Technical Suggestions

[Zero]

It has come to my attention that there are certain things on this site that I have qualms with, and although I have brought them up with `i z a and have been offering my help with the techmo side of this site for a while, I minus well throw this out into the public and get opinions.

Please note these opinions come from a Computer Science major, and we tend to be very paranoid.

1. Attachments: While a possibly useful, interesting addition to these forums, I would like to see these features disabled. There's no need for files to be hosted on this board, anything that requires attachments can be offloaded to MegaUpload or an Imagebucket, thus reducing stress on the server and reducing cost. The disabling of this system would also prevent massive uploads especially when dealing with spam, and overall is just an exploitative feature.

2. Same goes for the youtube script, that and my textbased brower hates it. Just provide a happy little link and offload resources somewhere else.

3. Reduce signiture size and/or allow for a 300px limit WITHOUT scrolling feature. Doubt anyone scrolls anyway, so just put the max cap on it and be done with the creating of another annoying frame/table. Also, this is a textbased roleplaying site. I understand that removing signatures altogether would be akin to killing artistic expression but at least reducing the obnoxiousness of them would be nice.

4. While I understand that since we're using a domain that's part of the lovely and kind administrator, as well as hosting from such and I don't wish to get them in trouble, perhaps it would behoove us to either a) ask for a main page where we specifically require that people over 18 come to this site or turn away or b) Give ourselves a domain name and do the same thing. Also, place ourselves on the google non-indexing list for mature material.

This list will be updated as new peeves get to me.

 

[Trygon]

I fail to see the merit in crippling our forums by removing features. Thank you, but I think we're fine as is.

 

[Vekseid]

1. Attachments: While a possibly useful, interesting addition to these forums, I would like to see these features disabled. There's no need for files to be hosted on this board, anything that requires attachments can be offloaded to MegaUpload or an Imagebucket, thus reducing stress on the server and reducing cost. The disabling of this system would also prevent massive uploads especially when dealing with spam, and overall is just an exploitative feature.

I might do what I did on E and offload it to an integrated wiki. That way it's not going through phpbb3's retarded download script.

2. Same goes for the youtube script, that and my textbased brower hates it. Just provide a happy little link and offload resources somewhere else.

The only difference here is I'm using the full embed tag recommended by Youtube, I'd be willing to go back to a smaller one but people like the feature yo

This place wasn't exactly designed for lynx.

3. Reduce signiture size and/or allow for a 300px limit WITHOUT scrolling feature. Doubt anyone scrolls anyway, so just put the max cap on it and be done with the creating of another annoying frame/table. Also, this is a textbased roleplaying site. I understand that removing signatures altogether would be akin to killing artistic expression but at least reducing the obnoxiousness of them would be nice.

Are you saying I should just clip it? overflow: none;?

4. While I understand that since we're using a domain that's part of the lovely and kind administrator, as well as hosting from such and I don't wish to get them in trouble, perhaps it would behoove us to either a) ask for a main page where we specifically require that people over 18 come to this site or turn away or b) Give ourselves a domain name and do the same thing. Also, place ourselves on the google non-indexing list for mature material.

Sign in as a guest and note the notice at the top.

 

[Zero]

1. Attachments: While a possibly useful, interesting addition to these forums, I would like to see these features disabled. There's no need for files to be hosted on this board, anything that requires attachments can be offloaded to MegaUpload or an Imagebucket, thus reducing stress on the server and reducing cost. The disabling of this system would also prevent massive uploads especially when dealing with spam, and overall is just an exploitative feature.

I might do what I did on E and offload it to an integrated wiki. That way it's not going through phpbb3's retarded download script.

A good compromise... but still, what sort of files do people need to upload onto an RP board? That is the question I'm attempting to ask here. I don't actually find that the feature does anything other than waste space and money, and also could potentially give you a security/spam risk.

2. Same goes for the youtube script, that and my textbased brower hates it. Just provide a happy little link and offload resources somewhere else.

The only difference here is I'm using the full embed tag recommended by Youtube, I'd be willing to go back to a smaller one but people like the feature yo

This place wasn't exactly designed for lynx.

True, nor was it designed for links2 ;D! Textbased, Tabbed browsing ftw. Anyway, I'm not terribly concerned with the youtube tag, and using the full embed tag rather than the smaller one is not the issue, as just the fact you're putting youtube videos on this site. But your site, so I'm backing off on this point.

3. Reduce signiture size and/or allow for a 300px limit WITHOUT scrolling feature. Doubt anyone scrolls anyway, so just put the max cap on it and be done with the creating of another annoying frame/table. Also, this is a textbased roleplaying site. I understand that removing signatures altogether would be akin to killing artistic expression but at least reducing the obnoxiousness of them would be nice.

Are you saying I should just clip it? overflow: none;?

Rather than clipping it, you can just set the size when creating the siggy and tell them that it's too big, an if statement and then return them to the current board with an error. Or, I'm still only familiar with phbb2, the overflow clip would be fine.

4. While I understand that since we're using a domain that's part of the lovely and kind administrator, as well as hosting from such and I don't wish to get them in trouble, perhaps it would behoove us to either a) ask for a main page where we specifically require that people over 18 come to this site or turn away or b) Give ourselves a domain name and do the same thing. Also, place ourselves on the google non-indexing list for mature material.

Sign in as a guest and note the notice at the top.

A little notice I don't think is sufficient. I think a full page blocking out entry to the site would be the way to go, and since the little link at the top doesn't actually prevent people from reading the boards... OR, if you made everything other than the welcome, intro to read/write only for MEMBERS, that would be fine with me too ^^.

Thanks for the point by point reply by the way, very helpful.

 

[Vekseid]

A good compromise... but still, what sort of files do people need to upload onto an RP board? That is the question I'm attempting to ask here. I don't actually find that the feature does anything other than waste space and money, and also could potentially give you a security/spam risk.

Pictures, mostly. Maps, character photos, etc. There was also a fairly large subset of people who liked to dig for hentai on previous boards. Right now I'm not even bothering to delete old log files, FFS

I'm not particularly worried security wise (there is a filter on what can get uploaded). Though certainly, one would expect to trust MediaWiki a bit more on those grounds.

True, nor was it designed for links2 ;D! Textbased, Tabbed browsing ftw. Anyway, I'm not terribly concerned with the youtube tag, and using the full embed tag rather than the smaller one is not the issue, as just the fact you're putting youtube videos on this site. But your site, so I'm backing off on this point.

At some point you're going to eventually except that there is a social community here too. When, Idunno

Rather than clipping it, you can just set the size when creating the siggy and tell them that it's too big, an if statement and then return them to the current board with an error. Or, I'm still only familiar with phbb2, the overflow clip would be fine.

It doesn't check when someone makes a sig like
hello
world
I
like
to
put
a
million
lines
in
my
signature
because
I
are
lame
like
that

Thus the overflow div.

A little notice I don't think is sufficient. I think a full page blocking out entry to the site would be the way to go, and since the little link at the top doesn't actually prevent people from reading the boards... OR, if you made everything other than the welcome, intro to read/write only for MEMBERS, that would be fine with me too ^^.

I can also add a much bigger notice on an external referrer, but that suffices, though I could make it lots more obnoxious of course.

 

[Zero]

Please, Obnoxious would be best. Safer > Sorry. ^^, that's what I prescribe to at least