Why is it with this change I feel I need to spend more time learning more about computers than learning about i.e. a new wood repair process? I thought this site was about Railway preservation not what version of 3.03 or 5.9 or whos a what'ch ya ma call it we have.
In running my shop I have a few things I belive in;
1. KISS engineering, Keep It Simple Stupid
2. If it's not broken ,don't fix it.
But I also belive you have to keep trying to find a better way to do things. Stagnation means your not going forward.
So I'm asking this to all of you donig this Change, and I know your putting alot of effort into it, Do you belive it will be worth it?
Part of what I belive in is perserving the way things used to be. Don't get me wrong I like newer and better or else I would not be on a computer. Newer bigger better means no more steam or interubans. I know the reasons for no steam but the no more interurbans sure doesn't look like such a good move anymore. Unless you like working more to pay more for gas.

irss@eriecoast.com

> 2. If it's not broken ,don't fix it.
> But I also belive you have to keep trying to
> find a better way to do things. Stagnation
> means your not going forward.
> So I'm asking this to all of you donig this
> Change, and I know your putting alot of
> effort into it, Do you belive it will be
> worth it?

Here's the major problem in a nutshell. WebBBS is crashing on us every 7-10 weeks. Each crash eats 1/2 day or more of Hume's time, without warning. He has to drop whatever else he's doing to keep the outage to a minimum.

We've worked hard to try to keep these crashes from impacting, you, the readers, but they have had a severe impact on us, the RyPN staff. We have to run everything on the site--not just the Interchange, but also all the editorial copy--outside of our paying day jobs and family responsibilites. Having the prospect of having to take a 4-hour hit to fix the Interchange without warning was really wearing us down.

So, what's the solution? It's to move to a software platform known to be nearly bulletproof in terms of basic reliability and stability, and to tweak it to make it as friendly for the readers as we can. That's why we're Beta testing right now, and the testing is enormously helpful. We've discovered annoying features we can turn off, good features we hadn't realized existed, and some problems we can also fix. We'll continue working on it until we're confidant that it's the best we can make it, then we'll switch.

So, I'll be honest--we understand that this change is a hardship for users who found WebBBS friendly and easy to use. But what our readers have to understand is that continuing to maintain WebBBS was becoming a serious hardship on your unpaid, all-volunteer RyPN technical staff--that is to say Hume, with a very little help from me.

To keep this site going for the long haul, we need to have it in a condition that does not burn out the people maintaining it and cause them to want to walk away. That, in the end, is the main driver of the change. I'm not trying to sell you on the idea that this is an upgrade or an improvement for all readers. But it is the best solution your staff has found to keeping this forum avialable to you for the long haul of years to come.

Also, please keep an open mind to some of the benefits. I have an inquiry this morning in my mailbox from a reader who wants a deep search of the Interchange archive for specific technical information. At the moment, all that information is not available to him. On the new board, it will be. If archiving information and making it searchable and accessable instead of tossing it out after 3 months is not preservation, I don't know what is.


eledbetter@rypn.org

BTW, just to be clear--I didn't mean to jump all over Jack for asking a reasonable question. But it was a good opportunity to explain what the stakes of this are for the RyPN staff.

We'll keep working on fixing the problems people are helping us find, and making improvements, and hopefully we'll have a different but also very usable platform to move you all to.

eledbetter@rypn.org

Erik, I enjoy this website so much that whatever form it takes I'll be willing to work with, keep up the good work.

Ray Montgomery


http://www001.upp.so-net.ne.jp/noz/yunnan/ezh-idx.
mont3682@bellsouth.net

I've not been on theis bbs long but I'm used to webbbs over on ngdf. I do not find this board difficult. The only problem I've come up with is that I like the cookie approach on the ngdf. The cookies here seem to forget every so often and then I get a 1 weeks set of posts I've already read. I do not have that trouble on ngdf unless I use Norton to remove all cookies by mistake.

DvV


douglasvanveelen@mindspring.com

Long time reader first time poster.

IÂ’ve been following the progression of the new forum with interest. IÂ’m the webforeman (I jokingly referred to myself that way one day and it stuck) for the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum and have phpBB sitting on a back burner for when I can find the time to get a membersÂ’ section of the site up and running.

I also visit some other forums ranging from geek-filled computer gaming sites to one thatÂ’s run by an astronomer and used by physicists, engineers, and other professionals. Most of them run off the phpBB code.

IÂ’ve actively used about 3-4 different BB types and I have to say that phpBB is the best IÂ’ve seen of whatÂ’s out there and really user friendly once you give it a chance. It is a bit more complex than this one, which I had never seen before coming here, but once you get the feel for it, I think youÂ’ll come to appreciate it. And I must say IÂ’ve seen the code altered somewhat before, but wow, Hume, youÂ’ve gone deeper into the code that IÂ’ve dared when I was mucking around with it.

So, I guess the main reason for me to stop lurking and actually post is to say just give it time. Like anything new, thereÂ’s going to be a few bumps, but you donÂ’t return a car to the dealership because you keep turning on the wipers when you meant to shift gears. (I recently changed from a steering column mounted shifter to a floor mounted one and am constantly looking like an idiot with my wipers swishing away with no clouds in the sky.) Believe me; once you get the hang of it, the new forum is going to be easy to use. ItÂ’s a good platform, very solid; I think youÂ’ll come to like it.

Hume, if you have questions or need help drafting up a usersÂ’ guide, I can throw together some of my experiences. Although as I mentioned earlier, I never got quite as deep into the code as you have so I might end up learning from you instead.

Jason


TVRM's website - major changes coming soon
webforeman@tvrail.com

> And I
> must say IÂ’ve seen the code altered somewhat
> before, but wow, Hume, youÂ’ve gone deeper
> into the code that IÂ’ve dared when I was
> mucking around with it.

Actually, I haven't touched the basic php code, I'm only editing the HTML forms. But, if we decide to bypass the index page, then I'll have to edit php code.

As far as what's available I looked real hard for a code that would emulate the treaded format of WeBBBS and had an SQL database. As far as I know there isn't one out there. If anybody knows of one please contact me.

Thanks for the encouragement. I agree that code should serve us well for a long time.

New Interchange
hkading@rypn.org

> I've not been on theis bbs long but I'm used
> to webbbs over on ngdf. I do not find this
> board difficult. The only problem I've come
> up with is that I like the cookie approach
> on the ngdf.... I do not have
> that trouble on ngdf unless I use Norton to
> remove all cookies by mistake.

> DvV

NGDF is running WBBs v5.12 not v 4.33 like here, which probably explains why they don't have crashing problems on NGDF.
MJ


mike211@yknet.ca

> NGDF is running WBBs v5.12 not v 4.33 like
> here, which probably explains why they don't
> have crashing problems on NGDF.
> MJ

No, the main reason is they lop off their archives at 6 to 9 months, which is one of the things we don't want to do. Also, it's worth noting that they too have had service outages over the last 18 months. All in all, I'd say their experiences are pretty comparable.

eledbetter@rypn.org

> No, the main reason is they lop off their
> archives at 6 to 9 months, which is one of
> the things we don't want to do. Also, it's
> worth noting that they too have had service
> outages over the last 18 months. All in all,
> I'd say their experiences are pretty
> comparable.

Yes, upgrading to the newest version of WeBBBS wouldn't solve the problems, plus it cost money.


New Interchange
hkading@rypn.org