TMU/TMOA Changes - 2012

[kuroken]

Since we have 11 months and a couple of weeks before we all die when the Mayans return in Nazi-designed flying saucers from their hideout in the center of the Earth...I figured we might as well be productive and go out with a bang!

As announced on the Holiday Spectacular show last Sunday, we're going to rock the first quarter of 2012:

Forum upgrade: Yeah, we're finally making the jump from vBulletin 3.8.5 to 4.1.9. Lots of new features and extra stuff, including...

Content Management System - this will replace the old TMOA homepage to provide links to show downloads and the radio streams, news and links to forum posts, RSS feeds to new uploads at TMU, and other things. It will have a relevance that the TMOA homepage never quite achieved...
Blogging - I know a lot of people blog on other platforms and will continue to do so - but for those who want to create a production blog for their films or other projects here, it will be available.
Forum Features - The forum has a lot of new features that I'm just beginning to play with on a test install - there's a lot of social media integration (you can integrate with Facebook, Twitter, etc.) and other stuff.

I have the upgraded version running, using a database dump from yesterday, to make sure the upgrade wasn't going to blow everything up - staff is playing with it, looking for things that are missing or broken - I'm playing with configuration and addons and mods and such.


If everything goes well, and we don't have any serious issues, I'll post the username/pw/URL to get to the new site on Thursday, so those interested can take a look, and we'll do the upgrade here on the live board on Friday morning and everyone can work on breaking it over the weekend.

TMU University: Once the forum upgrade is done and everything is running smoothly, the next big project is TMU University.


TMU-U is something we've been talking about for at least a year, year and a half. Think of it as online machinima classes. We'll be running distance-learning software, and featuring workshop-based classes on both general filmmaking subjects (writing, editing, sound, etc.) and engine specific subjects (iClone, MovieStorm, the Movies, Second Life, etc.).


We hope to be able to recruit some people who really know their stuff in their respective areas and let them guide people in the workshop, with both instructor and peer critiques, to sharpen their skills. There will be lots more about this in the next month or so as we get our minds around how we want to approach it and start getting some instructors lined up.


TMOA: Yes, some new stuff for the radio station as well...


New shows - I'd like to add at least three and maybe 4 new shows to the lineup - I think Monk can handle a couple more shows on Saturday (though that's ultimately his call) and we've got an opening on Sunday before Ken & Cathy with Industry 101 on indefinite and perhaps terminal hiatus - and I can also do a show before Wolf & Dulci on Monday nights. Don't pitch your show ideas now - I'm concentrating on the other stuff at the moment, so you have at least a month or so to refine your pitch. I will tell you that we're going to be picky about the shows we pick up - as any of the hosts will tell you, it seems like an easy gig, but it takes some commitment to show up every week and keep it interesting (I don't worry about my show being interesting because, hey, it's MY show). To start your thought process, lemme say that we do not want a clone of any show we're running - if it's like Ken & Cathy with different people, the answer is no....
Radio Plays - I don't say radio dramas because they can be comedies.... This is something else we've been talking about for a while, since they're storytelling in an audio medium, so they're like a machinima film without the visuals - still need good writing, good acting, and good sound design to make something worth listening to. If enough people want to try their hand at it, we may do a weekly show, with 2-3 different stories (one-offs or a serial) in each show. If there's not much interest, some of us will still do them, but as one-offs.

So that's the overview of what we'll be doing for the next 3 or so months and beyond. Comments, suggestions, thoughts, etc. are, as always, welcome.


Ken

[HappyStudios]

Content Management System.
Blogging.
Forum Features.
Wow cant wait for this. Awesome.
You guys have really done Great to the Tmu Website and this forums. :rockon: . i currently still new to this Forum, still learning how things work here.

Just a suggestion, i know you guys have alot at hand so wouldn't really post a big suggestion, but just one main suggestion i have :4:

I posted this in the other post i had.
here is the link to that post , The Group suggestion one only.
http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb/showpost.php?p=78097&postcount=37

You guys already have alot on your hand and i can see some great new feature coming to the forum and TMunderground keep up the good work, that was just a little suggestion from me.

[Fospherous]

Since we have 11 months and a couple of weeks before we all die when the Mayans return in Nazi-designed flying saucers from their hideout in the center of the Earth...

How did you discover Michael Bay's next film plot?


TMU University: Once the forum upgrade is done and everything is running smoothly, the next big project is TMU University.

TMU-U is something we've been talking about for at least a year, year and a half. Think of it as online machinima classes. We'll be running distance-learning software, and featuring workshop-based classes on both general filmmaking subjects (writing, editing, sound, etc.) and engine specific subjects (iClone, MovieStorm, the Movies, Second Life, etc.).

This sounds really, really interesting. I'm looking forward to seeing how this takes off.

Can't wait to see some of these upcoming changes. You da man Ken! :punk:

[BenTuttle90]

Very interesting there Ken. I'll look forward to the next few months with these new features.

[thebiz]

Sounds great Ken (also nice to hear from you here on the forums)! Hope this will add some spice to life.

Ive been thinking a bit lately about how the three heads of TMU are a bit seperated from one another. The Movies site from the forum from the live radio. I don't have any really solid ideas but it would be great to see them tied closer together. Perhaps the new content management system will achieve this.

Also might be interesting to have a annual or bi-annual officially TMU sponsored contest of some kind. Perhaps the theme could be tied to the TMU-U idea. Prizes wouldn't need to be crazy but some sort of recognition/badge type of thing might be of use. The official tmu recognition, an interesting theme and a well run event may be enough incentive to get some fiesty competition going.

[BiggsTrek]

Sounds great Ken (also nice to hear from you here on the forums)! Hope this will add some spice to life.

Ive been thinking a bit lately about how the three heads of TMU are a bit seperated from one another. The Movies site from the forum from the live radio. I don't have any really solid ideas but it would be great to see them tied closer together. Perhaps the new content management system will achieve this.

Also might be interesting to have a annual or bi-annual officially TMU sponsored contest of some kind. Perhaps the theme could be tied to the TMU-U idea. Prizes wouldn't need to be crazy but some sort of recognition/badge type of thing might be of use. The official tmu recognition, an interesting theme and a well run event may be enough incentive to get some fiesty competition going.

It's like you read my mind some times... spooky.

[thebiz]

It's like you read my mind some times... spooky.

Perhaps you and I are the same....now where did my pants run off to?

[stvndysn]

Perhaps you and I are the same....now where did my pants run off to?

god help us if you 2 are the same person.. :punk::punk:

the new updates sound good Ken


(see's the biz's pants run past the window:dots::dots:

[Dulci]

I am VERY excited about these changes & see only good things coming from this!

[animatechnica]

i heard from a reliable source that they share the same taste in underpants

but great idea on a TMU sponsored/managed festival - a great opportunity for new studios/directors to network and get to know members of the community.


god help us if you 2 are the same person.. :punk::punk:

the new updates sound good Ken


(see's the biz's pants run past the window:dots::dots:

[kuroken]

Okay, here's a forum question - would there be any interest in a chat function like the facebook chat thing? Where you'd have the ability to run individual or group chats within the forum (it mimics the look and functionality of Facebook chat at the bottom of the forum screen.)

Ken

[Fospherous]

Okay, here's a forum question - would there be any interest in a chat function like the facebook chat thing? Where you'd have the ability to run individual or group chats within the forum (it mimics the look and functionality of Facebook chat at the bottom of the forum screen.)

Ken

This sounds good, to me at least. It certainly offers a more direct form of communication for community members who may not have software like skype.

[Bezzer]

Some excellent stuff going on here Ken...love the TMU-U idea and pretty much all the stuff on the list:-)
Yup, the chat feature sounds cool too.

[6hm]

new years resolutions never last :(

[shidden]

a chat within the forum would be awesome. i dont got skype and i dont wanna be on skype... but a chat within the forum would give me and everybody else the oppurtunity to communicate.

----------------------------------------------------------------
http://i206.photobucket.com/albums/bb272/yesmon/broncoandbilly2.jpg

[kwistufa]

Sounds like a Great Idea Ken. Good Stuff!

[Jake]

I love the this new idea. I would not mind the Facebook idea, too.

[WX_IVAN]

:blink: Wow, chatting inside the forum without having to wait a week for a reply... Oh my. What modern technology is doing to us all. :thumbup1: Nice idea Ken. I am looking forward to these upcoming developments you have in store. :4:

[Uber]

Hopefully it will bring some members back. It's been dead lately.

[Uber]

Quick question, will there be an iphone/android app for the new site?

[kuroken]

Quick question, will there be an iphone/android app for the new site?
Interesting question and something I hadn't thought of (since I rarely use my Android's web capability)

Looking into it, I see that Tapatalk (http://www.tapatalk.com/rebranding.php)will let me make a specific TMU Forum app for the low licensing fee of $999....oh wait, that's for one platform...so if I want an Android AND iOS app, it'll be $1998....so probably no app specifically for the forum.

HOWEVER

I can enable the forum to make it accessible to the Tapatalk app ($2.99 in the Android market, not sure about Apple App Store but probably around the same) and also make it accessible to Forum Runner (http://www.forumrunner.com/) which is the same kind of app ($1.99 in the Android market, prolly similar in the App Store). So if somebody has either of the apps, they'll be able to use them with our forums.

Gonna go ahead and enable the new forums for both Tapatalk and Forum Runner.

[Uber]

Good stuff, while I can access the site via my Iphone, since my PC died, it would be easier and quicker to view in on my iphone/ipad that going through safari. i wouldn't mind paying a couple of duces for it either.

[kuroken]

Okay, both Tapatalk and Forum Runner are up and running on the test forum.

Since I'm not sure if either will work with the directory protection I had on the test forum directory (both installs couldn't be verified with it in place), and I do want to have it tested by those with the apps, I've removed the protection till we do the upgrade to the live forum tomorrow morning.

Next post will have the link to the upgraded forum so people will have a day to play with it till I do the upgrade to this forum tomorrow.

[kuroken]

I'm opening the upgraded version of the test forum at:

http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb4

That link will take you to the CMS page, and you can hit the forums from the forum tab. Log in at the top with your regular username and password.

The database dump I used for the install is a couple of days old, so anything that's been posted here since Tuesday isn't there. Anything that gets posted there will disappear after tomorrow, when I do the upgrade on the live site.

So knock yourselves out, try some of the different functions, see what is and isn't working. The only thing I know isn't working right now is the link in the postbit to the TMU Studio - no icon, no link. I'm gonna see what Riley did to the postbit here and try to duplicate it there today, so I can repeat the process tomorrow after the upgrade.

Have fun, give feedback (here or there), if you have Tapatalk or Forum Runner, try them out on the site and let me know if they're working.

Thanks.

[Chris62]

Nice Ken i like it looks great.

[animatechnica]

sweet, i use tapatalk a lot for moderating one of the android forums


Okay, both Tapatalk and Forum Runner are up and running on the test forum.

Since I'm not sure if either will work with the directory protection I had on the test forum directory (both installs couldn't be verified with it in place), and I do want to have it tested by those with the apps, I've removed the protection till we do the upgrade to the live forum tomorrow morning.

Next post will have the link to the upgraded forum so people will have a day to play with it till I do the upgrade to this forum tomorrow.

[kuroken]

sweet, i use tapatalk a lot for moderating one of the android forums
Good, then you can tell me if it actually works...LOL

[stvndysn]

new place looks great ken..

looking forward to the move to our new home

[kuroken]

Okay, the TMU Studio link is there and works properly on the new forum.

Right now the chat thing only works in the forum and blogs section of vBulletin 4 - I did see a way of possibly hacking it into the CMS template as well, but I want to investigate that a little more before I accidently blow things up on the CMS side.

Otherwise, keep testing things.

[Bezzer]

Yup, looks the business...sleek and shiny with lots of things to do:-)

[kuroken]

Okay, one thing I just noticed is that some signatures are showing up and some aren't.

Not sure why, but I'm going to try to rebuild my sig over there and see if that fixes things.

[ChatNoir]

Wonderful ideas! Look forward to the changes!

[kuroken]

Okay, upgrade in approximately 45 minutes. The site should be down no more than an hour or so, maybe a little more depending.

While the site is being upgraded, you can frolic on the test site - once the upgrade is complete, I'll be deleting that database and forum install, so knock yourselves out.

[kuroken]

Okay, I'm having issues (personally) with the chat - have to reload to see what I've typed. Gonna be working on that after I get a few more things loaded.

And the avatars seem to be gone....LOL - so something else to work on....

[thebiz]

Avatars and chat seem to be working fine for me. Is there a way to default to the advanced editor when you reply to a post?

[kuroken]

Yeah, I'm seeing some avatars and not others - may be on my end....I'll see if advanced editor can be made the default.

Still working on the avatar issue....standby......

[kuroken]

Okay, I think I'm pretty well done for the day - everything seems to be working, thread reply now defaults to the advanced editor per Biz's request...most of the addons are loaded (there's one that's interfering with the chat and I need to figure out which of two it is...)

Otherwise, got a couple more to add tomorrow and we're done for the moment.

Ken

[Jake]

So far, it looks good. Very intriguing. It will take some getting used to, but I like it.

[Cruleworld]

Glad to see things still going here

[Wailwulf]

Looks good. But it did take me a bit to get here.

The Link for the Forums at TMUnderground does not work. Gives me a blank page.

I was able to finally get on by Googling TMU TOA Forums, and using the cached button and then logging in from there, brought me to the log in page for the new forums. Sure Google will change that after a while, but the link at TMU needs to be fixed.

[regolero]

Take some getting used to the new format, but I look very good the new changes.

already on the changes, I would like to propose a translator in the forum, since many users are strangers (me for example, only speak Spanish, so a translator on the forum I would be very useful)

[kuroken]

Looks good. But it did take me a bit to get here.

The Link for the Forums at TMUnderground does not work. Gives me a blank page.
Thanks for spotting that (and thanks to Shidden for pointing it out in chat) - fixed now.

[kuroken]

already on the changes, I would like to propose a translator in the forum, since many users are strangers (me for example, only speak Spanish, so a translator on the forum I would be very useful)
Good suggestion, and something I hadn't considered.

If you look at the bottom of any page now, in the footer is a drop down to use Google translate to translate the page - the translation won't be perfect, of course, but it should be helpful for the non-English users....

(And interestingly, it also translates the chat which is pretty cool)

[Dulci]

I am honestly just testing the taptalk app and this seemed like a good thread to do it in.

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk

[animatechnica]

I am honestly just testing the taptalk app and this seemed like a good thread to do it in.

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk

Yeah dulci i love tapatalk i use it extensively as a moderator for an android tech forum.

Sent from my GT-P7510 using Tapatalk

[regolero]

Good suggestion, and something I hadn't considered.

If you look at the bottom of any page now, in the footer is a drop down to use Google translate to translate the page - the translation won't be perfect, of course, but it should be helpful for the non-English users....

(And interestingly, it also translates the chat which is pretty cool)


thank you very much, is not a perfect translation, but it helps a lot to navigate the forum and integrate more into it, and as you say, translates to chat :)

[BiggsTrek]

Thanks for spotting that (and thanks to Shidden for pointing it out in chat) - fixed now.

My bookmark was doing the same thing... all day until I tried another entry point from the radio site. I wonder how many others are trapped outside because they get a white, empty page?

[kwistufa]

I WAS getting the White Page Yesterday but now my Old bookmark for TMU has changed its lil pic & brings me straight to the new style forums..
All good... :chinese:

Seems I wasn't the only one Uber.. ;)

[Uber]

I WAS getting the White Page Yesterday but now my Old bookmark for TMU has changed its lil pic & brings me straight to the new style forums..
All good... :chinese:

Seems I wasn't the only one Uber.. ;)

Sober people found it just fine, matey.

[goofparade]

Sober people? Sure they found it more quickly but soon realized they lacked the effervescent sparkle to really, truly appreciate it.
Do the math!!

[Dulci]

Sober people? Sure they found it more quickly but soon realized they lacked the effervescent sparkle to really, truly appreciate it.
Do the math!!

You, sir, are indeed a wise math scholar!

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk

[kuroken]

(actually the term I was using here at TMU Central was not "golly," but a word involving both mom and the physical act of love...)

I knew there was a problem with bookmarks/links to the forum using http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb, and many (including me) had that as their bookmark or links left elsewhere....so I thought, since everything else seems to be running okay, I'd go ahead and work on that this morning before the show....

Nightmare!

I was playing around with vBulletin settings, server redirect settings, .htaccess files, etc. etc. - and at one point or another the links started recursing - so when I clicked a link, I'd go to http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb/index.phpindex.phpindex.phpindex.php etc. etc. etc. - so I took it down and tried to walk back through the changes I'd made.

After a while, checked it in Chrome, and it loaded right up - even the old /vb URL worked. Still wasn't working in Firefox, so I cleared the cache, and now it seems to be working.

Of course, now I'm seeing "Error: Please reload" in the chat thing, so maybe I've introduced a new problem. Off to fix that.

Ken

(Gonna reinstall the chat thing and see if that fixes it....so it'll be gone for a minute or two)

(chat seemed to be working okay after reinstall and just now I saw the Error:Please Reload thing again, so maybe not...)(why do I mess with things that are working?)(it's a rhetorical question - no response required)

[animatechnica]

Was just talking about this on the ken n roger show

Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk

[kuroken]

I'll probably do a little work today on integrating social media into the forums (Facebook, Twitter, whatever, not really my cuppa tea but I understand you kids love it...).

First try led to the forum hanging and throwing database errors. Of course, I should actually research these things before I start clicking buttons, but I'm on my first cup of coffee and it all seemed so...simple...

After cup two, will do some research and see if I can get this working - at one point I did see a Facebook connect button up at the top next to where you login, etc. but when I clicked it, I got the database error (apparently to use the features you click the button, login to Facebook, and then your account here is linked to your account there and you can have all kinds of crazy social media fun)

So more coffee, more research and a happy ending (happy being relative...)

[kuroken]

Okay, still struggling with the official Facebook integration thing, but at the top of every thread there's now a share thing that lets you share the thread on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ etc. etc. - just something to keep you occupied while I try to figure out why the Facebook integration is giving me chest pains (in a figurative sense)

[thebiz]

I really like the new diggs (or perhaps its just new wallpaper). Thanks Ken for the update. I was reminded of when TMO changed their forums and the resulting uproar that ensued. This transition has seemed pretty smooth.

Heres hoping for continued TMU coolness in 2012.

[WarLord]

Wow... you've been busy. Nice. May any further bugs be cast upon your enemies and your upgrade path be clear.


Sent from my rotary dial phone to animatechnica's Nexus S using TapaTap then relayed via non-encrypted satellite to Uber's house who refused the relay thereby making it necessary to use Dulci's MB855 to call Monk to type this damn message into the forum.

[thebiz]

Some thoughts on stuff I would love to see on the Home Page in the future (it looks a little bit lonely):

A Links Section - TMO Review Archives, 8eyedBaby, Reallusion, MovieStorm, whatevers relevant...

A Radio section - schedule, recent uploads, radio blogs perhaps?

Recent Blog Entrys

[kuroken]

Spent yesterday cutting, equalizing and uploading all the back shows, so all the TMOA downloads are now up-to-date (and I plan to keep them that way).

Today I've added links in the Navbar for the movie site and the TMOA archives. The other thing I want to get done is, per Harb's suggestion, add a new Competition/Festival forum, so that stuff will be easy to find and not buried in Movies Movies Movies or wherever.

Have added a new widget on the CMS front page for new blog posts (similar to the blog entries box here in the forums). I plan on a link box or widget for both the CMS home and the forum once I get more pressing things out of the way.

I would like to integrate more of the TMOA stuff into the forums/CMS and am still looking at that - once I migrate the TMOA home page to the CMS, that should be easier, and the only thing holding that up is the 75 gigs of radio archives - I want a vBulletin plugin download manager that will scan the directories and populate the download section without me having to re-upload all the shows manually (for obvious reasons). Still investigating that.

Not sure if it can be done, but would breaking the blogs into sections (General, Production, Radio, etc.) be useful to people? Right now they're just sorted by most-recent posts - would you guys find it useful to click a tab or menu or whatever to look exclusively at General blogs, or Production blogs, or whatever? (not sure if I can even do it, but assuming that I could....)

Ken

(Oh, and I'm always looking for suggestions to improve the site, so go ahead and tell me what you'd like and I'll see if I can do it.)

[thebiz]

Not sure if it can be done, but would breaking the blogs into sections (General, Production, Radio, etc.) be useful to people? Right now they're just sorted by most-recent posts - would you guys find it useful to click a tab or menu or whatever to look exclusively at General blogs, or Production blogs, or whatever? (not sure if I can even do it, but assuming that I could....)



Home page is looking better. Thanks!

As far as Blogs go, you have the ability to categorize blog posts within your blog which is enough for me. Im not sure each member can have more than one blog and i would like to leave my subject matter open to whatever strikes me at the time instead of having to focus on a movie production or whatnot.

[BiggsTrek]

Hi Ken,I'm having an issue with this Advanced Editor. My cursor is invisble, and I can't easily move it to where I want it. Any chance we could have the option to switch back to the Basic one?

[BiggsTrek]

Hi Ken,I'm having an issue with this Advanced Editor. My cursor is invisble, and I can't easily move it to where I want it. Any chance we could have the option to switch back to the Basic one?

Nevermind! I fixed it myself by switching my default editor to Standard. Works much better for me...

:asshole::38:

[kuroken]

As far as Blogs go, you have the ability to categorize blog posts within your blog which is enough for me. Im not sure each member can have more than one blog and i would like to leave my subject matter open to whatever strikes me at the time instead of having to focus on a movie production or whatnot.
Yeah, good point. Btw, I had never read the Exit Polls articles that you've been blogging - I recently rewatched Infidelitus (actually watched all the Xbox Comp films) and enjoyed reading Tre's thoughts on the film. And even, God help me for saying it, Monk was interesting in the interview about his film.

But of course, he was younger then....

[thebiz]

Yeah, good point. Btw, I had never read the Exit Polls articles that you've been blogging - I recently rewatched Infidelitus (actually watched all the Xbox Comp films) and enjoyed reading Tre's thoughts on the film. And even, God help me for saying it, Monk was interesting in the interview about his film.

But of course, he was younger then....

If you have a copy of any of Trewill's flick it would be very cool to upload them. I was always kinda pissed he didnt get around to uploading all his excellent work (before going off to make mouth love to hobos and such). Glad to hear your liking the read. They are pretty interesting. Im thiinking they might be worth picking back up in the future, time willing and such.

[riott007]

:ohmy:

[Dulci]

Wow... you've been busy. Nice. May any further bugs be cast upon your enemies and your upgrade path be clear.


Sent from my rotary dial phone to animatechnica's Nexus S using TapaTap then relayed via non-encrypted satellite to Uber's house who refused the relay thereby making it necessary to use Dulci's MB855 to call Monk to type this damn message into the forum.

:18:

[Rik Vargard]

A new home ! How sweet! How Amazing is this ! :tt1:
You guys just keep rocking!
Well done!

:sorcerer:Rik

[kuroken]

Okay, as mentioned in in the first post, we're going to (hopefully) be adding some new programming to TMOA in the next 6 weeks. I've put out a request for proposals for new programming which you can find here (http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb/showthread.php?6368-Request-For-Proposals-New-TMOA-Shows). All the details are there, so I won't go into it here.

I also have upped everybody's stored PM space from 50 PMs to 100 PMs, so knock yourselves out.

Tomorrow I'll be doing the upgrade from vBulletin 4.1.9 to 4.1.10 - shouldn't be any drama or cause any problems, but I'll put the board in maintenance during the upgrade, which shouldn't last more than 5-10 minutes.

Ken

[thebiz]

Hi Ken. The blog length is restricted to 10K characters per post. Is there any way we could double that? I'm trying to reprint an interview with Sisch and she could sure chat about her flicks.

[kuroken]

Hi Ken. The blog length is restricted to 10K characters per post. Is there any way we could double that? I'm trying to reprint an interview with Sisch and she could sure chat about her flicks.
Give it a shot now - just turned off the max characters per blog post, so you should be able to go as long as you like. Well, after I do this hopefully-quick upgrade to vBulletin 4.1.10....

(and the upgrade is done and didn't seem to break anything - if something doesn't seem to be working, let me know)

[Wailwulf]

How are we suppose to read our critics' replies on TMU?
http://i1121.photobucket.com/albums/l515/Wailwulf/The%20Movies/TMUnable2Read.jpg

[thebiz]

How are we suppose to read our critics' replies on TMU?


When someone clicks the "reply to this" link, a private message is sent to the person who left the review. Therefore you would receive a private message and can respond in kind.

The real (and rather unrelated) question is where did the reply button go on the forum? All I see is quote and multiquote buttons. Hmmm.

Edit: Ahh look at the beginning of the thread...Sorry.

[kuroken]

How are we suppose to read our critics' replies on TMU?
Hmmm, that's not what I'm seeing (or as far as I know, anybody else)

http://www.tmoaradio.com/screenie.jpg
You might try flushing your browser cache, or shutting down the browser and reloading. Definitely not coming out of the server that way.

[kuroken]

The real (and rather unrelated) question is where did the reply button go on the forum? All I see is quote and multiquote buttons. Hmmm.
As near as I can tell, you click "Reply With Quote" or the multiquote icon to insert quotes into your reply - click "Reply to Thread" (at the end of the thread) to make a reply without quoting a specific post - I agree, though, that there should be a straight reply choice on each post without quoting - I'll have to see if anybody has written a lil add-on that will give us one.

[Wailwulf]

Hmmm, that's not what I'm seeing (or as far as I know, anybody else)

http://www.tmoaradio.com/screenie.jpg
You might try flushing your browser cache, or shutting down the browser and reloading. Definitely not coming out of the server that way.

Now every thing looks like your. Weirdness, Well, at least it's fixed now

[kuroken]

I've added a donations button (that green thang that says "Donate" up in the menu bar) - read all about it right here (http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb/showthread.php?6376-Donations).

Next week, I'm gonna start looking at the CMS part of the forums - anybody have any thoughts on whether all users should be allowed to post there, if users can post there with moderation, or if only staff can post there? I can juggle the permissions for whatever seems right. (there was also a problem with registered users not being able to "read more" - wasn't able to find the permission setting for that when I was doing the upgrade and it was pointed out, but I'll figure that out as well....hopefully....)

Ken

[kuroken]

Thanks to the lovely Dulci's suggestion, we now have a new Forum called News Feeds that will eventually include RSS news feeds from a variety of sources.

The pilot source is Dulci's Scoop.it feed (yes, kids, these are THE VERY LINKS that the link-queen gives out on the renowned Wolf and Dulci Hour), but I hope to add feeds from MovieStorm, iClone, and other sources in the coming days.

I'm still playing with the configuration - it grabbed all the stuff from Dulci's Scoop.it page, since I told it to grab everything, but I'm not sure what will happen when I grab a really active feed - will it grab stuff going back years? Definitely something to look at when I add more. I also might want to break the News Feeds forum into subforums so people looking for iClone news, or MovieStorm news, or General news (all depending on the source feed) don't have to skim dozens of news articles that they're not interested in.

Also, if you have a suggestion for a feed, holler. We can also add feeds for your off-site blogs, if you like. Just let me know what you'd like to see.

Ken

[Dulci]

Thanks to the lovely Dulci's suggestion, we now have a new Forum called News Feeds that will eventually include RSS news feeds from a variety of sources.

The pilot source is Dulci's Scoop.it feed (yes, kids, these are THE VERY LINKS that the link-queen gives out on the renowned Wolf and Dulci Hour), but I hope to add feeds from MovieStorm, iClone, and other sources in the coming days.

I'm still playing with the configuration - it grabbed all the stuff from Dulci's Scoop.it page, since I told it to grab everything, but I'm not sure what will happen when I grab a really active feed - will it grab stuff going back years? Definitely something to look at when I add more. I also might want to break the News Feeds forum into subforums so people looking for iClone news, or MovieStorm news, or General news (all depending on the source feed) don't have to skim dozens of news articles that they're not interested in.

Also, if you have a suggestion for a feed, holler. We can also add feeds for your off-site blogs, if you like. Just let me know what you'd like to see.

Ken

Thanks Ken!

Lots of good feeds out there... here's two suggestions: http://www.scoop.it/t/machinima-prime & http://www.machinifeed.com/

[rgr]

Ken,

I know your lost of cool stuff to add only gets longer, but I figure I may as well add to it anyway. How cool would it be to have a film review function where you could click a button and get a random film assigned for you to review? The button could pick from recent films (or not even recent films) and use some heuristics to try and get reviews distributed somehow fairly. Obviously, we would need to allow a user to take a pass on an assignment and get another instead so folks are not stuck reviewing things they have no interest in.

It could be like, hmm I'm bored, I think I'll play toma review roulette ... and hit the button, watch a video, write up a review, rinse and repeat.

What do you think?

rgr

[kuroken]

Ken,

I know your lost of cool stuff to add only gets longer, but I figure I may as well add to it anyway. How cool would it be to have a film review function where you could click a button and get a random film assigned for you to review? The button could pick from recent films (or not even recent films) and use some heuristics to try and get reviews distributed somehow fairly. Obviously, we would need to allow a user to take a pass on an assignment and get another instead so folks are not stuck reviewing things they have no interest in.
In the lost days of history, in the The Movies Online days, there was a site called Review Trader. A lot of the oldtimers here will remember it, and probably most of them, myself included, were members. The idea was similar to this - people signed up at Review Trader, which put their movies in the pool and then members clicked a button to be taken to a random movie to review - they could decline (up to a point - being that the whole function of the site was to increase reviews for members, so unlimited declines kind of defeated the purpose, especially if you, as a member, were benefiting from the reviews of others).

I really like this idea as you presented it - and could expand on it to say that top reviewers could get some kind of recognition, through badges, etc. here in the forums. Technically we could do the recognition thing now, but....

A lot goes back to the movie site improvements mentioned in the Donations thread (http://www.tmoaradio.com/vb/showthread.php?6376-Donations) - when I started making websites in the early to mid-90s, it was all about typing raw HTML into Notepad, saving it, and loading the html file into a browser to see what it looked like. Things have changed, dramatically, in the past 15 years - these days it's all about SQL, php, CSS, etc. And my skills have not kept pace. At all. I can dabble, I can make changes to php code, edit CSS, do basic maintenance and changes to SQL databases - but real integration with multiple databases is way way way beyond my abilities - and it doesn't interest me enough to want to learn it.

I can tell you how to do it - tap the reviews table on the movie site, get the number of reviews, make that number a field variable in vBulletin, add the variable to the postbit template here and display a certain graphic badge if the variable is in a specified range. I don't have the skills to actually do that though.

On a grand scale, if we get the money to buy a new platform for the movie site, hire a php/SQL wiz to do the migration and cover the increased hosting costs, this would be something I'd definitely like to add to the process (and probably relatively simple to somebody who knows what they're doing) - on a smaller scale, depending on donations, I could probably get somebody to do this kind of thing for a minimal charge as well as things like the competition module that Rileyman was working on before he became the iPhone Application King of Manitoba (nothing snarky meant - Riley was hugely helpful to us, is a very skilled code and Web guru, and I hope he's shoveling piles of money into his bank account).

But I do really like the idea and it's on the list.

Ken

[kuroken]

Lots of good feeds out there... here's two suggestions: http://www.scoop.it/t/machinima-prime & http://www.machinifeed.com/
Both now added - have also broken down feeds into subforums, so people can more easily scan the feeds they're interested in without a lot of stuff they're not interested in.

Keep those feed suggestions coming - either here or in the thread in the News Feeds forum.

(and have added the MovieStorm Developer's Blog and John Martin's iClone/CrazyTalk Blog feeds as well)

[thebiz]

Both now added - have also broken down feeds into subforums, so people can more easily scan the feeds they're interested in without a lot of stuff they're not interested in.

Keep those feed suggestions coming - either here or in the thread in the News Feeds forum.

(and have added the MovieStorm Developer's Blog and John Martin's iClone/CrazyTalk Blog feeds as well)

I like the news feed addition but I generally keep up with the forums using the new post query and I fear missing non-news feed posts (posts by tmu members) in the flurry of rss feed updates. Will this update continually? Any thoughts suggestions?

Who thought I would end up complaining about there being too many posts...

Edit: This will also unfairly boost Ken's post count and make him appear to be particularly helpful/popular/interesting.

[Dulci]

I agree with Mr. TheBiz

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk

[kuroken]

Here's two solutions, one you can do, one I can do.

The problem right now is adding a new feed loads a bunch of new stuff, and so right now, What's New is full of stuff from the news feeds. If you go to the News Feed forum and click "Forum Tools, you can mark the entire forum as read and remove it from What's New for you (can also click Mark Forums Read) at the bottom of the Forum home page to wipe the slate clean. I'm assuming that there will only be a handful of new posts from news feeds per day, which won't drown out the regular forum posts, meaning this is probably a temporary problem.

From my end, I can download an add-on that will remove the News Feeds forum from "What's New", which solves the issue, but might cause you and others to miss something interesting.

Whatever works for you folks on this works for me.

(oh, and I can make an RSS Feed user (has to be some name on the posts) to avoid appearing helpful, popular, or interesting...I'm not nor do I need to be any of those things)

(and that's done - the poster for all future RSS feed posts, other than Ms. Dulci since she is a user here, is now RSSFeeder)

[macwemyss]

Hey Ken, thanks for all the changes - the site looks great!

I'm having one or two problems with the forums though... I dunno if it's just me but sometimes it takes multiple tries for me to get into various parts and often comes up with a database error screen (particularly the Movies Movies Movies section).. and I need to completely shut down my browser and reload to get back in (I'm using google chrome if that makes a difference).

[ashe5k]

Hey Ken, thanks for all the changes - the site looks great!

I'm having one or two problems with the forums though... I dunno if it's just me but sometimes it takes multiple tries for me to get into various parts and often comes up with a database error screen (particularly the Movies Movies Movies section).. and I need to completely shut down my browser and reload to get back in (I'm using google chrome if that makes a difference).

I'm getting it on FireFox so it's not just your browser.

[kuroken]

Hey Ken, thanks for all the changes - the site looks great!

I'm having one or two problems with the forums though... I dunno if it's just me but sometimes it takes multiple tries for me to get into various parts and often comes up with a database error screen (particularly the Movies Movies Movies section).. and I need to completely shut down my browser and reload to get back in (I'm using google chrome if that makes a difference).


I'm getting it on FireFox so it's not just your browser.
Yeah, wasn't a browser problem - at around 10 this morning (my time) the number of database connections hit a mix and started throwing errors (and 107 emails to me telling me about it...LOL) Hard to say what was causing it - database connections shouldn't remain after the browser grabs whatever info it's extracting (post text, graphics, whatever), but clearly a bunch of connections weren't letting go.

I rebooted the SQL service, which solved the problem, and am keeping an eye on the number of SQL processes open and my email to tell me if another problem arises. It may have just been a fluke with the SQL server and had nothing to do with the site itself. But I'll be keeping an eye on it for a while, and will investigate further - the only thing I can think is maybe one of the add-ons is hitting the database relentlessly, and isn't closing connections fast enough.

[macwemyss]

Hmmm, I like this feature too :)

Sent from my Desire HD using Tapatalk

[Dulci]

Hmmm, I like this feature too :)

Sent from my Desire HD using Tapatalk

Desire HD? Nice! :thumbup:

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk

[BiggsTrek]

Desire HD? Nice! :thumbup:

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk

Why do I feel left out?

(Sent from my fingers)

[Uber]

I'm feeling left out too.

(Sent from my keyboard like a normal person)

[thebiz]

Not me. Im on the inside staring out with my nose pressed into the glass!

(Sent from Uranus.)

[macwemyss]

Lol :D It's a nice phone Dulci, though more like a mini computer haha, I'm not used to having so much stuff on a phone..

Sent from my Desire HD using Tapatalk

[stvndysn]

Not me. Im on the inside staring out with my nose pressed into the glass!

(Sent from Uranus.)

wondered why i had diorhea at the moment .. now i know ... ewwwwwwwwwwww

[kuroken]

Facebook Connect is kicking my ass....

Thought I had solved the problem when I saw that you have to be logged out of Facebook for it to work the first time. Okay, so I logged out of Facebook (where I'd been working on the app) and was able to log in through the Facebook Connect button (up at the top, where you normally log in - if it's not there it's because I'm still working on it). Connected my account, and thought everything was GREAT!

No.

I could look at the forum pages, but when I tried to open a thread....hang, database error emails, badness.

So it's off now - I'm going to be working a little more with this over the next hour or so, see if I can figure out why the hell it's not working, then call it a day for now.

Edit: Still not working - so off I go in search of a way to make it work...

Edit 2: And still not working - tried to from Chrome, got rid of cookies, etc. etc. per some suggestions - now I can't wait to delete another 20 database error emails....

Edit 3: And I'm calling it a day on this project for now - may put through a support ticket to VBulletin to see if I can get some guidance on the problem, but for now, it's a wash - I'm tired of deleting database error emails...

[rileyman]

Wow, the forums have changed.
Wow, I have unread private messages from 2010.
Wow, see you all again after the 2012 armageddon!
:lol:

[thebiz]

RileyMan! Been a while.

[Anim8tor Cathy]

Ken - you *KNOW* I'm a Facebook whore. I need to link this bitch to Facebook. I need to bring my 170 friends into the forum. Where's the damn button? Am I soooo stoned I can't even see the damn button??? Well am I??? ... uh ... oh wait ... I am.

Viva Las Opiates!

:beta1:

[kuroken]

Ken - you *KNOW* I'm a Facebook whore. I need to link this bitch to Facebook. I need to bring my 170 friends into the forum. Where's the damn button? Am I soooo stoned I can't even see the damn button??? Well am I??? ... uh ... oh wait ... I am.

Viva Las Opiates!

:beta1:
You can post the thread to your Facebook wall or whatever the hell it's called - just use the share thing at the top of the thread. The Facebook Connect thing just lets you post thread replies and other stuff to Facebook, as well as "like" posts.

I haven't given up on Facebook Connect - I just just have to get over the heartbreak of my last attempt to make it work....

[Uber]

If you can conquer that massive cheeseburger.... you can conquer this.

[thebiz]

I like the news feed addition but I generally keep up with the forums using the new post query and I fear missing non-news feed posts (posts by tmu members) in the flurry of rss feed updates. Will this update continually? Any thoughts suggestions?

Who thought I would end up complaining about there being too many posts...

Edit: This will also unfairly boost Ken's post count and make him appear to be particularly helpful/popular/interesting.


I've given it some time to see if I get used to the RSS feed as threads and I still don't much care for it. It might be different if the threads had some content associated with them but when you click it rarely goes beyond the original title and if you follow the link it often takes you to a place that provides a link to go to the source material. So the thread is often 3 links away from whatever the thread is about. Am I just being crotchety? Its quite possible. Anyone else have any thoughts on this? Love the added content? Keeps you in the know? Makes it feel like there's a lot of action going on?

As a thought, It might be groovy if it were possible to place the RS feed links in a box/column to the left or right of the thread list. Or even just a list of links to the sites that the links are coming from. Even if the RSS feed threads stay I would love to see a list of links to external sites associated with TMU in some way.

[shidden]

yeah biz. to me its annoying. when i click on quick links and then todays post... all of them feeds are coming up. last time there were over 20 of them and i lost interest to look if somebody posted something in a thread or started a thread.

------------------------------------------------------------------
http://i206.photobucket.com/albums/bb272/yesmon/broncoandbilly2.jpg

[Rocco]

we need to grab people by the shalackies and make them share time for eachother

"the only way to have sex with a tyrannosaurus rex ....is from behind"

[JohnnyEx]

Odd and intriguing. Oh HOW I loathe change!
Damn you Ken and George Lucas!
Sigh and thanks for still bein here.
What a trip it was gettin home..
Perhaps I'll retell it all, ya'll wont believe it, as I was trapped in the future.
All good now.

[Bezzer]

Odd and intriguing. Oh HOW I loathe change!
Damn you Ken and George Lucas!
Sigh and thanks for still bein here.
What a trip it was gettin home..
Perhaps I'll retell it all, ya'll wont believe it, as I was trapped in the future.
All good now.

Welcome home mr. Ex:-)
Glad to see you back...from the future:-)

[TehPoptartKid]

Heh, I love the redesign. Easier on my eyes and stuff is easy to find.

Good work!

-James