Forum Upgrade

[Labster]

Why are we doing upgrades? What's wrong with using hopelessly out of date software, like EPU does?

Actually, there is an update for the EPU boards, released something like 20 years ago.  I'm a professional Perl programmer, and that DCForum software I tracked down is scary, man.

[Bob Schroeck]

Taking the facetious question seriously for a moment, there's something like 60 or 70 individual issues fixed in the upgrade, including a goodly handful of security issues.

I haven't gone through the entire list yet, but with luck a couple things on my To-Do list might be resolved for me.

[mephron]

The problem with the EPU forums is that no one is quite sure how to transfer it to anyone else's database, so and we don't want to go losing everything in it.

The question becomes what to go with, then get a network blacksmith to forge a convertor, which is going to be problematic in the short run.

[Labster]

As a professional programmer, I'm not really sure what a "network blacksmith" is, but like, this is a programmer job, not a sysadmin one. I've done a few conversions between software formats before, and I'd be happy to do it for EPU. Heck, this time would be easy, because I'd have access to the original software and access to the raw data. And I'd get to entirely skip the step where I try to hide my bot from the Powers That Be.

Browsing but not yet running the DCForum code, it looks like the "database" is just pipe-delimited flat files? I can't imagine why threads break. Er, I meant to say: that sounds easy to parse.

[Bob Schroeck]

Okay, this time for real. At some point this weekend I'll be doing the forum upgrade. Please be aware that I'll have to shut the boards down completely for the duration of the process, so if you try to access them at some point and are refused, that's what's happening. However, I don't think it's really going to take very long, so it shouldn't be a big problem for anyone.

Oh, and Brent, when I finish with that, I'll change the encoding on the message text field in the posts table.

[Dartz]

Okay...

But who has to go out to the emergency generator to cycle the power?

[Inquisitive Raven]

Not that it's particularly relevant to the upgrade itself, but is there a reason the announcement on the forum home page remains dated November 14 no matter what it says?

[Bob Schroeck]

Quirk of the Announcement plug-in. That's the date of the original announcement, which I've simply edited and re-edited over the weeks. Easy enough to fix.

[Bob Schroeck]

And it's done. Despite the intimidating size of the upgrade instructions, it turned out to be relatively simple. Yay.

[robkelk]

And it's done.  Despite the intimidating size of the upgrade instructions, it turned out to be relatively simple.  Yay.

Yay!

Hey, the edit box is white now... (at least it is on my system)

[Star Ranger4]

I dont see any change. Maybe its something in your color scheme? I've been using San Felix since we left... those people.

[robkelk]

Color scheme, browser, OS - how they interact can be arcane at times.

[Inquisitive Raven]

I dont see any change.  Maybe its something in your color scheme?  I've been using San Felix since we left... those people.

I also use San Felix. AFAICT, just using the quick reply box gives slightly improved contrast with the background, but using the New Reply button or replying to a specific post brings up a white edit box.

[Bob Schroeck]

Which is odd, because I've always gotten a white edit box on New Reply (and New Thread) in San Felix.