IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

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IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Andere Richtingen » Sun Jun 17, 2018 2:21 pm

Apologies in advance; this is long but please read and reply because it matters to all of us!

I've recently been in touch with Oddquine because I was unable to post messages on this board while using my Android phone or Android tablet. I signed in, as usual, but the system then immediately logged me out again. Logging in with my Windows 10-powered lap top has not presented any problems so I asked Oddie what might be done about this? She investigated and got back to me.

It turns out that this version of the message board we are using is very much out of date and not designed for use on mobile devices at all (so it's a wonder this hasn't happened earlier). Thinking about this a little more, I recall Penny has mentioned in the past that she's been "chucked off" the board on occasion? Is your experience the same as mine, Penny or did you mean something else? Maisie, also, has complained in the past about not being able to log in with her i-pad although her desk top PC is functioning OK. Anyone else experiencing these glitches?

Oddie says there is a solution. Well, two, actually.
The first solution would be to upgrade the board to the current version, retaining all the features and facilities we have here. This would entail weeks and weeks of work for Oddie, transferring all our log-ins and previous messages over to the new version. Inevitably, there would be bumps and glitches along the way but the end result would be a forum which looks and behaves much like this one.

The second solution would be to create a new and basic message board without some of the refinements we have on here. We would lose old messages and, most likely, would have to create new log-ins for ourselves. However, as soon as that was done, we could carry on as before. This, clearly, would be a much neater and less time-consuming solution from Oddie's point of view.

Finally, of course, things can be left exactly as they are so long as users are prepared to access the board on a lap-top or a desk-top PC. (However, it should be remembered that, as this is an out of date version, these functions may also stop working at any point).

What do you think? How do you usually access the board?
Personally, I favour solution #2. After all, if there's anything you particularly want to retain from among the old messages - a poem or a recipe, for example - then there's no reason you shouldn't save that item on your own device before we lose them.

Please give it some thought and reply here. Oddie has said that she will do what the majority of users prefer.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Penny » Sun Jun 17, 2018 4:27 pm

Fully agree to cut the number of places? on here. If one looks them over many have not been used for many years. Normal questions and items can surely all be but on our normal Good Morning spot. Only the places used a lot should be kept.I am not very good at titles, names etc but a lot on here I have never heard of. Needs a good cut down. cheers Penny
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby dita » Sun Jun 17, 2018 6:13 pm

Totally agree with Penny, I only use my laptop anyway on here and only occasionally have a problem logging on etc, but I know others do and so whatever folks decide that is fine with me.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby laurie53 » Sun Jun 17, 2018 7:53 pm

I invariably use tablets, both Windows and Android, and don't as yet, seem to have a problem.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Lacemaker » Sun Jun 17, 2018 8:10 pm

Same here, Laurie, with no problems. I use my iPad for everything since my laptop is still down in Melbourne with my daughter.

One of these days I might get it back !

Whatever you feel is the best, Oddie.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby maggieh » Sun Jun 17, 2018 8:21 pm

I also use my tablet and phone to log into here.As yet no problems.They are both Android, laptop is Windows 10.
I will go with whatever needs to be done.Maybe take away a lot of members names that don't visit anymore.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Oddquine » Mon Jun 18, 2018 2:16 am

I don't have a tablet,or mobile phone which does anything more than let me phone and text, so I know zilch about android set-ups, but it may be that those who can get on have downloaded an app. I believe there is one.

I was thinking, though...and I was convinced I had a forum style that was meant to work on mobiles at one stage, (though maybe it wasn't for this forum, as I used to have a couple of others).

What forum style are those of you who CAN get on with an android device, without being logged off, using, because it might be worth those with problems trying it ? If you say what your style is and it is all the same one(or a version of the same one as there is only two different styles, just in different colours) that can be tried first, and if it doesn't help, I'll download a new forum.

If you are happy not to have all the forums carried over, that will save a lot of hassle, and I should be able to tranfer the posts from those you do want....if you tell me which ones they are. I don't know what is in the latedt PHPBB version, but if there is anything you particularly want to keep out of what we have on here, I'll see if there is an updated version. I think you may have to re-register as the forums tend to upgrade security at the same time as everything else, but I will try to transfer the log-ins.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Andere Richtingen » Mon Jun 18, 2018 10:19 am

I don't use a Forum Style. In fact, I'd never heard of it until this morning and had to Google it to grind out what it is.

However, just a footnote to say that I'm currently logged in on the tablet, using the Puffin browser instead of Chrome so that may be a fix for now.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby twin1947 » Mon Jun 18, 2018 1:12 pm

I will go along with what eveyone else wants,i have just logged on with my tablet and sailed straight in .
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby marieann » Tue Jun 19, 2018 2:38 am

I normally use my desktop but have no problem accessing the forum with iPad, iphone or Kindle Fire with Google Chrome. I always find it very fast to load.
I can't give an opinion about what to keep or not as I don't know many of the people whose postings are stored here.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby ciderman_nz » Tue Jun 19, 2018 4:17 am

I always use my desktop for forums so I'm fine.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Lacemaker » Tue Jun 19, 2018 5:40 am

I log in with my iPad Air 2, Safari 11.4.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Oddquine » Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:55 pm

The Forum Style is just the look of the page. I only use 3 styles prosilver is the default and Fisubsilver and subsilver,are the others in different colours, so there are 5 options. Prosilver is what you see before you log on, and then you get the style you have ticked in the board preferences in your user panel. Hazel says she is on subsilver2.

Browsers can make a difference, but so can the strength of the connection. It is a heavy load with all the stuff on it, which is why, to run comfortably and reasonably quickly on a mobile it could be better less "busy" not in membership terms, but in add-ons and extras terms.

Which is why I need to know what you can happily live without if I upgrade to a brand new forum set-up....the forums you don't need AND extras like the Gallery, the arcade, the blogs, the chatbox at the top, the fancy stuff on the post box and the plethora of smilies you're not bothered about keeping.
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Lacemaker » Tue Jun 19, 2018 7:13 pm

I have saved all I want to keep from the galleries and from other links so you can go ahead and create a brand new forum as far as I am concerned, Oddie.

How about the rest of you ? Check things out and save what you need to and let Oddie know when she can go ahead with the new forum if needs be. :please:
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Re: IMPORTANT:Updating the Board. Please read & respond

Postby Andere Richtingen » Tue Jun 19, 2018 7:34 pm

Hi, Oddie.
I've been having a look around and, so far as I can see, nobody has ever used the Blogs section. Arcade games haven't been played for six years and Mini Chat hasn't been used for 18 months. It appears to me that we can probably all live happily without them.

The list of members is nice to have but maybe anyone who hasn't posted for, say, three years should be deleted?

Smilies? Well, some of us use some of them, sometimes but perhaps they could be pruned a little?

The Gallery? Until Penny's birdie pictures were posted there recently, I hadn't looked in there since the week I signed up to the forum. For some reason, it never crossed my mind to post pictures anywhere other than the Photography section.

A cull of all the forum segments is probably overdue. I'd suggest we have the following:
Admin Stuff
Forum Suggestions
News/Current Affairs
Advice Wanted
Leisure/Hobbies & Activities
General Chat/Anything Goes
Silly Games

No doubt others will have their own preferences!


I wonder, too, if there's sense in restricting the number of posts in any thread before it becomes unwieldy? GransNet restrict each thread to 1000 posts, after which you have to start a new thread. Maybe this could be 1500, but the "Hi Dita..." thread is well out of hand now!
I'd love to know what anyone else thinks.

PS:_Like LM, above, I've saved anything I want to keep already ....
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