End of the Forum Road
Over the last few days I’ve been quite preoccupied about the demise of the forum. Even though I’ve only been on it for a month, the interaction has been so pleasant and so sophisticated adn so helpful I’d hate to lose it. So Kudos to Alex for shouldering the burden. I’m not sure what the mechanics of the changeover will be but I assume that all current members will just have their membership move over and there will be an email notification (?)
Regarding forum platforms, I’ve spent some time on http://www.moyermarine.com//forums/index.php they seem to use a pretty standard and useful interface.
keep me posted
and thanks
Simon
I have obtained much from this site as I designed my own pacific proa over the last 3&1/2 years. Much of my design would be controversial as there are many adaptations from biomechanics, other structural applications, supersonic wind tunnel testing and sail advances. I want to thank you all for your input into this site, especially those running it. I finally signed on as a member yesterday and I find it is passing on but not passing away. Your shared knowledge has been of great assistance to me in this design process. I thank you all, and thanks Alex for taking on the new site. Terry Rempel, from Vancouver Island.
Hello Terry,
Welcome to the forum. Nicely worded post.
Your pacific proa design sounds intriguing - biomechanics? - supersonic wind tunnel testing? - you need to tell us more!! Perhaps when the new forum is up and running, you could post further details about your proa.
Cheers,
Paul
Wow, OK, can only say Thank you for all the insight, inspiration and opportunity to express my take on Worsley’s work. They say timing is everything, I must say I count myself fortunate to have found the Proafile with it’s plethora of generously shared knowledge from so many talented people. One can only hope an archive of this valuable information can be kept available. Thanks again, Roy
I think the best option is to rent a webserver, set up the software there, and run it by donations. Then we are in full control, can store everything persistently (images included), can move to another provider, or swap out who runs the thing, whenever we want. I think a server and a domain would cost something on the order of 10-20€ per month, which is not that much considering how many members we have on the forum.
I’ve got my last exam this semester on Tuesday (26th), that’s the earliest I could earnestly start looking into the whole thing. Finding a good provider and setting everything up would probably take me a couple of days, so if the forum really goes down on the 31st then I don’t know if I can have a new forum up by then… If Michael would be willing to give us an extension of a week or so then it would be much easier. If not, well then I guess I’d really have to hurry then! 😊
Where money is concerned, I would be willing to shell out the cash for the first month or two out of my own pocket, but I’m a student, so I really can’t bear that financial load permanently. I think the best way to do the donations would be to run them through a crowdfunding platform like kickstarter or something, and just do a donation drive once a year. Doing that would make sure everything is transparent, so everyone would know exactly how much money has been donated, and that no one is loading their pockets at everyone else’s expense (trust is good, but verifiable facts are better).
@Michael: How much traffic does proafile rack up in a month (peak)?
Cheers,
Marco
Just another thought, there is still the Proa_File Yahoo Group, which is really quite good if you ignore the odd tantrum. Plenty of space for photos and files.
I was going to suggest that (Yahoo groups) as well. Is there anything really wrong with it that a little moderation couldn’t make better? Seems like a lot of functionality and file storage for the money (free).
One thing I’ve really enjoyed here is the general lack of snark and crankiness that is widely available elsewhere. It fosters sharing and community, and becomes a nice place to just hang out. That can be accomplished with any forum or group, it really just depends on what the members want.
Also, while we have 291 members here, Only a very small percentage of them are active posters. Many are spammers who joined once and left as soon as they added a link to their profile. Really, we’re talking about say, 20-30 people who post. Some posted early on and then left, others came later, but the forum remains about evenly busy. An informal mailing list would do, and it did do for several years before the original Proa_File International group was started.
You might want to share emails with members with who you’d like to remain in contact, if you haven’t already done so.
With that little “real” traffic, a pro hosted site is never going to work…
Members are going to have to come up with an alternative.
Sorry - but we are out.
I’m working on getting everything set up at the moment. With the amount of traffic / users we have I expect we’ll get by with about 30€/year, webhosting has gotten much cheaper over the last couple of years… 😊 I’ll post again when I’ve got something!
Marco
Just did a test install of phpBB3 and that worked out fine, at least the rudimentary features worked out. Now I’m just going to wait for the SSL Certificate to come through (for https, so we have the option of an encrypted connection to the server), and reinstall phpBB3 again later today. Hopefully I’ll be doing some thorough testing tomorrow. In particular I’ll have to see what email settings I need for phpBB3, so it works with the provider (for account creation confirmatiom emails and the likes). That may still cause some trouble, but with a bit of luck I may have everything sorted as early as Thursday evening (UTC), if it proves complicated, it may take a bit longer, but I’m feeling pretty optimistic that I’ll get the thing running sometime this week. 😊
Cheers,
Marco
The SSL-Certificate is in, I’ve installed, and I’m some ways into the configuration, still have a couple of settings to check and a lot of thorough testing to do though. I’m off for the day, but I’ll get back to it tomorrow morning. So far so good! 😊
Cheers,
Marco
Wow! I haven’t been here in awhile. I’m shocked to read that the formus are closing down.
Halsted Morris
The SSL-Certificate is in, I’ve installed, and I’m some ways into the configuration, still have a couple of settings to check and a lot of thorough testing to do though. I’m off for the day, but I’ll get back to it tomorrow morning. So far so good! 😊
Hello Manik,
Excellent! Many, many, thanks for taking this on board. If the Proafile Forum can stay *intact* and continue, then the world will be a better place for it.
Doing some crowd-funding to help cover the costs may be a good thing. If each of us donate a few euros each, then that’ll be sufficient.
Cheers,
Paul
Yeah it’s looking pretty good so far. I have been busy testing things out (with Rob’s assistance), and the settings are getting there. Board emails are working, a SSL problem we had is resolved, categories are there, user permissions and file uploads are looking ok too, so a little more tinkering and I think we can go live with the whole thing. Still going to double and triple check the registration process works out fine tomorrow, an maybe start working on the aesthetics a bit—I haven’t found a theme quite as clean and nice-looking as the one on the present forums yet, but functionality first! 😉
Cheers,
Marco
Sorry for the radio silence, but it bodes no ill, for we are just about ready to go. Tomorrow I’m going to work on the last few touches and details for launch, so we’re looking good for the big announcement during the course of this weekend. I’m looking forward to having all of you guys on the new forum! - Just a few small finalities to go!
Cheers,
Marco
I am very excited about this!
It was a shock when i read about my favorite place on the net closing down.
Cheers,
Johannes