New Forum Basics

[Jerry Doe]

1) Login at the top of the page.
2) All registered users get 5MB to upload some photos. we will see how this goes.
3) VIP memebers get 150

I will update this thread as we go...

 

[gortnipper]

Is there a mobile mode? Have looked around a bit but have not seen one.

 

[Jerry Doe]

We are still working on the mobile version. It will be automatic when done. It could be a few weeks out.

 

[jseng1]

You say external image links are banned.
Is this an external image link?

 

[Jerry Doe]

I have not banned external images yet. I decided to offer minimal space to non VIP members and much more for VIP members. I really dont want to go through what we did with PB again. It has left so many dead images on the forum. I will implement this later. You will still be able to post external images links, but we are writing scripts to change these to images hosted here and these will count against your space usage. That is my thought. First have lots more tweaks and small fixes to do.

 

[gortnipper]

I get what you want to do with preventing another image hosting service fiasco, but there are a lot of useful photos, such as ones on Andover and other regular web sites, that get linked to.

Also, banning external images goes a long way to throttling prolific posters. When I take a look at this list, and I wonder how many external image links they have?

https://www.accessnorton.com/members/

Is there a way not to ban all external images, but maybe just those from image hosting services?

 

[chrismay]

I like the new format. Rececntly my norton (symamentics) virus protection software has been warning me when I signed in. I think new protocols are in order. Once again it's a wonderful site with incredible info. thanks jerry

 

[jseng1]

When you say:
2) All registered users get 5MB to upload some photos. we will see how this goes.
3) VIP members get 150 MB
Is this per month or total forever?
And external links will be converted but not banned?\
How big is an average photo?

 

[Jerry Doe]

Please lay off me on the image stuff for a while as I am overloaded trying to get the forum up to speed. I think you can see the problem with PB thumbnails all over the place. That is what I am trying to avoid. When I said external image links would be banned, they would not really be banned, as our script would convert them to internal hosted images. So they will be working forever. I am trying to come up with a good solution, so that we keep good content here. Of course images are what ever size you want to make them, so you can decide how many. In retrospect this is not something I am definitely going to do, but please help me try to work out a solution and let me know what you think can be done to prevent loss of data like just happened. I will carry on sorting the forum out in the meantime. Perhaps there is a way to convert (not ban) images from only some external hosts. This image thing is a huge job all on its own. Once I am done with phase 1 I'll see how much available space we have on the server and re-evaluate any free image hosting options for non VIP members. At the moment NON VIP members get 5MB and before they had nothing. I will gauge and make decisions on how much of that space gets used by everyone.

Another thing to think about is phishing attempts with external image urls.

You will notice we have an SSL cert now. That will error out in your browser with external non https links in threads, although I am not worried about that as we did not have an SSL before. An FYI only

 

[lcrken]

Is 1200 pixels max dimension still a reasonable standard for pictures?

Ken

 

[Jerry Doe]

Yes 1200 is ok. This forum is working better than the old one for image fitting...

 

[grandpaul]

If no external links to photos, all of my restoration and custom build threads are lost, no to mention racing photos, bike shows, rallies, etc.

That's really too bad, because I have that photo hosting service for EXACTLY the reason that photobucket tried to screw people for, and ruined so many threads for.

For what it's worth, since day one, I have sized 95% of my photos to about 800-820 pixel width or height (max per side). When I am shooting my final beauty shots, I use 1000 pix but only for the right and left side shots.

I sincerely hope you reconsider that, Jerry...

 

[Jerry Doe]

Regarding the photos I have a different solution now. All of your photos will be ok. I will explain later as its complicated and I have to go to my real job now unfortunately. Dont worry about your external photos being lost.

 

[grandpaul]

Cool, thanx.

 

[swooshdave]

Are you taking new feature suggestions yet? One of the coolest features I've seen on another forum is member tagging. For example if I #Jerry Doe then Jerry will get a notification and link to this post.

 

[Jerry Doe]

Hi Dave,

Yes I am going to turn on the tag system. I am still trying to work on styling CSS etc. Once I am happy it looks good and the new forum is stable, I will then start adding some modules to the forum. There are lots of the them for xeneforo, which is what this forum platform now is. I have quite a few lined up to install here. I am still finding my way around admin, but overall I am very impressed.

Cheers

 

[Jerry Doe]

I am closing this thread so we can keep any new forum related issues in 1 thread. Please use the "New forum observations thread"