- City
- Dexter
- State
- MI
This is your early warning that we will be moving the forum to new back-end software at some point (exact timing TBD) early this year. We have been using vBulletin since the forum's inception in 2002 and it has reached the end-stage of its life cycle. Mobile browsers and modern social media features are simply too much for its antiquated foundation. The "new" version of vBulletin isn't being used by us or most forums because it wasn't an improvement and it's been out for years now. It's on life support and is terminal.
In reality, we should have done this a couple years ago.
The New Software
We have selected XenForo software for the new back-end, having gotten multiple recommendations from other forum owners who have made this switch and after a good deal of reading/research.
I revisited an old forum from NC and found that they'd switched to XenForo. I've played with it there and been very impressed: https://nc4x4.com/
Mobile viewing/posting is great, photo uploads work perfectly (as we all know, a long-standing source of aggrivation) and there are neat little features like being able to "tag" people in posts by using an "@" and their username (like @bigwalton) and being able to "Like" posts easily.
Quick replies are easy and it's not so far removed from vBulletin that it's going to be a massive problem for folks to figure out. (They clearly used a lot of vBulletin as a design basis.)
There is absolutely no need for Tapatalk because XenForo started out being not just mobile-friendly, but natively mobile.
The Process
This is a big project and will take some time from start to finish. We have been assured that all of the existing forum content can and will be moved over and we will be testing the new forum out on a "staging" server with a select group of users before it goes fully live to try to find any and all issues before unleashing it on the masses.
There WILL BE FORUM DOWNTIME in order to keep from having posts missed in the conversion. We will minimize this downtime as much as possible (days, not weeks) and will try to post on the CJ-8.com Facebook page as often as reasonable to keep people updated (I know not everyone is on FB, but we won't be able to use anything from the current site during the transition). When we're back up, we should be able to send out an all-user email alert. (All of that is subject to revision as we finalize the process.)
The old forum and all it's data WILL NOT be deleted, it will stay put just in case as a backup.
Obviously, we will have a thorough ongoing back-up system in place and tested for the new setup before it's live.
You Can Help
We have always kept this forum free to use and not "crippled" free user accounts like most forums. We don't plaster ads all over the place to keep the forum "clean" for both free and paid users. Our paid forum supporters have kept the lights on here as we have recurring hosting costs and various upgrade/maintenance efforts on the back end.
This project goes far outside of this and will be done by an outside professional who had performed many of these conversions. That brings with it a significant cost.
If you're willing to help defray the conversino costs, we have added a "XenForo Upgrade Supporter" option to our Membership Page: https://www.cj-8.com/forum/payments.php
This is a one-time $10 payment to help offset the upgrade costs and won't affect your other membership status here. Anyone who helps out with this payment will have the option of being one of the test users on the staging server to get a sneak peek at what the new forum setup will look like and can help us beat on the software to see if there are any issues. This is not required, you can simply pay to help out and wait until the new forum is live, but I thought it would be a fun thing to offer for anyone interested.
When we're done, the forum will be in a MUCH better place and mobile use will be improved an insane amount. I CAN NOT WAIT until this is done, despite how much I am dreading the actual process of getting there.
In reality, we should have done this a couple years ago.
The New Software
We have selected XenForo software for the new back-end, having gotten multiple recommendations from other forum owners who have made this switch and after a good deal of reading/research.
I revisited an old forum from NC and found that they'd switched to XenForo. I've played with it there and been very impressed: https://nc4x4.com/
Mobile viewing/posting is great, photo uploads work perfectly (as we all know, a long-standing source of aggrivation) and there are neat little features like being able to "tag" people in posts by using an "@" and their username (like @bigwalton) and being able to "Like" posts easily.
Quick replies are easy and it's not so far removed from vBulletin that it's going to be a massive problem for folks to figure out. (They clearly used a lot of vBulletin as a design basis.)
There is absolutely no need for Tapatalk because XenForo started out being not just mobile-friendly, but natively mobile.
The Process
This is a big project and will take some time from start to finish. We have been assured that all of the existing forum content can and will be moved over and we will be testing the new forum out on a "staging" server with a select group of users before it goes fully live to try to find any and all issues before unleashing it on the masses.
There WILL BE FORUM DOWNTIME in order to keep from having posts missed in the conversion. We will minimize this downtime as much as possible (days, not weeks) and will try to post on the CJ-8.com Facebook page as often as reasonable to keep people updated (I know not everyone is on FB, but we won't be able to use anything from the current site during the transition). When we're back up, we should be able to send out an all-user email alert. (All of that is subject to revision as we finalize the process.)
The old forum and all it's data WILL NOT be deleted, it will stay put just in case as a backup.
Obviously, we will have a thorough ongoing back-up system in place and tested for the new setup before it's live.
You Can Help
We have always kept this forum free to use and not "crippled" free user accounts like most forums. We don't plaster ads all over the place to keep the forum "clean" for both free and paid users. Our paid forum supporters have kept the lights on here as we have recurring hosting costs and various upgrade/maintenance efforts on the back end.
This project goes far outside of this and will be done by an outside professional who had performed many of these conversions. That brings with it a significant cost.
If you're willing to help defray the conversino costs, we have added a "XenForo Upgrade Supporter" option to our Membership Page: https://www.cj-8.com/forum/payments.php
This is a one-time $10 payment to help offset the upgrade costs and won't affect your other membership status here. Anyone who helps out with this payment will have the option of being one of the test users on the staging server to get a sneak peek at what the new forum setup will look like and can help us beat on the software to see if there are any issues. This is not required, you can simply pay to help out and wait until the new forum is live, but I thought it would be a fun thing to offer for anyone interested.
When we're done, the forum will be in a MUCH better place and mobile use will be improved an insane amount. I CAN NOT WAIT until this is done, despite how much I am dreading the actual process of getting there.
I'm a XenForo Upgrade Supporter
