Future of TC (and Me)

camel · **Posted:** Thu May 25, 2023 3:40 pm

bluechucky wrote:

I've just added a few more people to that list.

There is one person who I haven't added as I'm not sure who it is. Payment was made on the 20/4 so if that was you, please let me know here or via PM.

Thanks everyone for your contributions. We have enough to keep us going for a year now.

That's great, thanks everyone. :beer:

CFC8795 · **Posted:** Thu May 25, 2023 4:37 pm

Great news!
Another year with my 'invisible friends' :smoking:

Go Blues!

snakehips · **Joined:** Mon Feb 28, 2005 9:18 pm **Posts:** 565

bluechucky wrote:

There is one person who I haven't added as I'm not sure who it is. Payment was made on the 20/4 so if that was you, please let me know here or via PM.

Might've been me? Transferred $50 on 19/4 :thumbsup:

bluechucky · **Joined:** Sat Feb 26, 2005 6:29 am **Posts:** 13684

Hi guys,

Started looking at this again. Reached out to a couple of Webhosts here in Australia to see what we could do.

The upshot is that because we are running very old software (php, phpbb and cpanel) we have to stay with a Virtual Private Server which even here in Australia is a minimum of $100 a month.

So essentially we are stuck in this holding pattern unless we look at upgrading.

I'll have another look at the steps required to upgrade but I recall its not an easy task from where we currently are.

bluechucky · **Joined:** Sat Feb 26, 2005 6:29 am **Posts:** 13684

Oh and one Web host has indicated an upgraded site would then be able to utilize their $20 a month option.

Wojee · **Joined:** Mon Feb 28, 2005 8:17 am **Posts:** 35135

bluechucky wrote:

I'll have another look at the steps required to upgrade but I recall its not an easy task from where we currently are.

Yeah, I think we have to do incremental updates due to being so far behind, plus there's the mods that may or may not work.....

bluebo baggers · **Posted:** Tue Mar 12, 2024 11:57 am

bluechucky wrote:

Hi guys,

Started looking at this again. Reached out to a couple of Webhosts here in Australia to see what we could do.

The upshot is that because we are running very old software (php, phpbb and cpanel) we have to stay with a Virtual Private Server which even here in Australia is a minimum of $100 a month.

So essentially we are stuck in this holding pattern unless we look at upgrading.

I'll have another look at the steps required to upgrade but I recall its not an easy task from where we currently are.

I know absolutely nothing about this stuff but is a "start again with the new software" even an option? I assume if that was the case all the old threads etc would be gone.

CK95 · **Posted:** Tue Mar 12, 2024 3:13 pm

bluebo baggers wrote:

I know absolutely nothing about this stuff but is a "start again with the new software" even an option? I assume if that was the case all the old threads etc would be gone.

If it deletes the ones from after the Ess game last year when I was trading the entire list, I'm good with that :lol:

jezzarules · **Joined:** Mon Feb 28, 2005 1:09 pm **Posts:** 5814

Surely if we just dropped Talking Stuff it would simplify things enough?

CFC8795 · **Posted:** Tue Mar 12, 2024 4:05 pm

Would taking Lochie O'Brien off the Banner help?

Sydney Blue · **Posted:** Tue Mar 12, 2024 5:56 pm

Let us know if you need us to chip in until you sort something out.

Sent from my SM-F926B using Tapatalk

Sidefx · **Joined:** Thu Sep 21, 2017 1:55 pm **Posts:** 6322

Sydney Blue wrote:

Let us know if you need us to chip in until you sort something out.

Sent from my SM-F926B using Tapatalk

x 2

kezza · **Joined:** Thu May 11, 2006 6:11 pm **Posts:** 14895

CFC8795 wrote:

Would taking Lochie O'Brien off the Banner help?

sinbagger · **Posted:** Wed Mar 13, 2024 8:55 am

bluechucky wrote:

Oh and one Web host has indicated an upgraded site would then be able to utilize their $20 a month option.

So we’re paying $100 a month but with an investment to upgrade/migrate we can reduce that to $20 per month? That’s $960 saving per year.

I wouldn’t mind paying someone a couple of thousand dollars to do the upgrade/migration, we’d break even in two years. I would donate $200 to that.

Actually I’ll help out with the work myself, it’s been a while since I did much hands on coding but I’m sure I can be useful.

Let’s see what the estimate of the upgrade/migration effort comes to.

bluechucky · **Joined:** Sat Feb 26, 2005 6:29 am **Posts:** 13684

The big problem is that upgrading from 3.0 to 3.2 will kill all our modifications. Most don't matter but the MVP is a pretty complex and critical one. I'll speak with Headplant to see what we can do as it's his code.

bender · **Posted:** Wed Mar 13, 2024 10:54 pm

Sidefx wrote:

Sydney Blue wrote:

Let us know if you need us to chip in until you sort something out.

Sent from my SM-F926B using Tapatalk

x 2

x 3

bluechucky · **Joined:** Sat Feb 26, 2005 6:29 am **Posts:** 13684

thanks guys, right now we are ok for the next 6 months. I'll reach out at the appropriate time.

Headplant · **Posted:** Thu Mar 14, 2024 12:50 pm

Yeah I'm not sure what mods are on board in addition to the google and header mods for the banners .... those 2 are relatively easy to do, just some copy paste after upgrades are done.

To upgrade to v3.3.11, you first upgrade the mySQL (or MariadB) dBase to the required version for v3.3. Also need the required version of php. Then need to run the phpBB3 database upgrade procedure which will change what needs to be changed in the TC dBase. Then almost all the files have to be removed except mainly configuration stuff, and the theme set to the original subsilver.. Then you run the upgrade to get 3.3.11 files get installed. After that, you have to redo the theme to get the colour scheme back, and add any extra mods which are in .... I think the new version uses extensions.

The new software seems quite similar to the old in some respects .... it appears to me that upgrading the MVP software is more a tedious line by line comparison and editing exercise, based on a simple comparison of the main posting and viewing files between the current version and the new version. I will have to do that, because I'm the only person who understands the design, structure and mechanisms used to hook the MVP into the phpBB3 code. there are bound to be a few issues I may have to work around.

And I really should do the main upgrade, because I've done many in the past for TBV and the last few for TC .

Unfortunately the mechanism for making database calls, and some of the data components in the software scripts have been modified to prevent direct compatibility, so each MVP source file needs to be edited to conform to the new programmatic style. It's not super complex, more just rather tedious and time consuming.

And of course, the appropriate local test and debug environment to make sure everything works properly before uploading to the live system. Don't want to screw up the database. I don't have everything totally setup on my laptop at the moment.

i also need to keep the wife happy!! Ski season is still in play, although maybe winding down a bit, but we have various reno finishing bits left as well.

sinbagger · **Posted:** Thu Mar 14, 2024 1:19 pm

Maybe something to schedule for the next off season after the Premiership win then?

Headplant · **Posted:** Thu Mar 14, 2024 4:35 pm

The code changes can all be developed and tested offline on the test/model website .... it can be done using a snapshot of the current database.

I'm unsure at the moment how long the MVP changes will take, but it's feasible that I may be able to get it done before 6 months. Depends if I run into any significant compatibility issues, which I don't really expect. Testing chews up a fair bit of time, because any logic changes in the phpBB3 viewing and posting code need to be reflected in the MVP code, I'm not sure yest if there are any significant program flow changes in the new phpBB3.3.11 . If the MVP changes are not correct, database consistency errors can occur.

The MVP code is mainly contained in 4 php files and a handful of display template files. I tried to keep it as separate as possible, while still maintaining the ability to set up the MVP forum and topics using the same logic flow used in the main forum software.

The trickiest bit is working out whether the dBase upgrade will work correctly with the MVP topics pointing to a set of new polll tables which do not exist in the standard phpBB3 database. Depends whether the Base update routines do any consistency checking.

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