Husky Posted May 5, 2011 Author Share Posted May 5, 2011 To get an idea of the overal site traffic, the monthly "hits" as recorded by the server run at around 11 Million. However as show season is now upon us and people are able to get out more with the cars rather than stay indoors and talk about them, its dropped off to about 10 million last month, and looks to be heading for the same or slightly lower this month. Though this is individual items served up to visitors, Google itself records individual page views at just under 1 million per month. I have had no broadband for almost a month so that probably explains the million or so hits down last month +1 should have loads of slack just now Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 I have offered my FREE services to improve the site, that including dedicated hosting on a Phenom X6 Hexa-Core - 6 x 2.8 GHz, 16GB RAM and 2TB Hard Drive but there is no will to take the help. There are a lot better solutions in terms of software (content management system) comparing to the extremely old PHPBB where SQL queries are long and slow, therefore at busy times eating up all the available resources ==> site offline / down. My offer is still open, I love this forum / community and I got hundreds of ideas and resources to improve it if the owners are willing to use them. One of my websites / community forum has over 12.000 members and is never offline as is happening here daily. This will put members off in time and they will move to different websites which is a shame... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chesterfield Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Octet, its not that the team have dismissed your offer of help, indeed all options are being discussed to fix the issues we have. We are aware that the problems can be off putting for members, but so is a complete change of the site layout and feel for users. Sometimes this is even more of a "put off" than the site being down for brief periods every now and then. While other buletin board systems are much more efficient than phpbb, they would have to have an element of customisation to keep the look and feel of this site as close to this as possible. While porting over to ipb or Vbulletin is a relatively easy process - it would instantly look considerably different to the site as it is now, which we know from experience alienates users in their hundreds. There is also the issue of trust, (and I dont mean this to sound disrespectful), but the administrators or keepers of the forum software/database at present have been known to each other here for in some cases many years. So while we really do appreciate members offers of help on any matters from meets to the forum itself, when it comes to the software/site we do have to exercise quite a bit of caution. For example we arent just going to hand over root access to our current server to someone we haven't met. I hope you can understand. There are possibly ways round this of course by providing copies of the database but we need to establish how this would be done because of course conatined within that database are the passwords/PM's/email addresses etc for every user on the board. So while we havent completely dismissed your offer of help, and actually appreciate it very much, we do need to think as a team how we can best resolve these problems and we may at some point be asking for advice or help, just not at this moment. Though if you do have any suggestions that we can implement ourselves, please feel free to PM one of the team as any advice/help is very much appreciated from any member. Can you provide the links to the other communities sites you have built? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Hi, I completely understand what you mean and this is the first positive step (approach) taken, before I've been told: thanks, but no, thanks. In terms of changing the layout you are partially right. What I meant by improving the site is not making it more complex, but give it more modern features and also keep it simple! I have upgraded my community websites many times in the past years, as we've started with PHPBB as well and later migrate to other systems. Never changed the website layout completely in one go, but gradually, when necessary. In my experience I found out that this was the major point of difference comparing to our "competitors", keep the website fancy, with many new / modern features, fast loading, well organised (specially the forum part and the tutorials) and so on. Never liked IPB or Vbulletin, I like open source forums We could migrate to PHPBB 3 or to Kunena(best option by far). Regarding the trust element, I agree with you, I'm fairly new in here, but I gave you all details (or if not yet I can PM) including the other companies I own, address, contact numbers, etc. Maybe we can also meet sometimes in the future, first meeting I will be attending is the Port Solent one on June, hope to get the car ready by then with all the mods I planned, most of the work being carried out this and the next week. ZMANALEX and Tarmac can also testify the amount of money I've spent with them and that I always kept my promises in the business relationship I had with them regarding payments, etc. The passwords in the database are MD5 (encrypted) but I don't need root access to it yet. As a side joke, if I really wanted it I could have just gain root access in here, trust me with few SQL injections / XSS We can start by building onto the new demo site I created here: http://www.350zed.co.uk and get few users from here to try every feature of the website and suggest what else we need to change / adapt. Once we have finished all the features we can then look into migrating the existing content into the new website and server under your domain. Once we've migrated to the new system, we can test it for another month let's say and then we can make it widely available. Details for SQL, FTP, email, control panel will be made available to whoever the team wants to, eg: all admins. Hope that clarifies it! Adrian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Husky Posted May 5, 2011 Author Share Posted May 5, 2011 It's all so different over there Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M13KYF Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Adrian, the reply back to you wasn't as blunt as your making out when you initially contacted me and we do appreciate your offer, For me I dont like your demo site you created and the forum part of it it a step backwards rather then forwards IMO. I did also look at other websites/forums you had made when you initially contacted me and took those into account also. Your pm was shown to the team and the team did look at you work. The team all decided to decline you offer. Its nothing personal just that I think the forum as it stands now looks better than your offering but thats no to say you have software expertise that could be very helpful to us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 i quiet like the look of the kunena setup its not disimiliar to other forums i use. as a side note i use s2ki.com which is a huge international forum for the S2000 and the onyl one really that s2000 owners use. think of it like all the zed forums rolled in to one its huge. well they recently updated their forum and it was a big change, major difference from old to new, but took about an hour to learn it. i think you'll find that people adapt quickly and i can;t see the change driving people away. as long as its logically laid out and easy to navigate it won't be an issue. at the moment the current setup is doing my head in, and more and more i just switch the site off than put up with it. i'd rather learn a new site than put up with laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaag. but thats just my humble opinion, and as many know on here its worth diddly squat i support the forum and what ever decision is made Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Hi Mike, There is one more thing I learnt over the years is that as much as you like or dislike one thing, people are different, they think different. When we build communities, voluntarily or in the business interest we have to listen in a democratic way to what members wish or suggest otherwise we risk of loosing them... That can easily be resolved by a trial period and poll over here. Things can be adjusted / amended to fit what the majority would like. The demo I have created took me only few hours that evening I wrote you, imagine what could be achieved in using all our skills combined, the resources we have, the user experience in here and listening to what the crowd wishes! P.S. Take in consideration that English is not my native language and things I may say in here may be interpreted different to what I meant. I can assure you of my true and honest interest in the good will of this community as a support and giving something back to the help I have received here and will receive in the future Later edit: I can provided the admin user and password to the members of the team here, admins and moderators if you want to play with the setup and configuration. The forum looks as a draw back because is empty but have a look in here for instance: http://www.kunena.org/forum/index Adrian, the reply back to you wasn't as blunt as your making out when you initially contacted me and we do appreciate your offer, For me I dont like your demo site you created and the forum part of it it a step backwards rather then forwards IMO. I did also look at other websites/forums you had made when you initially contacted me and took those into account also. Your pm was shown to the team and the team did look at you work. The team all decided to decline you offer. Its nothing personal just that I think the forum as it stands now looks better than your offering but thats no to say you have software expertise that could be very helpful to us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M13KYF Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Hi Mike, There is one more thing I learnt over the years is that as much as you like or dislike one thing, people are different, they think different. When we build communities, voluntarily or in the business interest we have to listen in a democratic way to what members wish or suggest otherwise we risk of loosing them... true, but its still takes leadership to make the ultimate decision. The team all collectively decide on the way the forum works. If you left it to everybody to run it then it wouldn't get anywhere. I think that generally all members are happy with the way this forum has been run so far Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 There's nothing else I could add but just to say that my offer remains available for a while. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M13KYF Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 There's nothing else I could add but just to say that my offer remains available for a while. and its appreciated and may be taken up Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Husky Posted May 5, 2011 Author Share Posted May 5, 2011 i guess the bottom line is; Can we keep the current format but resolve the lag and down time? If not then we need to change the format. If yes, then keep what we have and fix it... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 i guess the bottom line is; Can we keep the current format but resolve the lag and down time? If not then we need to change the format. If yes, then keep what we have and fix it... + 1 I like the way it is atm. Its definatley one of the easiest forums I've ever used Just annoying when your trying to sort things out & can't get on Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 i guess the bottom line is;Can we keep the current format but resolve the lag and down time? Simple answer is NO, because the systems is very old, outdated and uses extremely complicated long SQL queries that slow down the website at peak times as it happened yesterday in the evening again. Most likely the hosting is a big issue as well... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chesterfield Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 i guess the bottom line is; Can we keep the current format but resolve the lag and down time? If not then we need to change the format. If yes, then keep what we have and fix it... correct. If there is the requirement to move/upgrade, we need to be concious to keep the feel and ease of use the same, and ensure any changes are positive additions instead of possible clutter that would not be used and detract from the elements that are used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chesterfield Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 i guess the bottom line is;Can we keep the current format but resolve the lag and down time? Simple answer is NO, because the systems is very old, outdated and uses extremely complicated long SQL queries that slow down the website at peak times as it happened yesterday in the evening again. Most likely the hosting is a big issue as well... The website however is not dropping out at peak times. Most users online normally occurs in the morning. Indeed the record of 140+ was set at 9.06, and the site runs perfectly fine at that time. There are other factors at play other than the software, which is fairly up to date. The resources according to the server stats are not be stretched to the limits during the times of outages either, as access to the control panel of the server etc is still available, so at the moment it is looking likely that bots (those which are not detected as bots) are causing issues, as unknown bots are not picked up and subject to the same restraints as known ones. This is being investigated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Peak time doesn't necessarily means when most users are online, but when the users and the hundreds of bing, google, yahoo and other spiders are crawling the forum. While you're investigating have a look at the traffic stats, it may well be a case where DoS is happening. About the phpBB not being old, let us remember the following about the engine behind it: In February 2001, phpBB 2.0.x began development entirely from scratch; the developer's ambitions for phpBB had outgrown the original codebase. Doug Kelly joined the team shortly afterwards. After a year of development and extensive testing, phpBB 2.0.0, dubbed the "Super Furry" version, was released on April 4, 2002, three days later than intended. phpBB forums are used frequently with multiplayer online game sites. Work on phpBB 3.0.x began in late 2002. It was originally intended to be released as phpBB 2.2, and the first planned feature list was announced on May 25, 2003. However, as development progressed, the developers realised that phpBB 2.1.x (the development release cycle for 2.2) had eliminated virtually all compatibility with the 2.0.x line, so the version number for release was changed to 3.0.0, in keeping with the Linux kernel versioning scheme, which phpBB followed at the time. In September 2005, Paul Owen resigned as the Development Team Leader and Meik Sievertsen was promoted to the role. ...blah blah blah... The first beta of phpBB3 was released in June 2006, and the first release candidate was released in May 2007. The phpBB3 codebase received an external security audit in September, which was done by SektionEins. Finally, phpBB 3.0.0 "Olympus" (also dubbed the Gold release) was published on December 13, 2007. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
choptop Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 If you use Opera as your browser it loads quite quickly. I know this is not a solution but is all I am able to add to the discussion at this time . Web pages are not my forte. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chesterfield Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Indeed phpbb3 was released in 2007. The latest update however was to 3.0.8 in November 2010, so about 6 months ago. The fact its been built up and supported since 2001 would suggest to me it has a proven track record, and there is a large enough community around the likes of phpbb to obtain information from when things go wrong. Kunena is relatively new, so the support is still fairly much lagging behind the likes of others. It also still uses MySQL, so I cant see considerable improvements being made in that area. While it works perfectly well when integrated into the likes of Joomla, the porting over of data from a phpbb installation to kunena appears to be a bit cumbersome to say the least. If a software move were made, it would probably be to the likes of IPB, and although this costs in terms of the license etc, the continued support available from the company for the installation is also useful. phpbb forum itself has at the time of writing over 1100 members online, including many bots, and is working just fine - so it would suggest the software is more than capable, we just have to look at resources and configuration to find our issues in the first instance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Husky Posted May 5, 2011 Author Share Posted May 5, 2011 Every day is a school day, this is quite interesting as mentioned this forum is really easy to navigate and use compared to others, would be good to keep the same structure even if we do update. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 In the event of upgrading we will be keeping the exact forum structure, posts, user list, etc. It's just faster, more features in terms of interacting and so on. We can vote for the features that we would like to keep and that we would like to eliminate. Every day is a school day, this is quite interesting as mentioned this forum is really easy to navigate and use compared to others, would be good to keep the same structure even if we do update. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chesterfield Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Its my understanding the kunena has less features than phpbb or IPB, at least out of the box anyway. There is a distinct lack of "skins", and is it not just a rework/rename of fireboard? While kunena may be a good fit if wanting to have the forums set within a website and integrate it into joomla, thats not the purpose of this forum setup. As before, if other installations of phpbb3 can handle ten times the volume of traffic we have, then I dont think the software is the problem. Its the configuration of it or the hardware its installed on imho. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 By the way, just booked with Colin for the Wales event, I'll come and meet you guys, building on the trust element as I said See you all there! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 i'm learning a fair bit out of this as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian@TORQEN Posted May 5, 2011 Share Posted May 5, 2011 Its my understanding the kunena has less features than phpbb or IPB, at least out of the box anyway. There is a distinct lack of "skins", and is it not just a rework/rename of fireboard? While kunena may be a good fit if wanting to have the forums set within a website and integrate it into joomla, thats not the purpose of this forum setup. As before, if other installations of phpbb3 can handle ten times the volume of traffic we have, then I dont think the software is the problem. Its the configuration of it or the hardware its installed on imho. Kunena is the perfect alternative if you want to have a complete working system using Joomla as Content Management System - news, articles, calendar (list of all events happening with the feature that people can RSVP and it will show up in their profile), social networking (Facebook like, wall, apps, etc), live chat( not separated, members will be able the write a reply on the forum and private chat with different members that are online), photo album with dedicated albums from each event / meeting in one place where members will be able to comment on each photo or tag members like on Facebook, ads section where members can sell their cars, parts, etc, a members map and so on. If you just want a simple forum in terms of functionality then stick to phpBB 3 and forget about the paid crappy versions like vbulletin or IPB... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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