After all these years, WTF

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AuthorTopic: After all these years, WTF
Infiltrator
Member # 187
Profile #0
K. It's been a long time and every time I come back I half-expect we've updated from UBB to something..... well, anything is better than UBB. vB is a good one.

Why are we still stuck on UBB?
Posts: 586 | Registered: Saturday, October 20 2001 07:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #1
Moving to another board would either cost money, result in security holes or both.

Jeff isn't willing to spend a cent more on the forums than he already does, and there have been hack attempts on the boards before, so neither is an option.

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My BoE Page
Bandwagons are fun!
Roots
Hunted!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
Profile Homepage #2
Good ol' UBB. I don't see what's so bad about it.

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Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens.

Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me
The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever
Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #3
The one thing I don't like about UBB is that it's not very good at keeping track of which topics a user has viewed.

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My BoE Page
Bandwagons are fun!
Roots
Hunted!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Warrior
Member # 3870
Profile Homepage #4
Luckily, the traffic here, even on General, isn't so heavy that you lose track of what goes on even if you miss out a few days.

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"Toleration is not the opposite of intoleration, but is the counterfeit of it. Both are despotisms. The one assumes to itself the right of withholding liberty of conscience, and the other of granting it."
---Thomas Paine

Posts: 156 | Registered: Thursday, January 8 2004 08:00
Infiltrator
Member # 154
Profile #5
vB is nasty (and vB3 is bloated to extremes). I reccomend phpBB2.2, when it comes out of devel.

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Inconsistently backward.
SWOH. IM, PATF, ND.
Posts: 612 | Registered: Saturday, October 13 2001 07:00
BANNED
Member # 4
Profile Homepage #6
I have never heard of development being abbreviated as devel. In some ways, this forum isn't bad. Luckilly, security seems to be one of them- there has been a poingant lack of hackers thusfar.

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私のバラドですそしてころしたいいらればころす
Posts: 6936 | Registered: Tuesday, September 18 2001 07:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #7
phpBB is apparently pretty bloated. Also, its admin options really, really suck, especially in regard to fine-tuning member privileges. I don't know if the latest version fixes these issues.

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My BoE Page
Bandwagons are fun!
Roots
Hunted!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Infiltrator
Member # 4389
Profile Homepage #8
I like UBB. A lot. It doesn't have annoying things like post titles. And it's laid out well, here.

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fame fame fatal fame
it can play hideous tricks on the brain
Posts: 407 | Registered: Friday, May 14 2004 07:00
Shake Before Using
Member # 75
Profile #9
The last board I was on with useful post titles was ITW.
Posts: 3234 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #10
Boardhost has them too -- Zaloopa's boards moved to that for a while. The trouble is that the ITW-style threaded layout is annoying and inefficient for reading whole threads. Saying post titles on a layout like that are "useful" is like saying a wick is a useful thing to have on candles but not on lightbulbs.

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My BoE Page
Bandwagons are fun!
Roots
Hunted!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Shake Before Using
Member # 75
Profile #11
Well, it is.
Posts: 3234 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00
Infiltrator
Member # 187
Profile #12
There's good free forum software out there.
Posts: 586 | Registered: Saturday, October 20 2001 07:00
Master
Member # 4614
Profile Homepage #13
I see no problem with UBB. It's easy to read, easy to use, and if people want to post a one-line post, it doesn't take up half the screen height showing the picture, credentials, etc. If you really want those things, you can just click on someone's name.

[ Thursday, October 14, 2004 15:23: Message edited by: burglar ben ]

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-ben4808

For those who love to spam:
CSM Forums
RIFQ
Posts: 3360 | Registered: Friday, June 25 2004 07:00
Shake Before Using
Member # 75
Profile #14
UBB doesn't let us do cool things like give Canned members a flood timer of 900 seconds, though.
Posts: 3234 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00
Shock Trooper
Member # 4154
Profile #15
UBB is good enough. Though I agree that it can't keep track of what one has visited for beans (or even just one bean) but oh well.

...flood timer?

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You're a moron if you think I'm not.
Posts: 213 | Registered: Friday, March 26 2004 08:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #16
You know, the flood control? Where you can't make 2 posts within 1 minute of each other?

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My BoE Page
Bandwagons are fun!
Roots
Hunted!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!
Member # 919
Profile #17
Explain yourself, Chaldrath - what exactly is wrong with UBB?

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And though the musicians would die, the music would live on in the imaginations of all who heard it.
-The Last Pendragon

Polaris = joy.

In case of emergency, break glass.
Posts: 3351 | Registered: Saturday, April 6 2002 08:00
Warrior
Member # 5091
Profile #18
Right off the top of my head?

There's no "go to first unread post" link, like in Invision or phpBB. That's a real nice feature, especially if you've been away and there's been a lot of activity.

Invision's "Find New Posts" feature is also really fantastic.

UBB is the only forum I know to support changing displayed name, which is perhaps a blessing and perhaps a curse.

In general, IPB feels a lot more powerful, but UBB is significantly more simple. I didn't like what I saw of UBB's control panel, though; it seems to me that IPB has the best hands down.

I dunno how IPB scales compared to UBB, though. Its default skin is pretty lavish, and I don't think "skimpy with resources" is one of its selling points.

And, of course, SW would have to buy a license to the tune of $200 for IPB, and they've already bought UBB.
Posts: 180 | Registered: Friday, October 15 2004 07:00
Agent
Member # 618
Profile Homepage #19
Eh, UBB isn't bad. We're on... *scrolls to bottom of page to check* 6.3.1.1 and it's okay. It serves the needs of the community.

I prefer it to any of the Invision boards I've seen, not seen any of the others mentioned (to my memory) so I can't judge. Quite frankly, a different version of UBB would be nicer, SR uses 6.5.0 and that uses colour schemes for its pages and supports the use of avatars (remotely linked, before someone throws a hissy fit), but it is at the expense of being able to change your PDN (though that's probably just a board preference).

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Aut Tace Aut Loquere Meliora Silencio
Posts: 1487 | Registered: Sunday, February 10 2002 08:00
...b10010b...
Member # 869
Profile Homepage #20
t djur don't try to type "desperance" with your eyes closed

FBM, this version of UBB supports remotely linked avatars too. The problem with them was never bandwidth, it was loading time for users. Not that I saw anyone complain about that on the boards.

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My BoE Page
Bandwagons are fun!
Roots
Hunted!
Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00
Agent
Member # 618
Profile Homepage #21
Well, in that case, I would say that considering the
quote:
unlimited bandwith
that it is claimed that SW has, why not have avatars? If you keep them to a certain size they don't take any time at all to load and they're pretty cool. Hmmmm...?

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Aut Tace Aut Loquere Meliora Silencio
Posts: 1487 | Registered: Sunday, February 10 2002 08:00
Shake Before Using
Member # 75
Profile #22
Either UBB doesn't have avatar size limitations or Spidweb just wasn't setting them, but lost_king's avatar's fat face used to take up the whole screen. ._.
Posts: 3234 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00
Law Bringer
Member # 335
Profile Homepage #23
25 avatars per page, even fairly small ones, can make loading pages a painful task for those of us still on dialup.

—Alorael, who suffered terribly from the enormous avatars (Paterick's, anyone?) despite having a fast connection. Still, they did help identify the TGMs of the world.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Warrior
Member # 5091
Profile #24
Except that once you've loaded a given avatar, it's stored in your cache; since the number of posting members is relatively small, especially within a single thread, you'd only have significantly longer load times for a few pages.

Avatars, if kept relatively constant, are a great way to identify someone without having to deduce from their displayed name or remember their member number.

The skin I use on Desp Forums manages to fit the maximum amount of information in a minimum area as simply as possible -- it displays, on the left, merely the name, the avatar, and title. Those three items make it easy to instantly -- even without looking directly -- figure out who's saying what.

I guess I'm just needlessly symbolic. I often have trouble telling all of the members with somewhat long names (Alec, Thuryl, BtI, etc.) apart; if I didn't usually recognize their personality and writing style, I'd have to spend more time checking their user number, etc.
Posts: 180 | Registered: Friday, October 15 2004 07:00

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