DarkMinds said:
It’s not crazy. And I’m very, very, VERY well aware about what’s the normal around here.
I don’t know what you mean by “what you are familiar with”. I’ve been using BMR and other identical platforms for over 10 years now. I’m “familiar” with the user base.
I’m making this suggestion because it’s a program tweak that is effective without requiring upgrades. Yes, it will require users to be more mindful of their PM history, but it will lighten the load on the server immensely. This issue is actually incredibly common for forum RP websites. The PM system is among the biggest memory-gobbler and can easily wreak havoc on systems simply due to sheer volume. And as Veik said, 20 MILLION messages going through BMR.
What I fail to understand is how the conversion to Xenforo will NOT inconvenience users and their private messages. Because from what I understand, the three options given seem worse and more inconvenient than just implementing an inbox cap and auto delete function even if it is within conversion. And, again, it’s costly to upgrade.
So rather than providing a not-so-polite reply, it’d be more helpful for you to provide a proper explanation of why/how the conversion to Xenforo is more beneficial than my suggestion.
Thanks.
(That -was- the polite reply...a not-polite reply would have been posting [benderlaugh: aahahahah--oh wait, you're serious? let me laugh even harder--AHAHAHA] and a few pithy lines, which I almost did because that happens sometimes on another forum I frequent, but I realized "That would be rude here and in no way constructive, I should not do that." so I didn't.)
But yes, to see if I can explain this in more detail, at least from what I know (I am not actually BMR staff, so I can't claim to be truly authoritative, but this is what I know -from- staff postings in the past)so to begin with...
Well, to clear up something first, I see that you only joined late 2017, so you aren't actually familiar with this site, or any identical forums (by definition, there can never be an "identical" forum), though I grant you're familiar with -similar- forums, but similar is not the same, so, just keep that in mind.
You were not here for the "PM-pocalypse" when PM caps actually -were- imposed. So, you'll just have to take my word for it when I say that yes, it really was
that bad of a time, for this particular forum's particular userbase. As I said, when it happened, the #1 priority of the staff became arranging the situation so the PM-caps could be removed as soon as possible, by acquiring the funds to migrate to better hardware. But now, it's time to do the same for software. 20 million is a lot, but Xenforo can handle that, -and- I'm willing to bet somewhere between a third to half of those 20 million PMs are just duplicates in one person's outbox and another's inbox. Xenforo eliminates the duplication problem.
But, even the PM-issue aside, there's still the fact that the forums' current software is just old and outdated. It's not keeping up with modern improvements to internet architecture and browsers, new updates and patches are not being produced for the current software, at least not in any large scale. This stuff is just -old-. Not to mention, this forum -used- to have some other nice features--features that were disabled because the software couldn't keep up with the demands of the userbase. Even if PM caps were imposed, that's nothing more than a stopgap measure, kicking the can down the road further. This forum is -growing-, and that's something any forum owners -want- to see. But, a growing userbase imposes certain needs.
Let's compare a few things for perspective.
This forum:
-Current active users: 405
-total of 1,987,490 posts in 79,852 threads.
-currently has 29,924 members registered.
And as mentioned, we've already cannibalized a few nice things of this forum to keep up with the load.
Another forum I'm on, running Xenforo:
-Current active users: 3,669
-total of 30,257,369 posts in 446,965 threads.
-currently has 72,148 members registered.
And this forum's not even -close- to capacity, it's got plenty of room to continue to grow. (it had some troubles a while back, but like for BMR's earlier troubles, that was a hardware issue, not a software one)
By moving to Xenforo, BMR will then be working in software that is being actively developed, with modern programming efficiency techniques (important efficiencies that cannot be implemented on old software like this because it would be redesigning the core architecture from the ground up -anyway-), new features and quality-of-life improvements produced that make things easier for the userbase and the moderator/administration staff alike. I can't point to any one single specific thing--the point is, BMR -can't- exist on decaying old software forever, accumulating bugs and incompatibilities as the rest of the internet progresses. Upgrading to the new software is the best decision for the long-term health of the forum.
As I noted on the first page, the transition -is- going to cause an uproar, that's unavoidable. There will be some people with similar opinions as yours, wondering "why did this need to happen, I personally could do without it", but without your respectable civility. On top of all the people who just flat-out never read announcements ever and lose their heads when suddenly everything is different. For the inconvenience, some people are going to be slinging shit at the staff, chicken littles will be running amok. A few people are probably even going to leave. But, this forum will be that more attractive to potential future users, for having integrated modern conveniences and innovations, and for the majority of users--that is everyone not in the soon-to-come vocal angry minority--the benefits are going to outweigh the costs. It's the same in...well, literally any organization that fails to perform software updates and is stuck on older and older architecture until the situation becomes completely untenable, and upgrading at that point freaks everybody out because the upgrade is so extreme in magnitude. But at the same time, people often don't like incremental updates either because "This doesn't seen necessary, why do we have to be offline for a little while for such an unimportant thing?"
It's the struggle that IT staff the world over has to deal with, servicing their host organizations who collectively just don't understand how much work goes into maintaining computer systems. I am extremely appreciative to Vekseid and the BMR staff for being brave enough to take this important step for the good of the website. People are going to throw a lot of undeserved anger at them, and that's gonna suck. But, it will pass in time as everyone settles into the new home. And like I said, the staff has already been considering this decision for a very long time. They know the exact pros and cons, they know what they're getting into, far better than what I know, giving to you secondhand. Trust in them that if they are moving ahead with this despite the reservations some have, there is a whole list of good reasons and they know what they are doing.
Hopefully this has helped clarify a few things?
Your support makes Blue Moon possible (Patreon)
