46 replies to this topic

[Joshua]

• swingout.net homepage updated. It looks like the BBS now.
• Email subscription CGI updated. Tighter code, and it, too, looks the same.
• Moderators added. Barb & Karissa can bust heads now.
• old swingout.net calendar deactivated. swingout.net/cal/ reddirects to the BBS calendar.

[Joshua]

• swingout.net WAP functionality dropped. We can restore it after the BBS upgrade if people want to view the calendar with their cellphones. This may become a poll at some date.
• BBS software purchased by portlandlindy.org. We can now upgrade from version 1.2 to 2.04.

[Joshua]

The calendar is part of the usual phpbs stuff, right? Data for all this is stored in mysql somewhere I imagine?

IPB, not phpBB, but yes:

CODE

CREATE TABLE ibf_calendar_events (
 eventid mediumint(8) NOT NULL auto_increment,
 userid mediumint(8) NOT NULL default '0',
 year int(4) NOT NULL default '2002',
 month int(2) NOT NULL default '1',
 mday int(2) NOT NULL default '1',
 title varchar(254) NOT NULL default 'no title',
 event_text text NOT NULL,
 read_perms varchar(254) NOT NULL default '*',
 unix_stamp int(10) NOT NULL default '0',
 priv_event tinyint(1) NOT NULL default '0',
 show_emoticons tinyint(1) NOT NULL default '1',
 rating smallint(2) NOT NULL default '1',
 event_ranged tinyint(1) NOT NULL default '0',
 event_repeat tinyint(1) NOT NULL default '0',
 repeat_unit char(2) NOT NULL default '',
 end_day int(2) default NULL,
 end_month int(2) default NULL,
 end_year int(4) default NULL,
 end_unix_stamp int(10) default NULL,
 event_bgcolor varchar(32) NOT NULL default '',
 event_color varchar(32) NOT NULL default '',
 PRIMARY KEY  (eventid),
 KEY unix_stamp (unix_stamp)

[Joshua]

• Old BBS and database backed up, moved to swingout.net, restored; working.
• Upgraded BBS to IPB 2.03. Ran into a glitch with the license verification so I um worked around the glitch.
• Went through all adminstrative settings; everything looks to be in order.
• Changed forums settings; they used to display only the last 30 days of threads. They don't expire now.
• Rebuilt swingout.net logo. Background is a pixel off; need to correct that.
• swingout.voils.net has been deactivated. Update your bookmarks!

[thor]

wow... that new calender thing is fantastic... good work!  

[Joshua]

Want to play along at home? Head over to http://invisionize.com/ and pick out the skins and mods you'd like to see plugged in to the board. There's a lot of stuff there, some good, some lame. All suggestions will be happily considered.

[Joshua]

Added new emoticons. Examples:



You can see all the funs ones when you post by clicking the "Show All" link beneath the clickable smilies.

[bensongrey]

Want to play along at home? Head over to http://invisionize.com/ and pick out the skins and mods you'd like to see plugged in to the board. There's a lot of stuff there, some good, some lame. All suggestions will be happily considered.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I like these two skins (none blew me away, but hey, they're skins):
- fuzzy blue
- sunshine and lollipops (I sort of disagree with myself on this one)
Neither skin seemed to have a demo, so I'm just going off the screenshots. Both skins may look crappier in action.

As far as the mods go, a links system could be useful, but I don't have a clue how well the one on that website works.

[Joshua]

The logo now has two people dancing instead of a woman at the top of an aerial. Anyone else want to take a stab at it? Let me know and I'll send you the Photoshop PSD file.

[Joshua]

I like these two skins (none blew me away, but hey, they're skins):
- fuzzy blue
- sunshine and lollipops (I sort of disagree with myself on this one)
Neither skin seemed to have a demo, so I'm just going off the screenshots. Both skins may look crappier in action.

Yeah, even the "larger picture" link doesn't make it quite larger enough. Hrm. I have yet to see a skin that looks terribly vintage. Clean is nice but vintage would be better.  

As far as the mods go, a links system could be useful, but I don't have a clue how well the one on that website works.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I didn't register at the board with the demo. Going by their description, it sounds interesting. I'll have to head back and take a closer look. My gut reaction is that revamping the way links work on the board could be a pretty big undertaking for not much payoff. To date, we haven't seen very many links to remote sites. This could certainly change as the board matures.

---

There are a few mods that I am strongly considering:

• Unreal Portal [Demo]
  I especially like the Announcements blocks at the top, the Minicalendar on the side, and the ability to add blocks to any RSS feed in the world. The demo has too many blocks; they need to be trimmed down and simplified.
• Manage Uploads directory
  Simplifies the admin's job of fixing avatars and personal photos.
  
• View Calendar Permissions v1.0
  Lets us set permissions on which user groups can view the calendar page of the forums.
  
• Calendar Comments v1.0
  Allows a group of users to add (but not change?) comments to calendar events.

[kbuxton]

The logo now has two people dancing instead of a woman at the top of an aerial. Anyone else want to take a stab at it? Let me know and I'll send you the Photoshop PSD file.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I like it.

[kbuxton]

There are a few mods that I am strongly considering:

• Unreal Portal [Demo]
  I especially like the Announcements blocks at the top, the Minicalendar on the side, and the ability to add blocks to any RSS feed in the world. The demo has too many blocks; they need to be trimmed down and simplified.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

blocks to RSS feeds?  Does that mean it has RSS feeds already? If so, what's the URL?

[Joshua]

There are a few mods that I am strongly considering:

• Unreal Portal [Demo]
  I especially like the Announcements blocks at the top, the Minicalendar on the side, and the ability to add blocks to any RSS feed in the world. The demo has too many blocks; they need to be trimmed down and simplified.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

blocks to RSS feeds?  Does that mean it has RSS feeds already? If so, what's the URL?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Not sure if I understand. The board does not provide RSS feeds [yet]. See below. Unreal Portal, now that I look at it, doesn't either. I linked the wrong Portal. We want the one called "Portal", not "Unreal Portal". Details:
Portal, the right one [German Demo]

(Fear not, the demo may be German, but the mod is localized in English, too.)

Other mods of interest:

• Add WAP support . Is there anyone that wants to read this on their cellphone?
• Provide RSS feeds.

We really need some good documentation. A Quickstart guide, something we could email to new members, a "Swingout.net for Dummies", and a couple pages explaining neat things like RSS. Anybody want to help write docs? This would be excellent.

[kbuxton]

Adding an RSS feed would be great.  I just couldn't quite figure out what the wording meant when it talked about adding blocks to them.

[Joshua]

Anybody can now add calendar events!

Well, that's not exactly true. Anybody can add private calendar events, that only you can see. Try it, it's fun! Add your swing classes, parties; whatever. Nobody but you will see it; it's private.

If you run a dance, are in a band, or would like to post events to the calendar, talk to me. I can add you to the new Calendar group. That will give you access to add public events on the calendar.

Calendar moderation added to the Help webpages.

[Joshua]

• Have a development server now, my laptop. The BBS is running perfectly on it. Now I can really start breaking stuff.
• When looking at the poster of a thread, it says "Lindy: lead" or "Lindy: follow" under their picture.
  I don't like the term "Lindy"; is there a better one? Oh, only half the users have this field completed. I'll probably run through the db and update the tag accordingly.
• Turned on search indexing. Your searches should run faster.

[kbuxton]

• When looking at the poster of a thread, it says "Lindy: lead" or "Lindy: follow" under their picture.
  I don't like the term "Lindy"; is there a better one? Oh, only half the users have this field completed. I'll probably run through the db and update the tag accordingly.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's not exactly always accurate either.

[Joshua]

• Got 90% of the lead and follow tags updated.

[Joshua]

• RSS web feed added. This is very cool stuff. It gives other websites a view into ours. If they want, they can display our latest articles. Each time one of you posts creates a new topic, the RSS feed will be updated with it.
  
  You can use the RSS feed too, but first you'll need to get an RSS browser. For those unfamiliar with this kind of program, it's basically like a super-streamlined web browser designed to tell you ASAP when your favorite websites make any sort of update. The moment they update, your RSS browser displays a summary of the new stuff. If you're interested, you can click it and your regular web browser will take you to the real webpage. I'm playing fast an loose with the "ASAP" stuff, but it's close enough to the truth to convey the point.

Can anyone explain this better than me?

[kbuxton]

• RSS web feed added. This is very cool stuff. It gives other websites a view into ours. If they want, they can display our latest articles. Each time one of you posts creates a new topic, the RSS feed will be updated with it.
  
  You can use the RSS feed too, but first you'll need to get an RSS browser. For those unfamiliar with this kind of program, it's basically like a super-streamlined web browser designed to tell you ASAP when your favorite websites make any sort of update. The moment they update, your RSS browser displays a summary of the new stuff. If you're interested, you can click it and your regular web browser will take you to the real webpage. I'm playing fast an loose with the "ASAP" stuff, but it's close enough to the truth to convey the point.

Can anyone explain this better than me?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This makes me happy.  My suggestion for RSS if you're not familiar with it is to go play with bloglines.com.

[Joshua]

• Improved new user registration notification.

Admins get an email when new people sign up. It used to show just the user's name. Now we (by which I mean "I") get the email address, member id, a link directly to the member's profile, and a few other details besides.

[Joshua]

• swingout.net's hard drive filled up today. We went over the alloted quota.

That means that the hosting server refused to let us create new files. This may be why Angie and Amberlynn couldn't upload a new avatar pictures.

The old swingout.net photos, which were taking up half of the space allotment, were moved to Jeff's backup server, to ihateie.com. The links don't all work now, but then they didn't all work last month, either, so we're about par for the course. We need to get a better photo solution set up.

[Joshua]

1. Got rid of the "Forum Led By: <u><i>Moderators</i></u>" clutter that appeared beneath every forum.
2. Installed a skin from http://invisionskins.com/ called Hendrix. Looked at it. Looked at it real funny-like. Deleted.
3. RSS feed improvements
     
   • all posts are displayed. It used to just show the first post of a new topic.
       
   • Reply titles start with "Re: "
       
   • Newlines, bold, italics, images, and links now make it through the filter. They should be perfectly safe, having already gone through a validation filter when originally posted.
       
   • Posts now start with "<Author> writes: "
   • Order by post date, and grab the last 40 instead of ordering by topic_id and grabbing the last 10.
   • Don't replace every "A" with "euro". Seely Franch code.

Edited by Joshua, 26 April 2005 - 07:36 PM.

[swingbozo]

There's also about 10 versions of the old site in multiple locations last time I rooted around in there. I'm sure you are taking the entire swingout directory tree to the cleaners...

[Joshua]

There's also about 10 versions of the old site in multiple locations last time I rooted around in there. I'm sure you are taking the entire swingout directory tree to the cleaners...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hahahaha actually I'm trying really hard not to delete or archive anything I'm not familiar with. A lot of webpages and stuff has accumulated there over the past, what? Seven years? Longer?

I'm just not sure what's been orphaned and what hasn't. Because the web server log file doesn't go back more than a day, I can't just build up a list of webpages that people actually use. :shrug:

[ErikLane]

So how do you get the RSS to work? I don't see a button to click anywhere like I've seen on other sites, and I know that my browser works with them. (Firefox 1.0.1) Not sure that I'd use it if it does work, since I'm not always at the computer, but it's kind of a neato thing to play with...

[Joshua]

So how do you get the RSS to work? I don't see a button to click anywhere like I've seen on other sites, and I know that my browser works with them. (Firefox 1.0.1)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

RSS Feed: http://swingout.net/backend.php

I'm not sure how I add global templates yet else you'd see one with a button at the bottom. If I did, there'd already be a button at the bottom. :-)

I need to completely rewrite the RSS feeder. It needs to be able to handle user input. The program can be improved in several ways. Right now it will give you every single post in every single forum. It would be better if the user could subscribe to a feed for all forums (same as what we have now) or any individual forum (e.g. General Discussion), any topic (aka thread), or the calendar. That would let us publish calendar feeds and set up special threads to export important announcements.

For example, there's a topic for Tim's TWS. We could turn that into a feed all it's own by pointing our hypothetical RSS program at topic=2. We could create special threads for all sorts of exportable news, stuff that people outside of Portland might be interested in, too, for example, a Big Events thread, wherein we could add items like the Lindy Exchange, Joel & Allison Plys, Willie and Lila; you get the idea.

I started on the program two days ago. I'm still working on figuring out the difference between stock PHP and the IPB way to write code. I have eight years of day-in-day-out Perl experience. I have two days of PHP experience. It's slow going.

[Joshua]

• Installed the blue-colored Borderline skin from InvisionSkins. You can switch to it using the skin selector in the bottom-left corner.
• Icons. Read on...

I'm not an artist any more than the next guy, provided the next guy also isn't an artist. We haven't had any artists step up to help give swingout.net either a Swing, 1930's, Portland, Rain, or Art Deco theme. No worries, we can tackle that later. My goal isn't to make the board look amazingly perfect in one day, that's just impossible. Instead, it's an ongoing process; improving the site little-by-little every day.

Here's one more step down the improvement path: I found David Lanham's iSystem and iSystem Extras icons at http://iconfactory.com/ . These icons are free for personal use but not commercial use. Well, we aren't commercial, but then - although we are small and cozy - we also aren't personal. I asked David for permission and after a few days he gave it to us, provided we link back to Iconfactory and give them credit where credit is so obviously due.

The icons in question are not swingy. They are, however, clean, cool, and much better than what we have. Here are a few examples:

[swingbozo]

Art Deco! Cool!

[ErikLane]

RSS Feed: http://swingout.net/backend.php

I'm not sure how I add global templates yet else you'd see one with a button at the bottom. If I did, there'd already be a button at the bottom. :-)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That's the same link as earlier in the thread, right? I've tried clicking on it using I believe 3 or 4 different browsers, and they all return the same thing.

"
        This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below."

And then a bunch of code that looks like it's what the RSS feed should be, not that I really know what it should look like, but it's got lots of references to swingout.net and the text of posts with a bunch of html code in between. If it's helpful I can send you the whole thing.