/3rd of the cursed community they use XenForo (such as Minecraftforum), even my own web site is currently using xenforo http://www.tunedchaos.com/ (I have the registration turned off due to spammers, I know a bunch of anti-spam plugins and systems to implement though). Downside: no built in support for tapatalk but there are plugins for it.
Largest benefit to paid license: You are paying for a support license, which is often useful, Open Source limits you to community interaction which may be less than helpful.

Right now, of all forum systems, I have a #1 for both Free (open source) and paid:
Paid: XenForo
Free: MyBB

You can also feature sift by going here:
http://www.forummatrix.org/wizard.php <-- remember though, some forums actually have add-ons and plugins that enable features, for example, Vanilla Forum only has a non-threaded and user registration, but you add plugins to enable additional features, so it's more light weight. Penny-Arcade, and Cad-Comic both use Vanilla for their forums.

But I also know the amount of work that goes into a move to another forum system (usually including a second database for transfer).

I would be more than willing to lend a hand on a move to another forum system, I need to update the minecraft registration script to make it work anyway.

I have allowed vote changes. Feel free to post counter-points.

Either way i do think general should be closed of prying eyes, due to the fact that plenty of people do post some personal things in the general forums.

I don't see any problem with SMF. If the admin interface was that bad it would have been changed a long time ago.

User groups and minecraft profile names seems like a lot of nothing that no one really cares much about to do a whole lot of work to port server software over.


Solution for general discussion? Don't post shit you don't want random people to know online. It's not like we require some sort of invite to register. Guest accounts are probably forum members on mobile devices that don't want to log in anyway.

I honestly don't know enough about how SMF works on the back-end to make a call based on this
But the interface is my only thing It feels outdated..

But I do not want to see anything happen to current accessibility of the general forums or any of the other forums.
This is a very tricky thing.. Let's leave it alone because it's been fine for the past epoch or so..

I'd just like to see a cleaner, updated front end

(07-10-2013, 11:13 AM)WoahItsChooly link Wrote: I honestly don't know enough about how SMF works on the back-end to make a call based on this
But the interface is my only thing It feels outdated..

But I do not want to see anything happen to current accessibility of the general forums or any of the other forums.
This is a very tricky thing.. Let's leave it alone because it's been fine for the past epoch or so..

I'd just like to see a cleaner, updated front end

I don't remember what HeK said but I think there was a reason he didn't update SMF to the most recent version.

Don't meant to be a dick on this one, but there is currently no plans to change anything in the short to mid term future.

A vote on the matter in effect means nothing, and just because you see a bunch of robots indexing does not mean prism is after you. Whether a signup is required or not, these are public forums, treat anything you say as something that could be later dug up if you post or use any sort of IRL identification that is tied to your username.

There's not really a reason to switch off of SMF right now and HeK does a fine job of maintaining/updating things. What system is generally a personal preference and we've sunk our lot in with this for the time being. If anything were to change in the future that would largely be up to Hek / Surf / Kor / Myself to decide.

I just want more themes  :'(

(07-10-2013, 11:26 AM)Caffeine link Wrote: Don't meant to be a dick on this one, but there is currently no plans to change anything in the short to mid term future.

A vote on the matter in effect means nothing, and just because you see a bunch of robots indexing does not mean prism is after you. Whether a signup is required or not, these are public forums, treat anything you say as something that could be later dug up if you post or use any sort of IRL identification that is tied to your username.

There's not really a reason to switch off of SMF right now and HeK does a fine job of maintaining/updating things. What system is generally a personal preference and we've sunk our lot in with this for the time being. If anything were to change in the future that would largely be up to Hek / Surf / Kor / Myself to decide.

I don't consider your response dick-like, it's exactly the response I expected. And I'm not denying the maintenance and work HeK does is great. And as I stated in the post in the first place, I know the final decision is up to you guys. Also, the point of this thread is not to demean or undermine in any way, it is to make the motion known. I know it has no final bearing.

(07-10-2013, 11:26 AM)Caffeine link Wrote: Don't meant to be a dick on this one, but there is currently no plans to change anything in the short to mid term future.

A vote on the matter in effect means nothing, and just because you see a bunch of robots indexing does not mean prism is after you. Whether a signup is required or not, these are public forums, treat anything you say as something that could be later dug up if you post or use any sort of IRL identification that is tied to your username.

There's not really a reason to switch off of SMF right now and HeK does a fine job of maintaining/updating things. What system is generally a personal preference and we've sunk our lot in with this for the time being. If anything were to change in the future that would largely be up to Hek / Surf / Kor / Myself to decide.

You're only a dick while playing PS. Where it is mostly justified anyways.

(07-10-2013, 03:16 PM)cbre88x link Wrote: [quote author=Caffeine link=topic=7036.msg269278#msg269278 date=1373473560]
Don't meant to be a dick on this one, but there is currently no plans to change anything in the short to mid term future.

A vote on the matter in effect means nothing, and just because you see a bunch of robots indexing does not mean prism is after you. Whether a signup is required or not, these are public forums, treat anything you say as something that could be later dug up if you post or use any sort of IRL identification that is tied to your username.

There's not really a reason to switch off of SMF right now and HeK does a fine job of maintaining/updating things. What system is generally a personal preference and we've sunk our lot in with this for the time being. If anything were to change in the future that would largely be up to Hek / Surf / Kor / Myself to decide.

You're only a dick while playing PS. Where it is mostly justified anyways.
[/quote]

Caff is actually really friendly IRL. I was playing megaman very poorly at his place and there was a surprising lack of yelling at my ineptitude.

As to what Caff said I agree 100%. This forum relies a lot on the work put into it mostly by Caff and Hek. A big change could be good or it could be bad. It could also require more work than the people doing the back end can or are willing to take on right now, which would mean even if it could be good it wouldn't work in practice. Suggestions are welcome and if someone wants to improve the site they are free to propose suggestions to the people running the site. The best way to handle most of these suggestions is through PMs though, that way people don't get excited for something that is either impractical or may not work the way originally believed.

Are the bots actually causing a problem?  The way I see it everyone just needs to understand that everything here is accessible to someone looking for it, and that's not going to change even with a move to registration required.

but if we move to a new forum then I will lose all my karma.

(07-10-2013, 07:02 PM)rumbot link Wrote: but if we move to a new forum then I will lose all my karma.

Don't worry, Brother, I'm ruining your ratio as we speak. 

I don't really see any reason to privatize the forums. I guess if you were going to change the forum software, I'd support a move to vB, but honestly SMF works fine. It's not like we have a massive influx of friendly trolls and spambots.

I don't think anyone's answered the 'if it ain't broke, why fix it?' question, regarding both points.

because lol smf

(07-10-2013, 04:12 PM)Surf314 link Wrote: [quote author=cbre88x link=topic=7036.msg269292#msg269292 date=1373487396]
[quote author=Caffeine link=topic=7036.msg269278#msg269278 date=1373473560]
Don't meant to be a dick on this one, but there is currently no plans to change anything in the short to mid term future.

A vote on the matter in effect means nothing, and just because you see a bunch of robots indexing does not mean prism is after you. Whether a signup is required or not, these are public forums, treat anything you say as something that could be later dug up if you post or use any sort of IRL identification that is tied to your username.

There's not really a reason to switch off of SMF right now and HeK does a fine job of maintaining/updating things. What system is generally a personal preference and we've sunk our lot in with this for the time being. If anything were to change in the future that would largely be up to Hek / Surf / Kor / Myself to decide.

You're only a dick while playing PS. Where it is mostly justified anyways.
[/quote]

Caff is actually really friendly IRL. I was playing megaman very poorly at his place and there was a surprising lack of yelling at my ineptitude.

As to what Caff said I agree 100%. This forum relies a lot on the work put into it mostly by Caff and Hek. A big change could be good or it could be bad. It could also require more work than the people doing the back end can or are willing to take on right now, which would mean even if it could be good it wouldn't work in practice. Suggestions are welcome and if someone wants to improve the site they are free to propose suggestions to the people running the site. The best way to handle most of these suggestions is through PMs though, that way people don't get excited for something that is either impractical or may not work the way originally believed.
[/quote]

i remember much yelling. Then eightball left.

(07-10-2013, 09:18 PM)LT Crow link Wrote: [quote author=rumbot link=topic=7036.msg269304#msg269304 date=1373500959]
but if we move to a new forum then I will lose all my karma.

Don't worry, Brother, I'm ruining your ratio as we speak. 
[/quote]

Kevin Bacon - Fraternity Paddle

(07-12-2013, 04:53 PM)Elder link Wrote: i remember much yelling. Then eightball left.

I got rained on pretty badly on my way back to the train. I had some al pastor tacos that I had to shovel into my mouth before they got ruined, clothes drenched and meat marinade running down my face and arms. Fun times

I think leaving general open makes the community more inviting to newcomers. I lurked for a week or two before posting, so I could begin to put personalities to names.

I'd advocate moving the general forums to account only access if for no other reason, than the "hot girls" thread. Another forum i post on went that route due to possible legal issues involving allowing minors access to certain NSFW images. I forget the law, but its the same law that makes most porn sites have the "are you 18 or over" buttons.

(07-12-2013, 11:35 PM)Dtrain323i link Wrote: I'd advocate moving the general forums to account only access if for no other reason, than the "hot girls" thread. Another forum i post on went that route due to possible legal issues involving allowing minors access to certain NSFW images. I forget the law, but its the same law that makes most porn sites have the "are you 18 or over" buttons.

We can make an 'over 18' only section.