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Topic: Forum upgrade
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Catchfire
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4019
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posted 09 September 2008 10:30 AM
Babble has, from time to time, a recurring dream (articulated here and here, for example) that the site will somehow, beyond all hope and expectation, achieve what has been called an 'upgrade'. It has been promised like water to Tantalus for generations, only to be withdrawn at the critical moment. Until then, babblers have suffered always to be bridesmaids, and never brides.So, coeus, as generous and heartfelt your suggestions might be, they have but lighted fools the way to dusty death.
From: On the heather | Registered: Apr 2003
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Toby Fourre
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 13409
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posted 10 September 2008 10:08 AM
quote: Originally posted by jas: I think a lot of people like Babble because it ISN'T a mere clone of every other message board you can find on the web. I find the interface very visually appealing, much more so than any other board I've ever encountered, and sorry, but paginated threads suck. Smileys and graphics which try to take the place of intelligent discussion while slowing down loading time also suck. Please don't go this route, Babble. Just my opinion.
I couldn't agree more. However, the underlying code is terribly out of date. A quick check of validation of just this page gives me 210 Errors, 16 warning(s). quote: The following missing or conflicting information caused the validator to perform guesswork prior to validation. If the guess or fallback is incorrect, it may make validation results entirely incoherent. It is highly recommended to check these potential issues, and, if necessary, fix them and re-validate the document. Unable to Determine Parse Mode! The validator can process documents either as XML (for document types such as XHTML, SVG, etc.) or SGML (for HTML 4.01 and prior versions). For this document, the information available was not sufficient to determine the parsing mode unambiguously, because: the MIME Media Type (text/html) can be used for XML or SGML document types No known Document Type could be detected No XML declaration (e.g <?xml version="1.0"?>) could be found at the beginning of the document. No XML namespace (e.g ) could be found at the root of the document. As a default, the validator is falling back to SGML mode. No DOCTYPE found! Checking with default HTML 4.01 Transitional Document Type. No DOCTYPE Declaration could be found or recognized in this document. This generally means that the document is not declaring its Document Type at the top. It can also mean that the DOCTYPE declaration contains a spelling error, or that it is not using the correct syntax. The document was checked using a default "fallback" Document Type Definition that closely resembles “HTML 4.01 Transitional”.
Check it yourself. Babble has been living with these mistakes for a long time. The forum software needs to be re-written from scratch which is costly. It also needs some extra features such as "Preview". I have to post this before I can tell if I messed up or not.
From: Death Valley, BC | Registered: Oct 2006
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oldgoat
Moderator
Babbler # 1130
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posted 10 September 2008 10:36 AM
It was rewritten, and sure is costly. Remember, that it's not just babble, but all of rabble. quote: I find the interface very visually appealing, much more so than any other board I've ever encountered, and sorry, but paginated threads suck. Smileys and graphics which try to take the place of intelligent discussion while slowing down loading time also suck. Please don't go this route,
Every effort has been made to see that you get your wish. I don't remember if there's a preview feature however. Don't worry though Toby, there are over 15000 people here who are happy to tell you if you mess up. As far as pagination goes, you could be looking at it in two minutes if I went to the control panel and turned it on. Everyone hates it is why we don't have it.
From: The 10th circle | Registered: Jul 2001
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Michelle
Moderator
Babbler # 560
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posted 10 September 2008 11:50 AM
quote: Originally posted by Catchfire: Did you assume that meant October 23rd, 2008?
Oh hush. Seriously, we thought it would be done in the spring, but there really are funding issues that were holding us back. We desperately need a new system. The software is ancient and patched in so many places that it's falling apart for the rest of the site, and for babble too. We can't upgrade the rest of the site and not the babble software because a) we need an upgrade on babble's software - it gets continuously more wonky as time passes, and b) because we want to be able to integrate the content on babble into the rest of the site and the content on the rest of the site into babble more easily. I mean, we do it now, but it's labour-intensive. With everything on the same platform, it will be much easier. Not to mention that Drupal is open source, and UBB isn't, which means that we'll be able to work on it, tweak it, and upgrade it without paying huge licensing fees. BTW, Catchfire, it HAS to be done in October, because that's when we're planning our relaunch! And I've seen a lot of the test pages and test sites and it's really getting there. Really, really! Really!
From: I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell. | Registered: May 2001
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