Several weeks ago the ITM forum database reached the brink of collapse. Spoiler: It collapsed. You probably noticed this, because the site was chugging and/or not working for several days. Emergency works were carried out, including moving ITM (the whole site) to new hosting. But, for the forum at least, this was a temporary fix. The facts were this: Our database has topped 11 million posts. Our customised forum code is high maintenance. Dev resources are finite. And this will probably happen again.

Ian from HQ contacted me with a glorious plan: Move the forum to a vBulletin hosting plan. The benefits:

• vBulletin version will jump from 3.8.8 to 5.0.6
• Automatic updates, so we're always running the latest version
• Shiny new features (this is crazy, but thread tagging maybe)
• Much more access for admins (so we can fix or customise many things ourselves)
• Responsive design (this means mobile friendly)

This bright future comes with a price, however. We can't take a massive 11 million post database with us. One of the great aspects of a forum is its archival nature, and losing any of our history is going to hurt. But we have to cull to move forward. Here is the plan:

• Removal of all threads that have not been posted in since January 1 2007.
• Removal of all pre-2013 threads from the DJ Booth, Buying & Selling, and Helpdesk
• Purge a bunch of hidden / retired subforums. One million posts in this bullet point alone!

A full database backup (2001-present) has been made, so there will still be an archive. But if you would like an old thread to remain accessible after the migration, it will need some new posts in it. Just sayin'. Please be sensible.

I want to tip my hat to the team at HQ for devising this plan. There were easier paths to take, most of which would have ended badly for us. Instead we get new software, and more control over the site. I'm mildly giddy for the update. The dev team is also doing big work on the main site in the coming weeks, so expect a little more tumult and general weirdness.

I will update when we have a solid date on the upgrade.

You mean we'll be able to embed https & HD youtubes & vimeos & all that?

gifv?!!!

Will we get our view count back ??

Quote:

Originally Posted by NismoR31

You mean we'll be able to embed https & HD youtubes & vimeos & all that?

gifv?!!!

Good points. It's going to depend on native vs plugin support (I don't think we'll have the latter).

Quote:

Originally Posted by DANCINGDI

Will we get our view count back ??

I'm not sure what this is! Thread view count? Anyway, there's a good chance anything broken will be fixed in the update.

Is the forum theme going to change, or look mostly the same?

Is there a chance the track could bend?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr Rudi

Is the forum theme going to change, or look mostly the same?

Not sure at this stage. We will retain ITM branding of course, but I'm not sure how much of the current CSS would even carry over to the new platform.

Quote:

Originally Posted by NismoR31

Is there a chance the track could bend?

Not on your life, my... oh.

ive used vBulletin on other forums its going to looks awesome when its finished, wahoo all my stupid threads will disappear

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gruso

Good points. It's going to depend on native vs plugin support (I don't think we'll have the latter).


I'm not sure what this is! Thread view count? Anyway, there's a good chance anything broken will be fixed in the update.

Yes, thread view count

Quote:

Originally Posted by RaVeR_SpIkE

ive used vBulletin on other forums its going to looks awesome when its finished, wahoo all my stupid threads will disappear

we'll make a concerted effort to save yours.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RaVeR_SpIkE

ive used vBulletin on other forums its going to looks awesome when its finished,

ITM is running a skinned version of vBulletin right now, so it's simply an update - akin to going from ice cream sandwich to kit kat on android.

In this scenario, ITM are Sony Australia, vBulletin are Google/Android with a new update out, your phone is on ICS and you're furiously waiting for Sony and your mobile carrier to harry up and approve the kit kat update.

Fucked hell

relevant analogy is relevant

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bracko

we'll make a concerted effort to save yours.

Shit, I wonder if our emoticons will come with us. If they don't, Raver's posts will lose all meaning.

damn. we probably should have thought about that

Bring back :tripping: and :offchops: while you're at it

NOSTALGIA

All sounds pretty good, but does this mean we'll lose locked threads like PAPOYC?
Or is there a short-list of keepers pre-2007?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mickstah

All sounds pretty good, but does this mean we'll lose locked threads like PAPOYC?
Or is there a short-list of keepers pre-2007?

Good point and no, there is currently no shortlist.

Dig up any relevant threads and dump the links here. I'll bump them!

we've thrown around a few options... which forums to keep all threads, from 2010.... I think there was some discussion in the nerd thread, but feel free to post your ideas and we'll see what we can do to maximise the lolz we save.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gruso

: Our database has topped 11 million posts. .

my math is broken

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gruso

Good point and no, there is currently no shortlist.

Dig up any relevant threads and dump the links here. I'll bump them!

Cool, when I have the time I'll do a bit of research.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gruso

Good point and no, there is currently no shortlist.

Dig up any relevant threads and dump the links here. I'll bump them!

we need to preserve some newjack threads. $4178 & all

It's a real shame we'll lose the deep history.

Quote:

Originally Posted by NismoR31

we need to preserve some newjack threads. $4178 & all

http://www.inthemix.com.au/forum/sho...d.php?t=188893

oh, we're safe, this one was in '08..

http://m.inthemix.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=224004

just postponing the inevitable move to http://www.reddit.com/r/inthemix imo

I still drop SKOG (moreso this) and STRONG SCAN in random work conversation. I'm hoping, one day, someone will look up in a meeting, smile and nod knowingly.

will there be dogs?
and does lisa need braces?

Rental plan!

Only $14.99!

Pgotw?

Quote:

Originally Posted by bussyboy

Pgotw?

so we're going to lose all the cool funny old-skool threads?!

sacrilege!

Burn them. Burn them all.

POPOYC needs to be saved for sure - http://www.inthemix.com.au/forum/sho...d.php?t=145263
As does Cruisysloth's window blackout thread from the Brisbane forums - http://www.inthemix.com.au/forum/sho...d.php?t=138606

^ I completely forgot about tezzy...



Nawww.. Such mammaries

Quote:

Originally Posted by nrjize

POPOYC needs to be saved for sure - http://www.inthemix.com.au/forum/sho...d.php?t=145263
As does Cruisysloth's window blackout thread from the Brisbane forums - http://www.inthemix.com.au/forum/sho...d.php?t=138606

Done.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr Rudi

http://www.inthemix.com.au/forum/sho...d.php?t=188893

This one's safe, as it has posts from 2007.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Astro-Boy

Burn them. Burn them all.

agree with the ancient stuff. The internet doesn't need to remember what i was like in my early 20s

oh how everyone has evolved

I only joined ITM in 2006 and created my current account in 2007 :shobon: i'm actually kinda disappointed that a working forum probably means we'll be able to get away with less stupid shit like oversized avatars or exploiting the broken media tags for unintended uses. but if we get working media tags that mean we can do more shit without resorting to exploits that's mostly okay (just means no more autoplays ) just as long as likes are retained then it'll all be good (though if something should happen to astro's in the transfer i wouldn't mind)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bracko

I still drop SKOG (moreso this) and STRONG SCAN in random work conversation. I'm hoping, one day, someone will look up in a meeting, smile and nod knowingly.

i used to practice my cool hobby from uni computer labs and hope that someone walking past would see itm on my monitor and be all "OMG UR THAT FUCKHEAD FROM THE INTERNET " but of course this was years ago back when a) people actually used itm, b) i hadn't yet met pretty much all of brisbane itm, c) people still used uni computer labs before lol laptops. triple post, ead mods tt oh oh oh!! i was reminded of just how fucked ITM's current youtube embeds are and how I had to craft some bespoke idiot workaround to make that shit work on a clean (free of adobe malware) computer. hopefully vbulletin in my butt is a bit smarter than that. quadruple post t tt tt tt tt tt

i'll hook u in the gabber m8

cool i hope the new forum allows linebreaks

idiot

Are we there yet?

Are we there yet?

Are we there yet?

down tiger!

tt

do we have an ETA yet? ITM is totally bombing out

Nope.

http://m.inthemix.com.au/forum/ works nicely in the meantime.

ugh mobile site is so... WAP


and it doesn't stop

Quote:

Originally Posted by ITM, regularly

500 Internal Server Error

nginx/1.0.15

Still, mobile pages load 93% of the time every time. I'll take pages over no pages all day long.

I haven't had any further updates from HQ. But I only posted the thread a couple of weeks ago, so we're still within the window of anticipated horrors. Stay strong.

I can't give out precious likes on mobile site

Anyone up for necrobumping old threads to make them count for the upgrade???

jk