[The Smurf Collector]

Hi All

In May 2024, the Blue Cavern Forum will be celebrating its 20th birthday. Quite an achievement!

Though some decisions will need to be made, regarding the future of the forum going forward. This has recently come to a head with an error happening when submitting a post. I thought by getting an I.T specialist and the hosting company to help would fix the problem. It did but only for 24 hours.

Do we want to continue with the forum for possibly the next five years?

Do we want to upgrade the forum to the latest version of PhpBB?

Do we want to change hosting companies who are more helpful when assisting with errors?

Do you we consider changing the forum software?

With anything going forward it will involve getting outside assistance from someone who knows. I am not an I.T specialist and very often require getting a specialist to help.

There are also other things such as keeping the domain and the web hosting active.

I would appreciate any suggestions or comments you may have regarding the Blue Cavern Forum.

[Tommo]

Hi Kath,
I think it would be a shame for this forum to cease to exist as it hold so much information on it, probably more than any other website out there. Would it be a big thing, as in things could go wrong and information getting lost, if we go with a new host? Has the software/site hit its limitations to the point that things going wrong will become more and more of a problem? I like its current format as you can easily find things and all the discussions that go with them. As long at it doesn't end up going crazy like Dyers one does sometimes. I expect that all of this will come at a cost, for which I'm very happy to contribute to. Just out of interest, apart from us regular posters, how many people visit the site each month, and although they may not post do any of the old regulars still log in from time to time?
cheers, Tommo

[cheesy4you]

This is the only resource being more or less complete about smurf collecting in the internet.
I'm mainly talking about the smurf collecting section.
I think there some possibilities. Interested members are paying for the next five years staying here for the same provider.
Or we do moving to a new provider or a new format.
Third possibility is to let archive with archive.org and let it rest in peace.
Less work is certainly staying as it is and paying for it.
If we can move it out would make things maybe a little bit easier if we stay on the same forum platform.
Thinking of letting it die is a pain for me.
Theoretically I can do a lot of things what am IT head can also do but I'm not very skilled in this part.
If it is just the support I could try it next time to get it out fixed by myself

[Bundleofkent2]

I love the current format, and am of course happy to pay whatever is needed.

If we can somehow “ guarantee “ the ability to have a reliable third party to fix issues as they arise , that would be ideal for me.

Martin

[The Smurf Collector]

Thank you for your thoughts and suggestions for the forum.

It is pleasing to see others feel that the forum holds a wealth of information and is highly valuable. I thought this was just me. I agree, it would be sad to see to disappear. But I also understand that for the forum to keep going it requires work to maintain it.

At the moment I have no idea how many forum members log into the site each month. It’s also hard to know how many visitors visit the forum. We might be able to get this data when upgrading the software.

I have also started getting quotes for the host migration. A lot of hosting companies do the migration for free but we require to do some work before this happens. I have found a hosting company in Australia that sounds promising.

Should anyone else have any thoughts or suggestions, please feel free to add.

If anyone knows a web developer who would be willing to help, I am happy to provide them with the necessary information we have on the software and the current hosting company.

[cheesy4you]

I took a look at the migration task to a new provider. This seems to be pretty simple even for me. How it is at upgrading I don't know for sure.
If you have a new provider I could do the task for migration and updating.

[cheesy4you]

I took a look at the migration task to a new provider. This seems to be pretty simple even for me. How it is at upgrading I don't know for sure.
If you have a new provider I could do the task for migration and updating.

[Arno]

First, thank you Kath for everything you do to make Blue Cavern forum a great place to be, backstage and on stage.
Sadly, I have absolutly no IT knowledge that could be useful in this domain.
Of course, if we can manage to maintain the forum as it is (maybe a little old fashion but so easy to use and out of commercial business), it would be great !

[Bundleofkent2]

Hi Kath,

what steps do we need to take to move to another host provider?

BW

Martin

[cheesy4you]

Hi Martin, I did a backup from the forum and I will try to restore the backup next week locally on my computer. If this is working ( or patalkely) we can plan to move to a new provider.
Moving the website is only possible if the local backup is working and complete so we can be sure no data ( pics) are lost