Post by Admin on Jan 3, 2017 16:56:33 GMT
Welcome to the new ME3Explorer forum!
As many of you know, we've been talking about the possibility of moving the forum for a while. Since fall of 2015, to be exact. Freeforums.org is not a great host (for a variety of reasons), reliability has been steadily decreasing since early 2016, and those of you who have been around the old forums regularly since around Thanksgiving, know that the past two months have been exceptionally bad. The old forum goes down several times a week (8x we are aware of between 11/24 and 12/9, alone), and when it's available, it's extremely slow. To top it all off, most avatars and the forum banner are no longer displaying properly.
Before the Christmas holiday, we decided that now was the time to take the plunge. We've hesitated due to a few factors (we'll go into those below), but if a forum isn't accessible, nothing else matters.
With that said, welcome to the new ME3Explorer Forum on Proboards! We hope you enjoy our new home
Why continue with a free host?
A paid-for host is, unfortunately, out of the question. We're a five-year old, open source, community project. Toolset staff come and go frequently. Our regular forum user base is quite small. For example, fewer than three dozen users had over 30 posts total and had posted in the last 6 months (modders, admins, and emeritus notwithstanding). That's not much. Being able to collect donations for monthly hosting fees simply isn't a reasonable expectation, and it shouldn't be the responsibility of one person.
Another example: at the height of its popularity, the HTL community site (which also grew out of the Mass Effect 3 ending debacle) had trouble meeting its monthly donation obligations to support its custom forum. It was a beautiful site with an extremely active community, and eventually they shuttered because they couldn't keep up. We want to ensure longevity. We want the toolset forums stay accessible to everyone, as long as possible. We want folks who are modding Mass Effect with the toolset 5 or 10 years from now to be able to come to this forum and ask questions. And, don't think that can't happen -- modding communities keep games relevant, regardless of age.
Why not host privately?
For the same reasons a paid host is a bad idea for our community. People come and go too frequently; it's not smart to tie the forum to a single person. It needs to stay as much in the public domain as possible. That way administration of the forum can be easily passed to new admins as old ones exit. It's never a matter of porting the content itself. This is the toolset's forum. We want to make sure it stays that way.
Why Proboards?
There aren't a whole lot of options for feature-rich, free forums. Especially ones without limited bandwidth and page views, who don't use shady tactics and advertising, and who have good, responsive, technical support. ...And who have been around long enough, and continue to be popular enough, to suggest they will be here for a long time.
Something more modern like Discourse would have been great, but there is no free forum host for Discourse (unless you have a very large, popular GitHub repo). We looked at Lefora, but felt Proboards was the more reliable option. As you can see, Proboards allows for significant visual customization. This isn't a theme you're looking at; this is Google Fonts and custom CSS (by Giftfish). Proboards also has an extensive plug in library.
What happens to the content on the old forum?
It stays there. Any free forum has two drawbacks: lack of control over forum data and lack of ability to port the forum. These are the sacrifices you make to keep the forum free.
The content on the old forum is the main reason we've hesitated to move for so long. Despite the "new" wiki now being two years old, there has been little effort by the community to port content. Giftfish has done 99% of the work. Most technical research, modder's research, general references, and tutorials reside on the old forum. This is something that needs to change. We need the help of active modders and coders, especially, to get this content moved over. We encourage you to read the updated Wiki FAQ and pitch in. Anything that isn't moved will be lost if and when the old forum shutters.
The good news is that much of the content on the old forum is deprecated. A significant amount. A new forum means a clean start, and five years into a project like this that's not a bad idea.
What about the mods currently being developed in the Mods in Development threads?
We encourage modders to port whatever content they want from the old forum. The easiest solution is to copy the OP from your old mod thread into the new thread here. Edit/update as needed.
When will the old forum shut down?
Hopefully, not before we want it to. Freeforums.org has a policy that any forum without activity for 90 days is removed. We need to keep the forum just active enough that this doesn't kick in until all necessary content has been moved to the wiki. We'll let you know when we need help with this.
How does the structure of this forum compare to the old one?
The January 2016 overhaul to the old forum assessed the huge amount and variety of existing content, and erected new boards to create better structure. While we did close some areas, we were still somewhat lenient with content that was not particularly useful or no longer in the scope of the community. With a new forum, we're starting from scratch. This time it's about creating space for the specific content that we want to support, right now. The toolset community as it exists today and how we want to see it develop in the future.
Overall, things are very, very similar. Obviously, there's no "Archives" area, since there aren't any. There's a new "Modder's Chat" area that we hope will see some interesting discussions. The most significant change is the removal of the Coder's Board and the merging of some of that content into the main toolset board. The Mess Hall as been changed a little bit and some sections merged into a single "Basic Modding" area. All tutorial sections are gone, as tutorials should be placed on the wiki, not the forum.
Please be certain to take a quick read of the sticky posts inside each board -- they explain the discussion guidelines. Also, like on the old forum, the ability to add new threads is controlled by forum group. Therefore, not everyone can start threads everywhere, however, everyone can post anywhere.
Is this new forum finished? Will there be any other changes?
We're not planning on any immediate changes, but we'll adjust the board as needed. Design-wise, we'll be swapping out most of the icons, and probably doing some adjustments yet to the banner's location/size. FYI, 4K displays might have some visual glitches. For most people, the forum will look fine.
Any tips for those of us unfamiliar with using Proboards?
Yep, check out this thread
As many of you know, we've been talking about the possibility of moving the forum for a while. Since fall of 2015, to be exact. Freeforums.org is not a great host (for a variety of reasons), reliability has been steadily decreasing since early 2016, and those of you who have been around the old forums regularly since around Thanksgiving, know that the past two months have been exceptionally bad. The old forum goes down several times a week (8x we are aware of between 11/24 and 12/9, alone), and when it's available, it's extremely slow. To top it all off, most avatars and the forum banner are no longer displaying properly.
Before the Christmas holiday, we decided that now was the time to take the plunge. We've hesitated due to a few factors (we'll go into those below), but if a forum isn't accessible, nothing else matters.
With that said, welcome to the new ME3Explorer Forum on Proboards! We hope you enjoy our new home
Why continue with a free host?
A paid-for host is, unfortunately, out of the question. We're a five-year old, open source, community project. Toolset staff come and go frequently. Our regular forum user base is quite small. For example, fewer than three dozen users had over 30 posts total and had posted in the last 6 months (modders, admins, and emeritus notwithstanding). That's not much. Being able to collect donations for monthly hosting fees simply isn't a reasonable expectation, and it shouldn't be the responsibility of one person.
Another example: at the height of its popularity, the HTL community site (which also grew out of the Mass Effect 3 ending debacle) had trouble meeting its monthly donation obligations to support its custom forum. It was a beautiful site with an extremely active community, and eventually they shuttered because they couldn't keep up. We want to ensure longevity. We want the toolset forums stay accessible to everyone, as long as possible. We want folks who are modding Mass Effect with the toolset 5 or 10 years from now to be able to come to this forum and ask questions. And, don't think that can't happen -- modding communities keep games relevant, regardless of age.
Why not host privately?
For the same reasons a paid host is a bad idea for our community. People come and go too frequently; it's not smart to tie the forum to a single person. It needs to stay as much in the public domain as possible. That way administration of the forum can be easily passed to new admins as old ones exit. It's never a matter of porting the content itself. This is the toolset's forum. We want to make sure it stays that way.
Why Proboards?
There aren't a whole lot of options for feature-rich, free forums. Especially ones without limited bandwidth and page views, who don't use shady tactics and advertising, and who have good, responsive, technical support. ...And who have been around long enough, and continue to be popular enough, to suggest they will be here for a long time.
Something more modern like Discourse would have been great, but there is no free forum host for Discourse (unless you have a very large, popular GitHub repo). We looked at Lefora, but felt Proboards was the more reliable option. As you can see, Proboards allows for significant visual customization. This isn't a theme you're looking at; this is Google Fonts and custom CSS (by Giftfish). Proboards also has an extensive plug in library.
What happens to the content on the old forum?
It stays there. Any free forum has two drawbacks: lack of control over forum data and lack of ability to port the forum. These are the sacrifices you make to keep the forum free.
The content on the old forum is the main reason we've hesitated to move for so long. Despite the "new" wiki now being two years old, there has been little effort by the community to port content. Giftfish has done 99% of the work. Most technical research, modder's research, general references, and tutorials reside on the old forum. This is something that needs to change. We need the help of active modders and coders, especially, to get this content moved over. We encourage you to read the updated Wiki FAQ and pitch in. Anything that isn't moved will be lost if and when the old forum shutters.
The good news is that much of the content on the old forum is deprecated. A significant amount. A new forum means a clean start, and five years into a project like this that's not a bad idea.
What about the mods currently being developed in the Mods in Development threads?
We encourage modders to port whatever content they want from the old forum. The easiest solution is to copy the OP from your old mod thread into the new thread here. Edit/update as needed.
When will the old forum shut down?
Hopefully, not before we want it to. Freeforums.org has a policy that any forum without activity for 90 days is removed. We need to keep the forum just active enough that this doesn't kick in until all necessary content has been moved to the wiki. We'll let you know when we need help with this.
How does the structure of this forum compare to the old one?
The January 2016 overhaul to the old forum assessed the huge amount and variety of existing content, and erected new boards to create better structure. While we did close some areas, we were still somewhat lenient with content that was not particularly useful or no longer in the scope of the community. With a new forum, we're starting from scratch. This time it's about creating space for the specific content that we want to support, right now. The toolset community as it exists today and how we want to see it develop in the future.
Overall, things are very, very similar. Obviously, there's no "Archives" area, since there aren't any. There's a new "Modder's Chat" area that we hope will see some interesting discussions. The most significant change is the removal of the Coder's Board and the merging of some of that content into the main toolset board. The Mess Hall as been changed a little bit and some sections merged into a single "Basic Modding" area. All tutorial sections are gone, as tutorials should be placed on the wiki, not the forum.
Please be certain to take a quick read of the sticky posts inside each board -- they explain the discussion guidelines. Also, like on the old forum, the ability to add new threads is controlled by forum group. Therefore, not everyone can start threads everywhere, however, everyone can post anywhere.
Is this new forum finished? Will there be any other changes?
We're not planning on any immediate changes, but we'll adjust the board as needed. Design-wise, we'll be swapping out most of the icons, and probably doing some adjustments yet to the banner's location/size. FYI, 4K displays might have some visual glitches. For most people, the forum will look fine.
Any tips for those of us unfamiliar with using Proboards?
Yep, check out this thread