Yes, yes, Nait's right. Those are the only fora I can think of in which it's acceptable to revive old threads, actually.
And if people wanted to download the database for themselves, would it be so hard to delete all the passwords from that archived database? I really don't see why some app couldn't be written to do just that. Someone please set me straight if I'm wrong, though.
Peace
The Man
I say keep The Daily Grind, Help Forum, Open Source Forum, General Archive, Writer's Corner, Artist's Gallery and Staff Forum. Everything else can go to internet hell/heaven, depending on how good the threads were.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
I support what BooB said, plus the gaming fora. *nod*
Woteva. It's not really my decision, and if someone can come up with a way to blank out the passwords (or change them all to "blarg" or something) so that Bleys can post the pre-pruned fora online, then I don't think anyone will have any reason to feel upset. But I very much would miss the historically-inclined feel of EoFF, no matter what happened.
There's really no other way to do this? Maybe there's something wrong with the sorting software or something. Have you talked to vBulletin about this? They have their own fora on vBulletin.com, I believe. It just seems a shame to prune the fora now, because maybe in a few weeks we'd have heard of some other solution.
I support the idea of doing some research before we make the final prune decision. But that's just me.
Peace
The Man
The problem isn't the software, it's the physical limits of the server we're stored on. EoFF's database is really, really effing big. We have to get rid of stuff.
Squally: Not entirely up to the admins. Knights can move threads, too, you know. In fact, I've already asked them to do so.
Alright: The creative forums, the Archives, Open Source, Magestar, and the gaming forums don't get touched. General Chat, however, will be a much smaller place in the near future.
Unne: Looked at the announcements lately?
I'm not about to create a "we're pruning" thread in every single forum. In fact, I don't even care to put one in General Chat at this point. The announcement is there, *this* thread exists for feedback, and anything more would be terribly redundant.
Of course, if any of you strongly feel there should be a "we're pruning" thread in General Chat, go ahead and make it. I won't close it.
I am now much happier, now that the aforementioned fora are slated for safety.
Are you sure that there are no solutions for the password issue? Somehow, I think it should be easy to set everyone's password to "Blarg" (or some other common phrase that doesn't actually match the real value of the password string). Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd find it hard to believe someone couldn't write a simple algorithm to wipe clean all password references from an archive of the fora.
Peace
The Man
All passwords appear to be stored encryted in one database, but tampering with the database appears to render the vB unfunctional.
I'd rather a copy of the board not made available to the general public in any form anyway, since it's not only passwords, but other information could also be made available such as private messages, maybe personal calender notes etc. It's far easier if we just don't bother and not make it available.
Bleys knows how to prune without touching particular forums now, so why is this still an issue?
I guess you're right, crono. Could we simply disable logging in to the fora in any form then? I really would like to have a functional copy of the vB board exactly as it existed before the pruning present for all members to view, should they so desire. That's the only reason I'm asking.
Oh, and by the way, I just lost sixty-nine posts about fifteen minutes ago, both in my search results and in my profile. Has the pruning already begun? I thought it was supposed to start sometime in July.
Peace
The Man
No, because the data would still be present, even if the code was modified to disable logging in. You just have to drag-drop the database into notepad and you can see everything clear enough with the odd mysql database formatting around it, since stuff like PMs etc are not encrypted.
And you're still that concerned about your post count, eh?
Hold on a minute, let me get this straight. When the pruning begins and all those threads get deleated, is our post count going to go down for every post lost in this way. I'm not complaining or anything, but is there anyway to save our post count and delete those old threads at the same time? Just a thought for those people that value their post count. *cough*practically everyone*cough*
Not sure. Deleting posts/threads using the edit/delete button will reduce post counts respectively. Dunno if the same works for pruning though, especially on such a large scale - I'd expect not as it would be more accurate that way, but I guess we'll have to wait and see.
First of all, I'd think vBulletin would MD5 hash (or otherwise hash) passwords, so they wouldnt' be in there except as meaningless hash codes. If they don't, they need to get a clue.
But yeah, that still leaves PMs and such. I don't know how vB organizes its tables.. but it should be possible to just backup relevant tables (posts, etc.).. But even then, it would just be a huge MySQL mess (plain text...but very ugly to read) without a program to read it...
See, I never thought of private messages being viewable. What else have I not thought of? It's a somewhat scary thought, and it would be a sod of a lot scarier if the db was available for public download.
No, I think it's a sod of a lot safer if nobody but the admins have access to the database backup.
Hashing the passwords was actually something only recently introduced to the VB. I think 2.x or later. I can't even remember. But yeah they're hashed now.
An idea occurred to me earlier this evening, while I was away. Is there any way to write a program that will convert every thread in General Chat into an individual .mht archive (read: an html file with all the associated images embedded within)? If we could do that, then we could at least leave General Chat up, even if it would lose its searchability. Of course, that could be highly impractical as well, but if we could .mht-ize all the threads in GC and then post them as individual attachments in some new thread, that would severely decrease the number of entries in EoFF's databased.
On another note, I'm apparently not the only one to be affected by post counts drops, as Cute&Dangerous told me in chat that she noticed she lost some posts today (I myself recall her profile saying she had over 1,000 posts, and today that had dropped to 975), crono_logical had gained all of three posts between some point earlier today and 11:15 PM Eastern Time on June 22nd (which is unthinkable for him, especially since I've seen him post far more than three times between those dates), and Dee lost posts during that same time period. Musashius also apparently gained only five posts during that time, which seems unlikely to me as well. Oh, and then Bleys somehow managed to gain something like 22,500 posts during that time, but that's another story. O_o
The post count thingy didn't seem to affect everyone, and I myself only carefully checked the twelve highest posters. It seems very strange, however. It's not just the value in my profile that's off either; the search results decreased by a comparable out. Can anyone explain what's going on? I didn't think the pruning was supposed to have started yet, and I'm feeling very confuzzled. Meep.
Peace
The Man
When the board gets disabled, the whole thing gets disabled for everyone except admins, you can't just disable particular forums, unless you're willing to go around doing each one individually.
Why do you want all threads in Gen Chat to be archived like so anyway? If they're really that good, I guess they should be moved to the Archive - PM someone capable of moving them those threads and we'll see if it's really worth it
OOC: As for post counts, maybe I really did only post a few times since then - I've been playing FFX a heck of a lot so hardly been posting much recently anyway
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