Philotic Web

I thought that was what this whole discussion was about anyway. If we're just going to half-ass it again, we might as well stay here.

Hey, I see lots of talk about the forum and friends, which is great; I don't want to lose a thing. I just wanted to know if people were actually getting what I've been hoping we can accomplish here, via the nerds. Not just shiny, pretty new forum (though I think that's been a long time in the making). Former glory and all that jazz, too.

honestly the most difficult thing about adding real content to the website is deciding on and creating a theme/design that's appealing.

oh and creating the content.

i remember having a movie news section, and an EG inspired music section

what else was there?

Here. The two homepages are in that post, as well as some shots of the sections; click the thumbnails to get a better idea.

ETA: We had a lot of stuff that I've kind of seen scattered around the internet and the info is covered on Wikipedia but I thought the point of Pweb was to be the best collection of all things EG. Book covers, timeline, Steve's tech models, slang dictionary, art, music, movie news, contests, etc.

I'd like to see what zero has to say, to be honest. He's the most active nerd we have on this board, which to me somewhat translates into investment,

Well, you sure picked a terrible time to bring this up, then. I'm certainly not doing anything requiring any effort on this until next week, as my connectivity is currently less than ideal.

But, just for my views: I wouldn't mind hosting, but others are probably better suited to setting up any cms/forum/other-php-s***. I just come here for Milagre, and have little motivation for any actual EG-related things. I also have an intense dislike for anything PHP ("even Drupal?" especially Drupal), but I don't know of any popular packages written in anything else.

(Holly carp, someone wrote an nntp/phpbb converter! I could read pweb from a news client; that is incredibly cool if it works well.)

Also, I don't mind the current site at all. But I also view with custom CSS, so it looks different to me...

About the only requirement I have, or at least the most important one, is that we have everything backed up in a RAID or whatever this time around in case there's another crash.

Oh gah, just... no, this is the thinking that results in sites losing everything. Whoever does this, if it's not me: RAID is not a backup system. Off-site backups (or host-provided backups, if you trust them) are the only thing worth doing.

Edit: Also, I'd write a scraper/converter for the existing content, but it looks like Wil will do that before I get a chance. Wil, what are you writing that in?

Like I've already said, I gave up pretending to understand the more technical things years ago. I'm just here to make suggestions that others may not think of. It's up to those of you who actually know what you're doing to decide the best way to implement those suggestions.

That said, if you give me the required access and walk me through how to do it, I'll buy an external hard drive and do the regular backups myself.

Yes, we can. We also see them in the admin section when we pull up profiles.

Is it possible to either set my account to a moderator or could I get access to someones account for a little bit?

Edit: Also, I'd write a scraper/converter for the existing content, but it looks like Wil will do that before I get a chance. Wil, what are you writing that in?

I'm using libcurl and C++. I know perl would probably be easier, but I'm so comfortable with C++ I just go to it for pretty much everything.

Wil, you've been set as admin. Have fun. Don't ruin anything.

That was easy. I made a complete backup of the database through the Administration panel under the Backup Database option. Why didn't you tell me you could do that?!

Anyways, once philoticweb.org starts directing toward my domain, I'll make a final backup. So, any new posts made after that will not moved over.

Woah, holy s***, you mean we're really doing this?

I'm really awed, but also a bit stunned.

Is there a timeline for the move so we can know when to quit posting things we want backed up?

Or an FAQ of sorts for the non-nerds who have been following this discussion kind of nodding and smiling?

(My major questions -- will I be able to search for my old posts? What does the new place look like? How will re-registration work?)

Timeline? How about: I won't move everything over until everything looks and feels like everyone wants it to. Such that, when the website does everything that everyone here wishes it to do, and is happy, then we'll start using it.

As far as I am aware, all your old posts, PM's, everything will be saved. You'll be able to search for and find anything you can find here. I'll do some testing to ensure that this is true before we move.

http://www.philoticweb.org -- when it starts working -- will be the new website. There isn't anything there yet, and as of this posting it still transfers us back to this website.

http://forums.philoticweb.org -- when it starts working -- will be the new forums. There is a forum set up, but since the domain isn't working yet you can't see it. I haven't set it up yet either, so if it starts working when I'm not looking... don't do anything.

We can worry about aesthetics in the coming weeks.

There will be no re-registration, you'll be able to log straight in once everything is moved over.

Dude. That's awesome. Nicely done.

When we make the move, we'll likely be able to scrap/archive away much of the foyer posts. I have a fresh Rules and FAQ in a word doc ready to go and we can put birthdays back on the front page, so we don't have to worry about a birthday thread - besides to well-wish, of course!

Oh, and uhm, obviously, I'm going to be unavailable in the VERY near future for... let's say a month? We can wait till January, or we can just not worry about me being "in charge" until then, kay?

Wow. I didn't think it would move this fast. I'm having guilt about abandoning this place. I still think we should move, I just need to adjust to the idea of it. Can we wait until January, as Jan suggested? That would also give us some time to create some content for the non-forum parts of the site. Does anyone still have that image we voted would be a good replacement for screamy-lady?

Wil created it; he should have it but if not, I'm pretty sure I nabbed it, too. ETA: Yeah, I have a copy if he can't find his.

I have no issues with a January start or a more recent one; either way, I think it should be on the first of whichever month we do it. Technically, I got the birthday wrong (July 1st, not June 30th...thanks, Adam ), so it'd be cool to have another first be the new beginning of our oh so hostile takeover.

Second, this may seem random but I was looking through the current FAQs in the Foyer, since Jan mentioned scrapping/archiving there; is anyone going to be upset if I suggest we strip Hegemon of mod status? I would feel wrong about the inactive founders getting stripped and I know it may seem silly to be concerned with John having them since it makes little difference in the day to day of things but if we're getting a new start, well, it bothers me a little that he downright denounced this place and yet still has mod status.

Non-forum stuff:

Somewhere in Milagre is the link to the zip file or whatever it is that Elf collected using Wayback. Are we able to make that content part of a non-forum archive?

Legally, if we wanted to include pop culture references (like comic strips that specifically reference the series), how does that work? Give them credit, link to whatever, and that covers asses?

Random thought while biking home stuff:

I chuckled at the fact that JL will be the Boss-Lady, One-L is doing all the work on making this happen, and Two-Ls bought the domain. Now EL needs to do something.

Maybe I'll learn to be patient one of these days so I don't have to double post; I didn't want to edit because I actually wanted these to be seen.

I have copies of all my work and alot of the other founders work from the main site, also stuff like Ash Can Painters' song, Ender.

Adam, if you poke around here, is that still the case and if so, can we use this? Not do we have the capability but do we have permission or whatever is required?

Here is Elf's wayback zip. I don't know if that is useful at all but can we use that?

It's looking like you might have to re-activate your accounts. For some reason the backup isn't carrying over the users, which is so insanely dumb.

Since I can't exactly save all of your passwords, what will happen is this: At the new forum you'll basically enter your username and your email, and it will send an email to you. You'll click a link inside of the email, and then you'll enter the password you wish to use.

Holy crap, Wil, well done. Well done everybody. This is awesome. I'm pretty astounded that this is actually going to happen.

I chuckled at the fact that JL will be the Boss-Lady, One-L is doing all the work on making this happen, and Two-Ls bought the domain. Now EL needs to do something.

Well, you coulda suggested me for boss-lady. :p

Anyway, would it be possible, Wil, to create a slightly more sophisticated anti-bot thing during registration? They cracked the "Enemy's gate" one recently.

There should be a phpbb mod for that.

I'm not entirely sure where we're going with forum software (or if we've decided or what), but my two bits would be that the phpbb aesthetic is a big part of what I dislike about pweb right now and unless it can be drastically changed from the look that I've seen at every phpbb forum that I've seen, I would really prefer something different.

Woah, holy s***, you mean we're really doing this?

Of course we are. Carpe forum, as I always say.

I put this on the first post as well.

So, we might be moving! Here's what you need to know.

The plan is to have a main website again, with all the information and content that pweb was originally known for, on top of an updated forum.

I still need to know what forum system you all prefer. As such, I have set up a couple of forums that all of you can (hopefully) log in to very simply:

PHPBB3 is the newest version of the forum we already have:
http://forums.philoticweb.org/

SimpleMachineForums is the other option:
http://www.philoticweb.org/smf/

You can login and look around, though don't try snoopin on anything, I (hopefully) deleted all the private content! My account (Wil) is an admin account, and everyone else has normal accounts. All accounts can be logged in to using the password: lol

This is NOT the final backup, this is only for seeing what everyone likes. We will decide on a final date and time to backup all posts for transfer.

Let me know what you guys want.

FAQs:

Q: Is there a timeline for the move so we can know when to quit posting things we want backed up?
A: I won't move everything over until everything looks and feels like everyone wants it to. Such that, when the website does everything that everyone here wishes it to do, and is happy, then we'll start using it.

Q: Will I be able to search for my old posts?
A: All old posts will be saved. The only thing lost, it appears, will be PM's.

Q: What does the new place look like?
A: That all depends on you! We'll make it look exactly like everyone wants it to look like! We can worry about aesthetics in the coming weeks.

http://www.philoticweb.org is the main website.
http://forums.philoticweb.org are the forums.

Q: How will re-registration work?
A: You'll enter your username, and an email will be sent to the email that is on file. You'll click a link in this email, and it will ask you to re-enter your password. This works exactly the same as if you forgot your password and you're resetting it.

Q: Will we be able to set original join dates for those who know?
A: Yep! I'll just do it manually, so if someone could supply a list of original join dates that would be great.

I like the SMF version better. It reminds me of OpenBB.

I like the SMF version better. phpbb looks... garish.

Can I still submit smilies?

I like the SMF version better. It reminds me of OpenBB.

This. I'm assuming we can add a banner and customize it more (changes colors, rearrange the layout a bit if we want, etc.) but overall, I like it much more than a newer copy of the current.

I reeeaaaallly like the SMF better. A lot. The PHPBB3 scares me.

Next pweb awards, I nominate Wil for Special Award for Services to the Site.

I nominate PHPBB3 for the next Pweb Razzies since it's actually looks like the pbthb raspberry sound.

I nominate PHPBB3 for the next Pweb Razzies since it's actually looks like the pbthb raspberry sound.

Seconded!

Another vote for SMF.... it's totally prettier.

Oh man...the little nerd in me is in love with the statistics page.

Can we clear out the game room before the move? That "Last Post" thread is throwing off the stats!

I vote phpbb

I added a poll, to make it easier to keep track of preferences.

Anyway, would it be possible, Wil, to create a slightly more sophisticated anti-bot thing during registration? They cracked the "Enemy's gate" one recently.

reCAPTCHA for phpBB

I'm not entirely sure where we're going with forum software (or if we've decided or what), but my two bits would be that the phpbb aesthetic is a big part of what I dislike about pweb right now and unless it can be drastically changed from the look that I've seen at every phpbb forum that I've seen, I would really prefer something different.

It can.

It's looking like you might have to re-activate your accounts. For some reason the backup isn't carrying over the users, which is so insanely dumb.

The backup or the restore? Did you just try to restore the phpBB2 backup into phpBB3, or have you tried restoring to a phpBB2 installation, and then upgrading?