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Has the old forum gone ?

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bakerp
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by bakerp »

There's no need to email me, I can read it here.

The data for the old forum is stored in a MSSQL database, and then translated for display in plain text on the web forum. Without the translation the information is not simple to read or extract.

It would be perfectly feasible for someone to access the old forum using the regular web interface (once back online) and "backup" the site to a new section on this forum by copying/pasting relevant information, which I believe is what you have suggested?

Chris_R
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by Chris_R »

Hi, copying and pasting is not a realistic proposition. That would take hours and hours and the results would not really be much good.

Chris_R
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by Chris_R »

gConverter (http://gconverters.com/convert-snitz-forum-to-phpbb/) seems almost a no brainer for the cost.
They claim to convert up to 100,000 posts/replies for $310. 200,000 would cost an extra $20. Up to 100,000 topics/thread costs $15.
They also claim to convert ANY Snitz to phpbb.
As far as I recall, there was not more than 100,000 threads and not more than 200,000 posts/replies. This should not cost more than about $350, or about £250.

For Topics/threads, the following is converted: Subject
Content Text
File Attachments
Author Data
Publish Date
Views
For replies, the same except for views.

Obviously, their claims will have to be put to the test, but even then, for £250, even if it doesn't work it's hardly going to break the bank!

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John-B
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by John-B »

I'm inclined to agree with you, Chris.

Summarising,

https://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtop ... 0&t=460820 has been tried and not worked.

http://snitz2phpbb.sourceforge.net/ may work but needs conversion to phpBB2 first, adding risk, then upgrading to phpBB3 and would mean all passwords would be lost. Members of the old forum would be able to view, but to search would have to change a temporary password which would be inconvenient. It's free so no sensitive information would be handed to strangers.

http://gconverters.com/convert-snitz-forum-to-phpbb/ may work, at a cost, but would mean handing all email addresses to an unknown US company that might sell them to a hacker. Passwords would be lost and temporary passwords would have to be changed. The Board would have to approve the cost and the risk by handing over all email addresses. How could any individual member opt out if he wanted his email address kept private? It might be better to delete all memberships and email addresses first and then ask people to re-register after conversion to phpBB3. The new phpBB3 archive would be active and capable of accepting new members and posts, so it might be possible to merge the archive and new forums, although the archived part would be locked and old usernames would not work.

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sherlock
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by sherlock »

John-B wrote: The Board would have to approve the cost and the risk by handing over all email addresses. How could any individual member opt out if he wanted his email address kept private? It might be better to delete all memberships and email addresses first and then ask people to re-register after conversion to phpBB3.
Perhaps someone could use the Binding Corporate Rules with Gconverter ?

http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protec ... dex_en.htm

Also, someone could ask your Information Commissionner' Office : https://ico.org.uk/
John-B wrote: The new phpBB3 archive would be active and capable of accepting new members and posts, so it might be possible to merge the archive and new forums, although the archived part would be locked and old usernames would not work.
So the old forum threads would become proper archives...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am a froggy, nobody is perfect

1934 BSA three wheeler - 1968 Daimler 250 V8 - 1993 Daimler XJ40 Majestic LWB
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Chris_R
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by Chris_R »

It is reasonable to be cautious about the content when releasing it or providing access to an outside entity and some diligence is required. What is frustrating many is the apparent lack of any decision or progress on this question. The board should have managed this transition properly and not in the half-baked way that they appear to have done by only allowing part of the job to be done.
This new forum has been active since March and even before the cutover I was posting on the original forum that the content from that original forum should be migrated to this new one to preserve it. 4 months on, and still the board have not acted despite continued complaints on this forum about the access to the old content. What do they do in their meetings?
Before the old forum went away, I did some analysis on the content and who was posting. I posted the result in the old forum (which I can't get to now).
There were a lot of users that had never posted. All those could be deleted straight away from the old forum (I presume there is someone who still has administrator access). Then there are many users who have not posted anything in the last few years. Perhaps they can be deleted. If there is a "last login" flag, then a cutoff could be set and if a user had not accessed the old forum, say in the last 2 or 3 years, then their ID is deleted (from the old forum).
That will clear out a large number of users completely. It might only leave a couple of hundred login IDs and then perhaps those could be edited and any email addresses deleted, or changed in someway, perhaps to a fictitious "@" address e.g. @dloc.com (an address that doesn't exist).
The posted content would not be affected as far as I know, if a user is deleted, any posted content still remains. In this way, the sensitive content of the old forum could be sanitised such that a company like gConverters would not have anything to gain if there was a breach of security on stored email addresses.

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sherlock
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by sherlock »

Well done, old chap ! My limited knowledge of the English language impeachs me to write a so precise and rigorous roadmap but I hardly agree.

A good argument for your board : a very large proportion of the new members of the clubs come from the public forums of these clubs. My own experience as a member of the board of several french vintage car clubs shows that 95% is an average proportion now.

And probably, I shall be one of the 95% for the DLOC soon
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am a froggy, nobody is perfect

1934 BSA three wheeler - 1968 Daimler 250 V8 - 1993 Daimler XJ40 Majestic LWB
Image

Chris_R
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by Chris_R »

Well, it's another three weeks further on. No news or update has been published. Has in fact anything more been done? Has anything happened?
On 22nd June, John-B wrote:The Board would have to approve the cost and the risk
Have they? Has even a proposal been submitted to the board or is the old forum simply being ignored in the hope the questions will go away and therefore the old forum can be simply forgotten?

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John-B
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by John-B »

It's frustrating for all of us. I had one successful view and one failure today.

I'll prod Peter B again. He did reply to my email on 22nd June saying "I will chase the hosts to see why it's up and down."

Chris_R
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Re: Has the old forum gone ?

Post by Chris_R »

Thank you John, but that is not really what I was referring to. I recently posted about a conversion service that would cost all of a few hundred pounds to which the response was the board would need to approve that.
As nothing has happened, I guess the board don't care enough to bother. Or they don't want to. As it is, this forum is a shadow of the previous one and I don't visit or contribute as often as I used to visit the previous one. I accept it might take a while for this one to build up but at least if the previous content was here it would be a bigger incentive to old (forum) members to rejoin and for new people to join for the historical content.
If the board can't be bothered to care about a very valuable Daimler, Lanchester and BSA resource, I shall seriously consider if I can be bothered to renew membership when it comes up later this year.

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