Hi,

We just wanted to voice or concern and dismay re the impending deprecation of the Support requests feature.

Appreciate it's somewhat basic and that there's more advanced alternatives on the market but for many small communities like ours, all we need is a basic solution and that's exactly what Invision provides. This is the primary reason we upgraded to the commerce package and we will be removing this from our subscription once the feature is removed.

Like many, we are entirely non-profit, maintained by a small team of volunteers. The prospect of having to install & maintain another third party COTS application just to meet our basic ticket requirements is not welcome, same for paying for a third party hosted application that will likely require some integration. - No thanks. 

At the very least, Invision could create a method whereby a simple contact form submits a topic in a designated forum whereby site staff can reply. The user could then respond to their support topic via email. This would at least provide some basic functionality. I think it's fair to say that a "Contact Form" of sorts is a basic requirement of any website and it's a shame that the related support requests feature is being deprecated.

We will probably resort to using a basic contact form + mailbox for support requests, but in the past I have found this to be a much less effective of keeping support requests organised and the lack of integration with Invisions interface will be a major drawback.

Thanks

 

Edited December 10, 20231 yr by Canal World

This is what I used to do before moving and using commerce. Having it all on the front end makes it a little easier, and it can also help staff members who don't have access to ACP.

 

This is what I used to do before moving and using commerce. Having it all on the front end makes it a little easier, and it can also help staff members who don't have access to ACP.

As an alternative, you can use Pages to create a new support system based on same idea with tickets as on Commerce.

 

Yeah, until they scrap pages too 😄

I'll just quote the official statement they did a few months ago : 

• ”We will help anyone that uses the support desk feature to find an alternative and plan a migration.
• We will create and strengthen native APIs to enable apps like Zendesk and Helpscout to access your community data for use in custom fields, etc.
• We will work with you to help migrate your data. Please contact us if you'd like to learn more about migrating support data to another service.”

They already thought about replacement for ticket system and as i saw on a few different community they already start using 3rd party website for the support section.

And, if you don't want to use Pages, you can get in contact with one of the providers to create an app for your desire.

Now that we are very near release, is there a recommended path/setup for those of us that use Support Requests in V4? I’d prefer to stay in the Invision Community space as much as possible (opposed to a seperate software). I will handle email with an auto-responder.

I won’t be switching to V5 until our major custom app gets updated so I have a bit of time.

Thanks!

 

IPSv5 already has a third-party option for a built-in support system. Its developer is an IPS employee, guaranteeing future updates and the rest. You can find it here at this link.

I now use my private messages as my support system and connect my profile send message link to the contact us button.

Ha, @Daniel F post came while I was typing.

50 euros for something our current software already supports is pretty egregious. I still fail to see the reasoning behind removing it. Even in its basic form it's still valuable. I for one love the fact that commerce support threads can span email chains and don't force you to be a part of the community.

 

Any website that needs a support system to offer support, must be earning some sort of income to be offering support. €50 as a one time payment which includes future updates and support is more than reasonable for the time and effort @Daniel F put into creating the app. Unless you are one of those people who pay the IPS $200 per year classic fee or IPS cloud service fee, to offer people free service and support, who then expects everything should be free.

Spend money to make lots more money, that's the aim of the game.

You're missing the point that the current software offering has this functionality already for a fee. Is commerce's price going to reduce with the reduction in functionality? Or is it going to stay the same + the increase in cost having to go elsewhere for functionality that is being removed?

 

Not really constructive. I was directed here from the last update as a place to discuss it and trying to shut down discussion isn't helpful.

There is no discussion here but time wasting. I'll repeat it once more.

IPS removed the support system and nothing anyone will say or do will make them return it. You either find an alternative or you live without it. Full stop!

 

If someone were to come in here and saw support and decide to work on porting and maintaining it, then you'd be proven wrong.

That's what this community needs. People who can help to improve and help to evolve the IPS software to be greater than it already is. I encourage you to do it, as I'm sure some community members would find it useful to a have a ported version of the old IPS support system.

 

That's what this community needs. People who can help to improve and help to evolve the IPS software to be greater than it already is. I encourage you to do it, as I'm sure some community members would find it useful to a have a ported version of the old IPS support system.

You might not be the best to ask this, but maybe you know. Is the current 5.0 version in any sort of stable state and available to use? If so, I might dig into it. I already make small adjustments to the code of my current install. Going to be annoying to migrate those to 5, but I'll already have reason to have my nose in it. It may be something I consider doing.

Edited February 9Feb 9 by Sakisan

 

I'll be total honest. It's the best. And when I say best, I do really mean it's the best system on the market at this moment. I find it very stable. There are a few bugs which should be expected from a software that was rewritten mostly from scratch, but the IPS dev team are fixing them as fast as they can.

Was mostly asking if 5 itself as a version is stable enough, but that's good enough. I've been using ipb since the 1.x days. A very long time. Used to originally use the non-commercial free version 👼a few years later eventually getting a life license in 2006. Sad time to see the life-ness pulled back but hey, what can you do. I've stuck it out this long. Might as well put something back into the community I've used for over 2 decades 😎 I guess I shall take a peek at the 5.0 code and see if it's something I want to get into and hopefully for at least my own benefit it is.