Unless there is merit in subdividing the maintenance/how to into subsections to make finding things easier - engine, gearbox, suspension, brakes, electrical, aircon, etc etc?? I know it can be a sometime pain to search manually for something you know is there so you can find the page and post up a link for a newby.... May well make it easier for all.
I was thinking of suggesting something along these lines, perhaps sections for V6's, four pots, diesel & general.....
The software we use does not allow setting up sub forums unfortunately, so having too many boards creates an cumbersome list...
So... Without wanting to let Pandora out of the box, so to speak, is it perhaps time to collate all the points/suggestions/flaws and look at an alternate set of software (or whatever its called to a relative technophobe like me) and migrate/transfer to something a little better or user/admin friendly? Also, if the rubber band keeps snapping as it has over the past months, is it time to review/replace/upgrade?
We are now counting 1230 members in less than a year and, even allowing for duds and duplicates, its fair to say that we are here to stay so why not go onwards and upwards?? You know both my thoughts as well as the majority of the ongoing feelings as to funding but why not explore that path a wee tad?
The only major issue we've had in the last few months is the loss of the images server for a few days. Strangely enough, this is the only bit on professional, paid for hosting...
A couple of switch failures, have resulted in brief outages, as has a couple of reboots. Other than that, it seems to be open season for YaBB exploits this month, but patches and workarounds are quick to be implemented. Full root access helps to implement and monitor quickly.
If I'm honest, YaBB wouldn't have been my first choice of software, but the more you dig in to the back end, the more you can see its actually not a bad product.
Migrating from YaBB will either a huge, huge, huge task, or even impossible.
Shared hosting probably isn't suitable for a busy interactive site, such as forums - certainly you would notice a significant drop in performance from what we now see. We started off on shared hosting, and ran in trouble straight away (ok, the host was crap), and eventually got shut down by the hosting company. We are now significantly larger, so the performance would be further reduced.
However, despite having a dedicated server at the moment, it is not a long term solution - more a short to mid term. It was always supposed to be very, very temporary when we unexpectedly had the plug pulled on us by Hosting Unlimited without warning. However, as the performance was so much better than with affordable shared hosting, it has remained, and may as well remain whilst it gives us the best results for the money we can afford.
The server that runs the VM will have to be replaced soon, due to its age, but I reckon I can do this with just a couple of brief outages.
The next step, I fear, would be a professionally hosted, dedicated server, or co-lo, but obviously the costs would rocket.
However, I think the Admin team are always open to suggestions, so this is not a 'we will not do that' type post, more the scenario as I (personally) see it. We all welcome the suggestions, and listen. And may even be convinced. Maybe it should be a wider debate?
So what are your thoughts - should we change software? Should we change the hosting solution? I will try to answer any technical questions as honestly as I can, with the exception of anything that I think may compromise the security or stability of the site.
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Topic: How about a "Projects How To" ?? (Read 2126 times)