Site upgrade

[gstark]

Well, a little bit of good gnus on this front: I've been able to locate further support for the portal that we use here, and I've been able to upgrade a copy of the database to the latest version of phpbb3 and then push in the current version of the portal.

It's quite an involved process, and I have yet to progress to the point of removing the unwanted front page stuff and then adding back in what I want, but I do think I have a path forward, and a baseline codebase in place.

Probably a week or two away, depending upon how other stuff transpires, but I just thought I'd let all y'all know.

And yes, happy muvvers' day to all you muvvers out dere.

[Mr Darcy]

And yes, happy muvvers' day to all you muvvers out dere.

Why thank you Gary. I am called a muvver quite often (usually followed by another word I don't quite catch)

FYI. Subscriptions also seem to be broken. I haven't had a notification for several days.

[gstark]

FYI. Subscriptions also seem to be broken. I haven't had a notification for several days.

Yep; thanks.

I mentioned (in the other thread) that I thought that email advices were broken, and I've basically been able to confirm this since making that post, and your confirmation helps.

The new server configuration uses a different MTA, and I'm trying to work out how to get phpbb to talk to it. Sending email directly from the MTA works, so that part of the system is operational; it's just the interface between the board and the MTA that's misbehaving, it seems.

[TonyT]

Thanks for the update Gary Sound like a lot of extra work for you. We all seem to have some sort of work around at the monent so thats good.

[the foto fanatic]

Thanks Gary

[Remorhaz]

Thanks Gary

+1

[sirhc55]

[Matt. K]

[phillipb]

As a noob to all this stuff, what benefit will you or the site get from this upgrade considering all the time and effort you"re putting in?

[biggerry]

Nice one Gary - if you need a hand do not hesitate to ask.

[gstark]

Thanks, Gerry.

I actually think I'm where I need to be with this now, and the codebase is actually looking quite good.

What I need to do next is shut down the forum, backup the database to a new db, and then using the new db delete some tables and records that will cause me grief during the upgrade, convert the db to the new phpbb format, add in the new portal db changes, make a few changes to the default portal settings, and then publish the new site.

Probably about two hours work now that I have a handle on it all, and I shall probably do this all tomorrow (Tuesday) night.

For those using Tapatalk, I've also copied the current source into the new codebase; hopefully that should work out of the box as well.

So, please expect a temporary shutdown in the next day or so, and as always, please keep me appraised of any issues that you may encounter once the upgrade has been completed.

Oh yes, one other thing - as your avatars sit within the codebase, please refrain from uploading any new ones until the upgrade is complete, as they won't be brought across now that I have the new codebase in place.

[gstark]

As a noob to all this stuff, what benefit will you or the site get from this upgrade considering all the time and effort you"re putting in?

Good question, Phillip.

Personally, I see no actual benefit; the site makes no money, minimal Google advertising revenue aside - that's not going to make me a millionaire.

The site will see an improvement in its internal security and hopefully a little bit in terms of performance, as the server is using a much newer version of the server software (that's been in place since the HDD crash two or so weeks ago) and thus the forum software version upgrades can hopefully take advantage of the more up-to-date server and provide us with a better experience, although the actual quantification of that will probably be difficult to see in any practical sense.

Perhaps easier maintenance tasks looking further into the future? The forum software is much more stable than it was when we first adopted its V3.x upgrade (we're moving from V3.0.02 to V3.0.10, although we started with V3.0.0) so that may actually assist in terms of managing the spambots that we see.

Of course, the fact that the email side of things is currently broken is also helping in that regard, in that the spammers don't get their registration email. But neither to legitimate members, and neither do I, if you want to send me an email about something that's not working, so overall, that is not a good thing.

[gstark]

Of course, the fact that the email side of things is currently broken is also helping in that regard, in that the spammers don't get their registration email. But neither to legitimate members, and neither do I, if you want to send me an email about something that's not working, so overall, that is not a good thing.

Well, I now know why the emails haven't been working, and have a temporary fix in place. I need to investigate a workaround for the temporary fix however, as the basic advice for the fix - which is to disable the SELinux security option entirely isn't a good practice.

But for now, the email functionality should be back; please let me know if you find that's not the case.

[Mr Darcy]

I did NOT receive a notification of this post.
Either it is still broken for me or it does not work retroactively. PS remind me to buy you a beer (or three) next time I see you.

[gstark]

Either it is still broken for me or it does not work retroactively.

It doesn't work retroactively, in that email notifications should be being generated in real time, as and when a new post is being made. If you've set the "Notify me" flag on a thread, then any new posts should certainly be triggering an email to you.

I've certainly been (finally) getting emails from the board now, for the first time since the server was rebuilt, but I don't have the "notify me" flag set on any threads.

[Mr Darcy]

Either it is still broken for me or it does not work retroactively.

It doesn't work retroactively, in that email notifications should be being generated in real time, as and when a new post is being made. If you've set the "Notify me" flag on a thread, then any new posts should certainly be triggering an email to you.

But I didn't receive a notification of your previous post. & if you had already fixed things when you made that, I should have as I was subscribed to the topic.

Still, it appears to be working now.