Hi all I just wanted to give you a detailed update of some exciting changes coming to the forum! 
Apologies for the long post but it's important you hear the details of what's coming as it is important that you all understand what's coming up and why it's so exciting!
Over the past 6 months the mod team and I have been discussing an upgrade to the forum software we use here on the site that keeps you all busy and interacting with one another.
Now first for some background, the site as you know it (Expandas Downunder) from its inception has run on what is known as VBulletin 4 which is a world renowned piece of software and as I am sure you have seen is something that has built the foundation of our community from way back when to where we are now (Over 4 years later).
Currently as of now the site is still happily running VBulletin 4 but six or so months ago Internet Brands who develops VBulletin announced VBulletin 4 would be retired and VBulletin 5 would be introduced to take its place.
VBulletin 5 was touted as a complete re write of the VBulletin forum software product from the ground up and although it was announced 6 months ago it was also released at that time in a beta form to give existing forums an idea of what is coming and allow us to forward plan for its full release in early 2013.
At that time whilst VBulletin 4 was operating solidly on our forum and many others, development somewhat stalled for add on modules which you all use on a day to day basis sometimes without even knowing. Things like the mention system (User tagging), anti spam management, like this post and other tools. These are all written not by VBulletin but a community of coders who both devote their efforts for free and sometimes for a fee. We as a site running VBulletin rely on this development community to keep the extra features going and although development somewhat stalled it allowed us to focus on "What's Next".
Further to this knowing all this was coming it was exciting times for us as a group as it really allowed us to plan out what we wanted to do in 2013 for Expandas Downunder and ensure that if we upgraded to VBulletin 5 it would contain the bits and pieces we needed to continue engagement and membership growth of the site.
After careful assessment of the VBulletin 5 product we have found it unfortunately does not cater for the needs of Expandas Downunder in 2013 and beyond. Further to this to achieve everything we wanted to with a new version of forum software by introducing exciting new features we would need to look outside the box of VBulletin to achieve this.
Enter Xenforo; Xenforo is a forum product very much the same as VBulletin and although similar in usage where we can interact with people about our favourite topics its very different in its functions and add-ons. After carefully assessing Xenforo it certainly allows us to lay the foundation for the road ahead and most importantly provides you as users of the website the best possible experience on a day to basis moving forward.
So where are we going with all this? Well earlier in the month I mentioned we were making changes to the site to prepare for some upcoming changes and this was all part of this plan. So from mid next week we will be converting our forum over to the Xenforo platform with a fully tailored layout and alot of additional features to keep you in touch with your forums posts and others on the boards who you regularly communicate with.
I understand change is not always an easy thing but rest assured the entire team behind Expandas Downunder is ready for the change and have ensured a smooth transition to the new software product in the background.
All of your existing data will be moved across automatically and that includes forum posts, attachments, rankings, photos, usernames, passwords and everything else you have here on the site. You will simply see a new forum on the day and be able to login with your existing details and continue using the site but with a new software product in the background.
Please note though as Xenforo is a new product some differences will be apparent in the way you interact with the site and there will be a couple of small things you may need to correct once you gain access to the new site. These include things like your avatars; on Vbulletin avatars are quite a bit smaller compared to Xenforo so the resolution of the avatars looks a little blurry so new sized avatars will make your profile look alot more personal. Also currently to date image albums are not portable from VBulletin > Xenforo. All photos you have created will be available in a special forum for you to access but will require recreating in the new photo album section. We are working on a solution to this and more will come on launch day behind this.
Some of the exciting new features you will have access to is as follows (This is not the complete list but gives a few key features) -
1) You will have the ability to follow people on the forum, then in your profile you have an option called "News Feed" where posts from these people show up so you can see posts from certain people that you would are following! And yes you can follow more than one person and can easily enable / disable the list of people you follow.
2) Staff on-line right now is a available throughout the forum which shows you who from the Expandas Downunder team is on-line at the time you are on the site which gives you a person to contact should you have troubles.
3) Automatic thread preview when hovering over the title of a topic. This allows you to see a preview of a post before clicking into it so you can verify whether you want to click into a thread or not.
4) Recent Activity in your profile like a news feed of what's changed recently.
5) Likes you have received panel showing you a summary of the likes you have received and from whom.
6) A trophy system depending on the amount of posts you get a trophy will be added to your profile and this is something we will build on through the year.
7) Enhanced like system more details on this will follow the launch of the new site.
8) An enhanced search solution which allows for a more customised search allowing you to find information in a much more efficient and timely manner.
9) An alerts system which allows you to identify when someone responds to your threads or communicates with you via the differing communication channels.
10) Thread conversations via private messaging, much like Gmail if you are familiar with that which allows a complete thread conversation in the private messaging system.
11) Personalised status so you can let others know how you are feeling on the day.
And much much more!
I hope you are as excited as we are, it's a huge change and something that we have been working on for a long time in the background from server configuration to software development and much more.
Next steps, you will shortly see some screen grabs of the new site and mid next week we will flick the magic button and we will be outlining more of the new solution as we progress over the next few days.
Finally a huge thanks to @cruza driver, @chartrock, @Bushman and @Moto Moto for working through the change with me over the past 6 months we certainly wouldn't be here without you!
And to [MENTION=2232]Antman[/MENTION] for allowing us the usage of his images for the header of the forum and [MENTION=1933]andrea[/MENTION] for getting us the fantastic logo for our stickers which now becomes the new site logo which you will see shortly.
And Finally @MrsExpanda for putting up with me garbling about this for months!
If you have any questions please contact me directly and don't be afraid to chime in on anything as this change is about all of you and we are here to work through this change as a group together!
Exciting times ahead!!!!
Apologies for the long post but it's important you hear the details of what's coming as it is important that you all understand what's coming up and why it's so exciting!
Over the past 6 months the mod team and I have been discussing an upgrade to the forum software we use here on the site that keeps you all busy and interacting with one another.
Now first for some background, the site as you know it (Expandas Downunder) from its inception has run on what is known as VBulletin 4 which is a world renowned piece of software and as I am sure you have seen is something that has built the foundation of our community from way back when to where we are now (Over 4 years later).
Currently as of now the site is still happily running VBulletin 4 but six or so months ago Internet Brands who develops VBulletin announced VBulletin 4 would be retired and VBulletin 5 would be introduced to take its place.
VBulletin 5 was touted as a complete re write of the VBulletin forum software product from the ground up and although it was announced 6 months ago it was also released at that time in a beta form to give existing forums an idea of what is coming and allow us to forward plan for its full release in early 2013.
At that time whilst VBulletin 4 was operating solidly on our forum and many others, development somewhat stalled for add on modules which you all use on a day to day basis sometimes without even knowing. Things like the mention system (User tagging), anti spam management, like this post and other tools. These are all written not by VBulletin but a community of coders who both devote their efforts for free and sometimes for a fee. We as a site running VBulletin rely on this development community to keep the extra features going and although development somewhat stalled it allowed us to focus on "What's Next".
Further to this knowing all this was coming it was exciting times for us as a group as it really allowed us to plan out what we wanted to do in 2013 for Expandas Downunder and ensure that if we upgraded to VBulletin 5 it would contain the bits and pieces we needed to continue engagement and membership growth of the site.
After careful assessment of the VBulletin 5 product we have found it unfortunately does not cater for the needs of Expandas Downunder in 2013 and beyond. Further to this to achieve everything we wanted to with a new version of forum software by introducing exciting new features we would need to look outside the box of VBulletin to achieve this.
Enter Xenforo; Xenforo is a forum product very much the same as VBulletin and although similar in usage where we can interact with people about our favourite topics its very different in its functions and add-ons. After carefully assessing Xenforo it certainly allows us to lay the foundation for the road ahead and most importantly provides you as users of the website the best possible experience on a day to basis moving forward.
So where are we going with all this? Well earlier in the month I mentioned we were making changes to the site to prepare for some upcoming changes and this was all part of this plan. So from mid next week we will be converting our forum over to the Xenforo platform with a fully tailored layout and alot of additional features to keep you in touch with your forums posts and others on the boards who you regularly communicate with.
I understand change is not always an easy thing but rest assured the entire team behind Expandas Downunder is ready for the change and have ensured a smooth transition to the new software product in the background.
All of your existing data will be moved across automatically and that includes forum posts, attachments, rankings, photos, usernames, passwords and everything else you have here on the site. You will simply see a new forum on the day and be able to login with your existing details and continue using the site but with a new software product in the background.
Please note though as Xenforo is a new product some differences will be apparent in the way you interact with the site and there will be a couple of small things you may need to correct once you gain access to the new site. These include things like your avatars; on Vbulletin avatars are quite a bit smaller compared to Xenforo so the resolution of the avatars looks a little blurry so new sized avatars will make your profile look alot more personal. Also currently to date image albums are not portable from VBulletin > Xenforo. All photos you have created will be available in a special forum for you to access but will require recreating in the new photo album section. We are working on a solution to this and more will come on launch day behind this.
Some of the exciting new features you will have access to is as follows (This is not the complete list but gives a few key features) -
1) You will have the ability to follow people on the forum, then in your profile you have an option called "News Feed" where posts from these people show up so you can see posts from certain people that you would are following! And yes you can follow more than one person and can easily enable / disable the list of people you follow.
2) Staff on-line right now is a available throughout the forum which shows you who from the Expandas Downunder team is on-line at the time you are on the site which gives you a person to contact should you have troubles.
3) Automatic thread preview when hovering over the title of a topic. This allows you to see a preview of a post before clicking into it so you can verify whether you want to click into a thread or not.
4) Recent Activity in your profile like a news feed of what's changed recently.
5) Likes you have received panel showing you a summary of the likes you have received and from whom.
6) A trophy system depending on the amount of posts you get a trophy will be added to your profile and this is something we will build on through the year.
7) Enhanced like system more details on this will follow the launch of the new site.
8) An enhanced search solution which allows for a more customised search allowing you to find information in a much more efficient and timely manner.
9) An alerts system which allows you to identify when someone responds to your threads or communicates with you via the differing communication channels.
10) Thread conversations via private messaging, much like Gmail if you are familiar with that which allows a complete thread conversation in the private messaging system.
11) Personalised status so you can let others know how you are feeling on the day.
And much much more!
I hope you are as excited as we are, it's a huge change and something that we have been working on for a long time in the background from server configuration to software development and much more.
Next steps, you will shortly see some screen grabs of the new site and mid next week we will flick the magic button and we will be outlining more of the new solution as we progress over the next few days.
Finally a huge thanks to @cruza driver, @chartrock, @Bushman and @Moto Moto for working through the change with me over the past 6 months we certainly wouldn't be here without you!
And to [MENTION=2232]Antman[/MENTION] for allowing us the usage of his images for the header of the forum and [MENTION=1933]andrea[/MENTION] for getting us the fantastic logo for our stickers which now becomes the new site logo which you will see shortly.
And Finally @MrsExpanda for putting up with me garbling about this for months!
If you have any questions please contact me directly and don't be afraid to chime in on anything as this change is about all of you and we are here to work through this change as a group together!
Exciting times ahead!!!!
