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From 3.1.4 to 3.3.4 it's a downgrade to me.


GfxMan

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Hi to the developer of invision board from a long time user.
I waited a lot before updating the board, beacause it's always incredibly time consuming form my personalized skin.

Bytheway i decided to go grom 3.1.4 to 3.3.4 and that's what me, and me 80.000 board user found today:

0 - the ability to use in the non-real time editor the html builder: why is that? why do you hide the bbcode button in that editing mode?
It's easier to use the non-real time editor, when you have a lot of images and url.

1 - topic description > gone. We have tags now. Not the same at all, very bad decision to remove it.

2 - warning panel and level in the user profile > gone. now i have to go in the user profile
2a - ability to send a MP from the warning panel when i took an action like restrict from posting for a user.
That was incredibly usefull to comunicate the punishment to the user and start talking with them about that.

3 - fast button to send an MP from the user profile in the topic > gone
4 - jump forum list > gone in favor of the little tiny small invisible icon in the up right of the board
5 - user ability to have a custom number of post per topic > gone

6 - why i can't delete all the unapproved topic in a fast way? i have a 4 million post board, with 600 topic hidden and thousand of spammer "unpproved post" am i supposed to delete them by hand?

7 > top poster hook? i can't find it, gone?
8 > watched forum and topic > i cant' find it, gone?

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You forgot about "linear view > gone!"

Non-<censored> BB-Code editor > gone!!11

Yes, at last time IPB becomes a mix of some SoCiAL-emO-faeces and less look like a forum. It's a problem.

I personally think IPS now need to delay introduction of new features and concentrate on cleaning the engine of a large backlog of problems. Then enter the really necessary things, solving problems of internationalization. Instead of typing a bunch of decorations of questionable utility.

PS. Sorry for my english.

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I can post a tutorial about how to get topic descriptions back if you really need it. Right now im trying to make a workaround on how to get avatars back, so far im doing good, but the images get distorted and out of place on the profile view. (I Just really like the avatar feature they had, so im gonna do all I can to get it back)

Was linear view also part of 3.1.4? Maybe I can do something if it's from 3.1.4.

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5) IPS has already announced why this was done... It is for SEO purposes so that posts on 'Page 2' are the same for ALL users.
8) You can watch forums and topics using the button at the top of the topic or forum...

Some of these ommisions you're talking about could simply be an ommission in your personalized skin.

As i'm sure you're aware, skins are infinitely customizable... In many cases omissions of information where you want them can be easily put back...

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0 - the ability to use in the non-real time editor the html builder: why is that? why do you hide the bbcode button in that editing mode?


It's easier to use the non-real time editor, when you have a lot of images and url.



This is the biggest problem I have with IPB-versions higher than 3.1 currently. Some months back, maybe a year.. I think IPS promised they would be back in some future release. We might hope for it in 3.4, but no promises from me... But I REALLY hope it will be. The new editor have lots of problems that I would've simply ignored if the simple mode editor worked as before.

1 - topic description > gone. We have tags now. Not the same at all, very bad decision to remove it.


We found topic descriptions in most situations to be uneccessary and actually had it commented away already back in 2.3.X. With only admins and moderators able to set them up.

The problem was due to members mostly using the fields incorrectly. With something like "HELP!!!" in the topic title, while the actual useful information would be placed in the description. This was a problem since the search engine never have searched through the description and the most important part of the title section didn't contain the useful information.

You can get topic descriptions back with this hook: http://community.invisionpower.com/files/file/4873-pav33-topic-description/

2 - warning panel and level in the user profile > gone. now i have to go in the user profile


2a - ability to send a MP from the warning panel when i took an action like restrict from posting for a user.


That was incredibly usefull to comunicate the punishment to the user and start talking with them about that.



3 - fast button to send an MP from the user profile in the topic > gone


Not really sure about number 2 since they were changes introduced in IPB 3.3 and I'm not sure if I understand what you mean.

Not sure about 3 either, MP?

4 - jump forum list > gone in favor of the little tiny small invisible icon in the up right of the board


5 - user ability to have a custom number of post per topic > gone


4. While I agree it's not clear what's gonna happen when you click the new button, I have to say the old way always seemed "ugly" to me, I didn't like it. But I agree that there exists a lot better solutions for the forum jump. Then again we're not really bothered too much with this, since we decided to make a custom click-expandable forum list menu in the left menu we have in our skins.

5. This one really bothers me. I kind of accepted the explanation I got from IPS back in the day, but I believe they made the wrong choice. It's a combination of complaints from users. How some users won't have more than 20 posts due to some image topics and some members who want to have lots of posts on pages without having to click through them all. Combine this with the possible need for administrators to decide the number of posts per page for things like ad placement, guests not being bombarded with information, acceptable scroll-lengths etc. And in additon not the all too promising effects changing it may have on search results and indexing etc. So I feel this is one of the features I want them to bring back.

6 - why i can't delete all the unapproved topic in a fast way? i have a 4 million post board, with 600 topic hidden and thousand of spammer "unpproved post" am i supposed to delete them by hand?


Was that possible before? Why didn't you delete them then?


8 > watched forum and topic > i cant' find it, gone?



Click your username on the black menu bar -> My liked content. Toggle edit options to change the notification frequency.



And this is why you don't upgrade before doing your research :)
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post count filter on IPB cpanel/members serarch >> gone
important when u wanna split a member group based on post count or even clean board for all 0 posts members.
Cant really understand why this was removed from IPB cpanel either since its available on forum side/members tab (advanced search options)
cant really understand why everything is so backwards nowadays with IPB, honestly

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  • 1 month later...

I have a different list of complaints, but I completely agree with this:


I personally think IPS now need to delay introduction of new features and concentrate on cleaning the engine of a large backlog of problems. Then enter the really necessary things, solving problems of internationalization. Instead of typing a bunch of decorations of questionable utility.



I'm very reluctant to upgrade from 3.1.x myself. Given all the bad design in 3.1.x, I anticipate lots and lots of problems in all those frills added for 3.3.x. And I believe making forums more Facebook-like rather than easier to use as forums is self-defeating -- it's not appropriate for my site anyway.

Facebook as a platform and user experience is garbage. Even the teens are deserting it because it's lost its cool.
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I have a different list of complaints, but I completely agree with this:




I'm very reluctant to upgrade from 3.1.x myself. Given all the bad design in 3.1.x, I anticipate lots and lots of problems in all those frills added for 3.3.x. And I believe making forums more Facebook-like rather than easier to use as forums is self-defeating -- it's not appropriate for my site anyway.



Facebook as a platform and user experience is garbage. Even the teens are deserting it because it's lost its cool.



The forums aren't more 'Facebook-like' they are still the same forums. The enhancements that have been made allow your users to share content from your site to the social media. Which, if you don't like, you can entirely disable.

You're latching onto something that has nothing to do with the recent upgrades. The 3.2.x and 3.3.x series introduces better SEO, upgrades to java, Ajax, prototype, to give your users a more advanced/current web standard use of your forums.

You are more than welcome to keep your forums in the 3.1.x series. That is your prerogative if you don't want to keep your forums up to date with the latest web standards.
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  • Management

This topic is very half empty isn't it?

When developing software, you sometimes have to remove things in order to continue moving forwards. A lot of people were confused about photos/avatars as they both did almost the same thing. The posts-per-page option had to be removed so we can use a universal /page-x/ identifier in the URL which is better for SEO and better for humans (this is coming in 3.4).

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6 - why i can't delete all the unapproved topic in a fast way? i have a 4 million post board, with 600 topic hidden and thousand of spammer "unpproved post" am i supposed to delete them by hand?



I'm currently upgrading from 3.1.4 to 3.3.4, and my jaws fell to the ground reading it.

I checked the fact, and we can't indeed any more mass delete / approve / unapprove hidden topics and messages in a forum.

Why that ?? :( :mad:
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I'm currently upgrading from 3.1.4 to 3.3.4, and my jaws fell to the ground reading it.



I checked the fact, and we can't indeed any more mass delete / approve / unapprove hidden topics and messages in a forum.



Why that ?? :sad: :mad:




I would expect the decision to remove the feature was not made lightly. There is undoubtedly a big picture reason why the IPS team did this.

Solution: approach one of the top modders to develop a hook or modification to restore that functionality. Before you cry foul over having to pay extra, consider that IPS must design their features to work efficiently while addressing a huge spectrum of demands.
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  • 2 months later...

I would expect the decision to remove the feature was not made lightly. There is undoubtedly a big picture reason why the IPS team did this.

Solution: approach one of the top modders to develop a hook or modification to restore that functionality. Before you cry foul over having to pay extra, consider that IPS must design their features to work efficiently while addressing a huge spectrum of demands.

Completely wrong approach! Instead of listening to the paying customers what these customers want and need the IPS is forcing customers to accept their product as it is and was done.

When developing software, you sometimes have to remove things in order to continue moving forwards. A lot of people were confused about photos/avatars as they both did almost the same thing. The posts-per-page option had to be removed so we can use a universal /page-x/ identifier in the URL which is better for SEO and better for humans (this is coming in 3.4).

Completely wrong! Why "moving forward" is more important that having happy customers?

That wasn't my aim. You and only you control what you do with your board.

I was merely correcting your seemingly incorrect understanding of later versions.

Not so true - I was happy using 2.x forums but was forced by IPS to do the upgrade to 3.x because of support being stopped for 2.x. This is the truth I can prove with logs and screen shots communicating with IPS staff. As soon as I wrote I'm still using 2.3, the reply was "sorry, it's an old unsupported version" and support session closed.

Why there's a need to change something when people are satisfied? Just to be cool and could tell the world "we are using the most recet web standards"? Thats bull-you-know-what. Unfortunately this is not just the problem of IPS, a lot of companies do products not to be functioning but to look nice. However you should take into consideration the fact that people are not going to the forums to see fancy graphics, sliding menus, facebook i-dunno-what integration, but for the informations in the forums! They want the information and want it quickly. Unfortunately it seems this fact was heavily overlooked by the key decision makers at IPB in the past two years!

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hxigor,

IPS and the 'others' you refer to are companies. They are constantly innovating and marketing their product to help the bottom line. You may not need the new features, but some want them, and more...

Probably a better example... If Apple never made a new iPhone since it's original launch in 2007, do you think it would have the market share it does now? I'd think not.....

As with any company, products are phased out / no longer supported. This allows said companies to focus their resources on the newer products. Look at Microsoft, they officially announced, a long time ago really, they were going to stop providing updates for Windows XP... IPS not supporting the oldest of its versions is no different.

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  • 2 months later...

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