2015-07-29 Forum issue

[Jim]

A few weeks back two forum changes happened. One was by me and the other was by our web host.

I changed the calendar to have the "Start of the Week" to be "Monday" instead of "Sunday". The reasoning was that the weekend is our focus and having both days together on the calendar display might be nice.

Then, our host moved us to a new server.

Sometime after that, I noticed (and a few others did too - and PM'd me [THANKS!]) that the "Yellow Box" of trail runs was off by one day. A trail run properly scheduled for the 5th (for example) would display in the "Yellow Box" as being on the 6th.

I did some research and testing and came up dry as to a resolution. I started a support ticket with our host and they dug into it. In their work they disabled several add-ins. That set the forum on a one-way trip. The plug-ins would not re-enable to get the forum back to its "normal" self. The option was to restore from a backup. The most recent backup was at 4:40am today (July 29). About 6pm today the restore started. The forum was 100% offline for a bit and then it came up with partial usability.

Between the desire to process the restore and when the process hit, I opened threads that were updated within the last day so we'd have a copy of posts, if needed. Should anyone wish to see their recent post, PM me and I'll look to see if I have it (I simply opened threads in a browser and still have them open).

Sorry for the hassle. The Yellow Box is still an issue...

[FINOCJ]

Thanks Jim - don't know if this is related or not but seems as though the 8/4 Bill Moore/Mill Creek RSVP on the calendar is sort of doubled. Say sort of as its not the same when you go in via the calendar (or yellow box) as opposed to when I linked it into the Planned trail run thread (http://www.frontrange4x4.com/forums/showthread.php?23539-Bill-Moore-Mill-Creek-Tues-8-4). The biggest difference is that one show an extra sign-up and the other does not (in this case sdswingr). No idea how this happened or if its causing any problems but just an FYI.

thanks

[Jim]

I would use / promote the one that is visible on the calendar. Remove the link for the "not-quite-right" RSVP that is not visible (or delete it and then remove the links). Send a note to SDswingr to re RSVP on the "currently listed" run.

In the restore, some functions of the forum were functioning but some were still restoring. If an RSVP came in when the forum was in that transitional state, weird things could have taken place.

Fortunately, we're fairly small and we can remember the threads that should be in place and we can fix'm.

[FINOCJ]

Unfortunately I cannot delete either of the runs. Says I do not have proper permissions. I'd say delete them both and I'll start clean and link it into the planned trail runs thread.

[Jim]

Upon further review... I believe it best to leave things as-is.

I reviewed the URL's and see three different URL's in use:
www.FrontRange4x4.com/forums/calendar.php?do=getinfo&day=2015-8-5&e=759&c=1 (http://www.frontrange4x4.com/forums/calendar.php?do=getinfo&day=2015-8-5&e=759&c=1)

The above URL, to the right of "do=getinfo" has three additional components - &day=, &e=, and &c=

&day= looks to be a month-day-year listing of the day. It does not look like this item is needed for the system to show/display the event. Two variants were found - the calendar shows the correct day where the yellow box link shows the one-day-off day.

&e= which I take as "event" and this entry is for event 759. In my belief this is the primary identifier for the run / event.

&c= which I take as which calendar to use. We have only one calendar. Some URL's don't list the calendar entry and should default to the only calendar we have, cal 1.

The "good" and "bad" URL's both reference event 759. Since they both reference 759 I believe it the "bad" RSVP/calendar listing were to be deleted, the good calendar listing would also be deleted. It's not terrible to delete and re-create and ask people to re-RSVP but I'm thinking to leave things as-is. The calendar items there were alive when the forum was restored will roll off in a week or so without having people re-RSVP.

Let me know your thoughts. I can delete if you wish.

[FINOCJ]

Its fine...will check both and anyone who signs up on either (or 3?) Will be included.

[alexb]

Thanks Jim for taking care of this. Your admin help is definitely appreciated so that the site can keep on kicking.

[Jim]

You're most welcome.

Chris has put together a nice forum to use. There are some issues behind the scenes that look to be problems. For now, it's running and I'm crossing fingers it'll keep rolling w/o issue.

I anticipate talking with our host, a vBulletin specific host, and with Chris. I could see experimentation with a "clean" forum setup in a test environment to get what we want and are used to (RSVP system [HIGH requirement], Yellow Box [would be nice to have], donations system [would be nice to have]). It would be nice to have consistent capability for folks to upload / post photos from mobile devices (the rotation issue may remain).

Anyone else have suggestions / desires for the forum to provide?