vBulletin 4 upgrade

[Fraser]

Okay, as some of you might notice, everything's new. I've upgraded the site to vBulletin 4. I was hoping that it would be a long slow, careful upgrade, but I had to do it quickly because of today's hacking.

Regarding the hack, from what I can tell, it was some kind of automated hack that inserted hidden banner code into the site's template. This was designed to generate advertising revenue for them based on traffic to BAUT. It's a pretty low-risk hack, from what I can tell.

I've upgraded vBulletin to the latest version, reverted all the site templates to their default versions. This should both close up the exploit and remove the hacked code from the website. Please let me know if your Nortons, etc are still being triggered.

Of course, now we're upgraded to vBulletin 4, which is going to require tweaks and fixes. So, hit me with them and I'll start working through them.

[slang]

Thanks for all the work you're putting in for us, Fraser.

[HenrikOlsen]

Thanks for the good work.
It even looks like the post links in the post numbers aren't horribly broken anymore and members links are the combination of uid and name I've been suggesting for ages so that's that bug closed

Now for the slightly less good:
The visual difference between the icons for forums with and without unread posts is very little and if my head is even slightly off center when watching the difference disappears
The tooltips for the thread icons is mostly empty, It's because it's putting lots of whitespace in the tag.

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[chrissy]

I haven't got any problems from my anti-virus warnings so far. yay!

[Van Rijn]

This isn't a problem, just something I noticed and thought might be worth pointing out:

The "report post" icon still exists, but is now on the lower left below a post, not the upper right above. And it isn't red.

[Spoons]

Good day people! What a funky new surprise for the day. This should blend in on my screen at work much better! Very stealthy - thanks Fraser!

One thing I've noticed so far - if I want to check for new posts in my subscribed threads I used to click for the control panel or however it was labelled, in the top left corner. Now I see I can click under Quick Links and select Subscribed Threads. Is there any way to filter down to the threads which I haven't yet viewed out of those?

[Grashtel]

Thanks for the good work.
It even looks like the post links in the post numbers aren't horribly broken anymore and members links are the combination of uid and name I've been suggesting for ages so that's that bug closed

IIRC those were the fault of an SEO plugin that was apparently lost in the upgrade, and IMO good riddance to it as it seemed to cause more trouble than it was worth.

[Grashtel]

I have to say that I am not a fan of the new look. Am I right in thinking that it is going to be a temporary thing until the templates for the old look are fixed and updated?

[George]

Thanks Ty Pennington (Fraser) for the makeover.... I think.


"The quantity of matter is the measure of the same, arising from its density and bulk conjunctly. "
[Copying from Word to see if it gets messy as before.... Nope, all is well, apparently.]

Can we put most any word in the thread title? Yes? Well, it's about time.

[And no filters imposing punisment. That's a relief.]

Testing...
Red
[colour=red]Red[/colour]

Ah ha!, there be color here!!!

[novaderrik]

i gotta say, i don't like the layout.. it looks too- i don't know the proper word to use- cartoony to me. i just don't like rounded edges and soft colors on bulletin boards.. but i will adapt, i guess..
of course, i'm running Windows Vista that is configured to look like WIN98, so what do i know?

[LotusExcelle]

Avira identifies the sent virus as originating in 2007. Does the server run on a linux/unix platform or on a Windows based platform? I'm curious as I doubt very much that the embedded code was sent to attack the server. It is embedded-ad in origin.

[Swift]

I agree with the negative comments about the new look, I don't love it, but I could get used to it. I also agree that I would like the Report Post icon to be more noticeable; red would be good.

[George]

Hmmm.... Will you be able to give us the button that lists all of the threads that have had posts subsequent to ours?

[Gillianren]

Yeah, disliking the look a lot, but if that's what it takes to, you know, not be hacked, I'll cope.

[Spoons]

I agree with the negative comments about the new look, I don't love it, but I could get used to it.

10: Yeah, can we get it to look more like the DOS prompt or a text based game, like Zork? This whole Windows thing bugs me.
20: It's all so repetitive.
30: GOTO 10

[Swift]

10: Yeah, can we get it to look more like the DOS prompt or a text based game, like Zork? This whole Windows thing bugs me.
20: It's all so repetitive.
30: GOTO 10

You make an old man very happy. Can I install BAUT from an 8" floppy, or will I need a tape drive?

Seriously, I would like a darker line between the text of the post and the signature, and quite frankly, the whole blue-gray coloring is kind of ugly and hard to see.

[Fraser]

In my many years of webmastering, one thing I've learned is: don't mess with the default unless you've got a really good reason...

I'm going to get our big banner back up shortly, but I'm not going to mess with the design at all.

[Spoons]

'Tis my pleasure Swift! That old setup takes me back to sitting in a caravan down the bottom of our block tapping away on the Vic 20, and tape drives. The world seemed less complicated then.

I notice the Quick Style Chooser in the bottom left corner. By default it's set to vB4 Default Style.

What would be great would be if a style template was created which was as similar to the previous layout as possible while this one still available, so that we can take our pick. Is it possible for individual users to customise their formatting of the screens to a degree? I appreciate we wouldn't want too much variation available, otherwise it will create confusion when explaining things to each other, but things such as colour themes etc would be neat.

ETA: Fair call Fraser - it can just be tempting fate to mess with things much. People will get used to it with time. I don't have a problem with it myself, though I do find myself running striaght from the message body into the signature often. I still like the look for the fact that it's less obvious at work.

[Spoons]

George (and others) - if you're referring to the User CP, I just found that it is linked under Setting in the top right corner. Hover over it and you'll see it's actually the User CP rather than a settings section.

I don't know if that's going to change. It works fine as is, just wasn't where and labelled how I was expecting.

[Nick Theodorakis]

I notice the url of our profile pages now include some kind of id number in addition to the name, which should help guard against the username spoofing we talked about elsewhere.

Nick

[tashirosgt]

I would prefer a higher contrast page (like the old look) rather than the pastel colors of this new look. This is not because of artistic reasons. It's because I'm getting old enough to want high contrast pages and big fonts.

[clint]

I almost closed the tab again, thought I was on the wrong site...

[clint]

Just recovered from the first shock

One thing I've noticed so far - if I want to check for new posts in my subscribed threads I used to click for the control panel or however it was labelled, in the top left corner.

It was called "User CP" - I used it all the time, too (haven't yet investigated if there is anything similar in this new version - so please let me know!)

POST EDIT: I see you have already answered this a few posts above - thanks!

This isn't a problem, just something I noticed and thought might be worth pointing out:
The "report post" icon still exists, but is now on the lower left below a post, not the upper right above. And it isn't red.

What's interesting is that those buttons below the posts only loaded after a few minutes. First I could only see the "reply with quote" one.
Only the first time, though, now it's immediate (probably due to the cache memory?)

[tusenfem]

Thanks for all the work, Fraser! Was surprised, but will get used to the new look!

[Spoons]

Yeah, that's the one that is now linked under the title Settings in the top right corner.

Oh yes, and I'd also like to forward my thanks to Fraser for his prompt response to the drama. It was all hunky dory when I went to sleep last night, and all fixed and updated by the time I got to work this morning (unless my boss is reading this, in which case it was ok within a couple of hours of me arriving at work).

You've done a great job Fraser, and it's greatly appreciated!

[Gillianren]

I do appreciate the work, Fraser, but still reserve the right to grumble about the bits you have no control over.

[Spoons]

Yeah Fraser, my hair gel only holds for an hour or so! *grumble grumble*

[mugaliens]

10: Yeah, can we get it to look more like the DOS prompt or a text based game, like Zork? This whole Windows thing bugs me.
20: It's all so repetitive.
30: GOTO 10

c:\cls
c:\edlin
.Nope, that didn't do it.
.Where'd these pics come from?
^C

Actually, the new look doesn't bother me in the least. It's just different, and nothing looks the same as it did five years ago, whether we're talking commercials, cars, or clothing styles, so roll out the carpet for the new look and let's move along!
PS: Fraser - everything seems to be in good working order.

[slang]

Nice! The "check multiple posts" to reply to all of them at once feature works again!

[Philippe Lemay]

Would be nice to have the boxing astronaut back at the top of the page. He was fun. lol

But yea, the new layout looks very nice.