Hi,

vBulletin has released a later version beyond the one I am using now. I'm not going to upgrade right now, since most of the changes are internal and about performance.

Fact of the matter is, in my haste to get this board looking the way I wanted it to, I messed around with the templates and didn't have enough foresight to keep things simple.

As a result, the upgrade that will come shortly will require a bit of work on my part to get things back to the color scheme and such that they use now.

Because of this, two things will happen:

1 - I will wait until vBulletin 2.0 comes out (current updated version is 1.1.4, with us running 1.1.3). 2.0 will include Private Messenging and Poll Subjects as built in features, rather than hacks.

2 - I will likely have to shut the board down for perhaps a day or so when I upgrade. I may not have to, but if I don't you might see the board as a bit "funky" for awhile as I try to get it back up to speed and looking okay.

Feel free to comment on the situation! :)

I guess that's okay with everyone, then? :)

It's okay with me.

You can always set up a test board and then copy all of the templates you changed from the test to the live version. That way your downtime is minimal. You can also make the changes at a time or day of the week that has less traffic. Just look at your webstats.

Just so you know, there isn't too much new in terms of this - vBulletin 2.0 is still in development. We'll abso-freakin-lutely be upgrading shortly after it is released, though.

Like I said: I'll have to make a copy of the board and try to work things out from there, but there may be some downtime, so don't fret! :)

No worries Chris. Whatever you think will help improve the community and forum :).

Word is going around that vBulletin 2.0 will be ought in a couple weeks at most - some people think it'll be released right near the start of February...I hope so!

you have my permission.

just kidding! sounds cool. ;D

Update: vBulletin.com (the official site of this forum software) is now running vBulletin 2.0. They had a beta up beforehand, but their actual support/community forums are now running it.

Here it is:
http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/index.php

It's still "choppy", but they're still fine-tuning things. This is a good sign. I expect the new version ought sometime in February - perhaps a week or two. I sure hope so!

Some of the new features...

- A new "Calendar" page that allows you to add your own private events, and view public events posted by the Admins. It also lists the birthdays of all the forum members - which they'll specify in their profiles/registration. An example is viewable here: http://www.sitepointforums.com/calendar.php

- Private Messenging. This allows you to let other forum members contact you without giving out your email address.

- A Buddy List - add other members to your list and view their profiles or send them Private Messages.

- Subscribing to Threads. This allows you to receive email notifications without posting in threads. You can also subscribe to forums to receive notifications of new threads and such, I believe.

- A User Control Panel, to edit and modify all the things listed above.

- Built-in polls with graphical bars representing voting results.

- A "report this post to a moderator" option.

- Avatars. These are basically little pictures/icons that show up under our username/post count on each post you make. Some boards provide you with many to choose from, just a few, or allow you to upload your own. I don't know if we'd implement this or not - could slow things down quite a bit.

- A "Rate This Thread" option. I'm not sure what effect it will have, though. There might be little stars visible to indicate how high something has been rated. We'll see.

- Some sort of merge option to mix the posts from two different threads together. Sounds very cool.

- Clickable title links - on the forum page for each forum you have links at the top: "Thread", "Last Post", "Views", "Replies" - that's all of them I think. Clicking on one of these will reload the page with the threads sorted by that field.

That's most of it. :)

I've had a look at those links, I especially like the calendar page! It would be cool to wish every user a happy birthday on his birthday!!

All those options sound great as well. I was thinking about suggesting the buddy list and the private messages as an alternative to the chat room I mentioned earlier. Overall, I can't wait for the new upgrade!! :)

I think a chat room would ruin the forums, but private messages would be cool. Any news on the pictures in profile thing?

That would probably sort of be like this Avatar thing - it'd be a buttload of work for me to write some kind of custom hack, so it's up to the vBulletin developers really.

You could always make your Avatar your picture - but heck, like I said, Avatars would slow things down a bit.

We'll see what happens, but I have to be careful not to put too much emphasis on little features and such. In cases like that, more posts are posted on the forum concerning how it should look and what it should change than is actually posted concerning the subject OF the forums.

Update: vBulletin 2.0 has a (tentative, I think) launch date of roughly two weeks from now - woohoo! :) Be prepared for some possible downtime.

I'm likely to wait to upgrade, though, until maybe a week after it's release, as that is when many bug fixes tend to be released as well.

Needless to say, I'll make a valiant attempt at getting the rest of the site up around the same time - we shall see. :)

vBulletin 2.0 Beta has been released! I could upgrade right this minute, but I'm going to hold off just a little while (a week or so, roughly) to wait for the script to stabalize - I'll upgrade then.

Should be cool. :D

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