Forum Migration Scheduled for Jan 24th
Over the last few months, we’ve been working on a new Arduino Community Forum, and it’s about to open. We’ve been listening to comments and requests you’ve made, and have incorporated several of them:
* The categories have been rearranged and simplified
* We’ve added the ability to post pictures and video from YouTube, Flickr, or Vimeo
* Added better email notifications
* Added a new profile page
* Added a new help page for newcomers
* Added notification pop-ups when login to the forum
* Made the style compliant with the Arduino Look’n’Feel
About Your New Profile
The new Community Forum will include both the discussion forum and the playground. You’ll be able to login to both with one user profile. As we add new features in the future, this profile will apply to them as well, to make your whole experience of the Arduino site easier. You’ll see your login status in the menu bar, and if you’re not a member yet, you can sign up from the menubar as well. Members will be able to post in the forums and edit the playground. When we open the Arduino Store site in a few weeks, you’ll have the option to register your Arduino boards with your profile too. This optional feature will help us offer better support, by knowing which batch of boards yours comes from, and other manufacturing details. We want to offer the best support we can for the tools we make.
The new forum and playground will still be open to discussion of Arduino derivatives and offshoots as it always has. We consider those a valuable part of the community.
Your privacy is important to us. The new profile database is more modern and secure than the old one, and the interface uses standard HTTPS transfers so your profiles will happen securely. Most fields will be optional, so you only enter data about yourself that’s it’s useful to you as part of the Arduino community. We hope this new system will make it possible to manage the community discussion and to support Arduino products better for you.
The Transition
In order to make the transition work well, we’re going to freeze the old forum and start anew with the new one. The old forum will remain open and accessible and searchable as an archive, but its content has not been ported into the new forum. If you have posts or items that you feel should be ported to the new forum, you’re welcome to do so. Having watched the Processing team make a successful forum this way, we felt it was the most effective way to upgrade our own forum.
Here’s how the change will happen:
* On January 24th we will freeze the old forum at 9AM CET/ 3 AM EST, disabling login or posting. The same will happen for the Playground. Both sites will remain browsable, however.
* We will migrate all the users to the new forum. This should take several hours. Once that’s done, we’ll open the new forum.
* The new forum should open by the end of the day CET on January 24th, assuming a quick and successful migration.
* You will be able to access the new forum with the same login and password you used for the old forum.
* We will keep a team working around the clock for 48 hours to make sure things are working and to fix any problems as they arise
January 18th, 2011 at 11:13:59
What time is that in familiar non-proprietary GMT or UTC?
January 18th, 2011 at 11:49:46
Not thrilled by the no-migration approach – this will make things complex for a few months/a year or so.
Is migration really so tricky?
What forum type are we going to then?
January 18th, 2011 at 12:41:41
Awesome!! Now Arduino has there own store!!
January 18th, 2011 at 14:47:12
9AM CET is 8AM GMT/UTC, local time can be calculated using
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_time_zones_by_country
January 18th, 2011 at 14:57:03
phpbb, smf, vbulletin… which is the software of the new forum?
January 18th, 2011 at 15:12:23
@mowcius: I have a feeling it might be vBulletin by Jelsoft Enterprises, but that’s just a “gut feeling”.
My question is whether we’re all going to be “junior members” again…sigh. I don’t care so much about the number, more so than if everyone on the forum is a “newbie”, nobody will know who has been around longer, or who has the most postings (who is most active and helpful), etc – that some real newbies use to determine if the advice they are getting is quality advice from “old timers”.
I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.
January 18th, 2011 at 15:55:08
And will the Playground NOT be ported either?
I would feel very abused if that were the case…. I’ve worked hard on sections of that, thinking I was “building” something….
Would not be inclined to repeat the work.
January 18th, 2011 at 16:28:13
Heh well…. though im really exited about the new forum the old one wasn’t that bad either lets see what will happen !! ( +1 with cr0sh )
January 18th, 2011 at 16:40:52
I think at least some playground information should be ported like the really good tutorials and libraries.
On the other hand, if nothing gets ported everything added will be more up to date.
On the other hand again, things added by members who aren’t active anymore what are still useful will perhaps be forgotten.
So, I would say: wait some mouths or so and then place links for every thing that has not been redone in the new playground that point to the old playground so nothing gets forgotten.
JanD
January 18th, 2011 at 16:49:42
cr0sh, I will simple register as you and have it my way 🙂
I really really disliked what the “newer” Processing forum. Bad example. Very different look and feel and …
January 18th, 2011 at 16:53:37
I can’t see a single new feature that warrants the pain of creating a new forum.
As far as I can see the current one ain’t broke…and you know what they say about fixing things that ain’t broke.
Time will tell I suppose.
January 18th, 2011 at 17:44:48
Can I change my user name to Grumpy_Robert 🙂
Flattery and all that …
January 18th, 2011 at 19:11:35
Hmmm. So simple to run an import script…. why lose existing content and users? Quite odd.
recommendation: XenForo.com
January 18th, 2011 at 20:40:39
You say “We’ve been listening to comments and requests you’ve made”.
I’m only a “God Member”, but this announcement that this WILL happen is the first I’ve heard of it. A little (more) consultation, or an explanation of why things can’t go on as they are would have left a better taste in the mouth.
If it ain’t broke- don’t “fix” it.
I hope decent search facilities will be silver lining for what I anticipate will be a cloud.
January 18th, 2011 at 22:15:59
If we all will be newbies again…
I just can’t wait to write my first “It doesn’t work” post… Ahh, good old times.
January 19th, 2011 at 12:34:59
Quoting:
I have a feeling it might be vBulletin by Jelsoft Enterprises, but that’s just a “gut feeling”.
Well, that would be a pretty bad idea.. vBulletin is a non libre proprietary software. Absolutely a wrong move for an open community like Arduino.
I’m also against the non porting of the old stuff approach .. I still don’t understand why all these changes are made in “secret” while Arduino has a huge community of people which could help doing such things..
Personally, I’ve worked on porting DBs between different platforms and I would have been happy to help with this..
January 19th, 2011 at 18:48:16
vBulletin, Jelsoft Enterprises? That’ s the same service as the Ubuntu Forum uses!
January 20th, 2011 at 00:19:56
If posts don’t get migrated, I highly doubt I will continue to post and help on the new forums… It’s already hard enough to get users to use the search feature, having to direct them to two different searches…. NOT GUNNA HAPPEN…
Change your mind guys…. trust us… You will not be happy with the results if you don’t.
January 20th, 2011 at 02:38:42
SMF is completely open source and a way better option than vBulletin.
Migrating YaBB flat files to SMF mySql would be difficult but not impossible. The off-the-shelf solutions don’t work completely, but they are enough to avoid having to start a forum from scratch.
Starting from scratch is a really bad idea. People here need to be making intelligent decisions, not quick decisions, so spend a bit more time going over all the options and speak with web developers that are experienced in this field before doing something you’ll likely regret.
January 21st, 2011 at 08:43:43
Quote: “SMF is completely open source and a way better option than vBulletin. ”
Nope. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_Machines_Forum#SMF_and_free_software
January 21st, 2011 at 11:47:45
I agree with the comments above. I’d port everything, and if that’s not possible, I’d stay with the current forum. I have no complaint about it.
I just think It might become quite tricky to find a topic if there are two different forums, and besides that, it might be useful to reply to a thread in which a related problem has been discussed and there’s more information about it rather than creating a new post in the new forum.
January 22nd, 2011 at 18:07:13
I think it’s a really bad decision to not migrate the old topics to the new forum. I hope you will reconsiderate that approach.
What’s the reason for not migrating the old content?
January 22nd, 2011 at 18:07:54
Reconsiderate = reconsider
January 24th, 2011 at 09:01:52
“The old forum will remain open and accessible and searchable as an archive, ”
… not so at the moment. Attempts to access it insist on logging in. Not being registered already, means I am LOCKED OUT! Not happy!
January 24th, 2011 at 11:56:01
Goodmorning, i’ d like to register . Where is the link where i can register.
January 24th, 2011 at 14:52:59
How can i register to arduino forum ? I’ d like to join with the group to translate arduino.cc from english to italian
January 24th, 2011 at 17:59:45
HOW DO YOU GET THERE? Every link I try takes me to the OLD forum.
Granted I am currently in South Africa (vs. at home in Portland Oregon, USA), and I am never quite positive about exactly what time it is. But I thought it was supposed to be open by now (8pm in UTC+2 zone)
January 24th, 2011 at 18:25:05
Who can i find the url for the new forum ?
January 24th, 2011 at 19:00:05
All I hear is complaints-complaints-complaints. Times change, the world changes, forums change.
I found the forum quite suckky compared to the other 14 forums I frequent. Sure there will be gremlins popping up, lets work through them and enjoy the better forum.
As for old information I think something like a wiki should be started (the Suzuki DR650SE has a nice one) to capture the kinda info that constantly comes up year after year in a forum.
But in the end, its a new forum, some will like it, many will hate it, a few might even leave, in the end you can not keep everyone happy.
January 24th, 2011 at 19:27:08
when will this happen? i can’t see any changes yet and the clock is way past 9…
January 24th, 2011 at 19:33:06
WHERE IS IT? All the links appear to take me to the OLD forum.
January 24th, 2011 at 20:11:53
Is the forum still not up?
How come I see people logged in? 🙂
January 25th, 2011 at 00:42:12
I’d feel bad for grumpy mike if the post count was reset.
Also, I agree to whoever said it: requiring two searches to find a solution to a problem is not going to work. Maybe a customized google search that includes both forums? Should be easy.
January 25th, 2011 at 05:42:41
What’s the outlook for the new forum opening?
January 25th, 2011 at 07:41:51
What’s happening guys. 24 hrs now and not a word. At least give is some word about progress.
“open an email account for you to send your comments, please be patient :-). Both will be announced at the Arduino.cc page”
Where?
Meanwhile on the old forum people can still respond to their own threads and are probably wondering why eveyone is ignoring them.
January 25th, 2011 at 09:17:43
My son sent me this email with the migration email attached:-
Dear arduino user,
Mike Cook (Grumpy Mike) has beaten everyone at the game of ‘Forum’. To this end we are resetting everything and starting again
Many thanks, Arduino
😉
January 25th, 2011 at 10:45:45
Hi guys,
What is url of the new forum ??
January 25th, 2011 at 11:00:05
Hallo,
vielleicht bin ich der einzige deutschsprechende Forumsteilnehmer, der nicht weiß, wie das neue Forum zu erreichen ist.
Oder ob es überhaupt schon erreichbar ist, einige aktuelle Kommentare legen die Vermutung nahe, dass das neue Forum noch nicht funktioniert und das alte nicht mehr…
January 25th, 2011 at 12:05:44
still not up ??? …. maybe “, assuming a quick and successful migration. ” didn’t happen
January 25th, 2011 at 12:37:54
Should we start downloading “wiring” yet ? 😉
January 25th, 2011 at 12:39:36
i’m still waiting for the forum upgrade… or is this only a big joke to get the server load down? =P
January 25th, 2011 at 13:04:35
Try this instead: http://mbed.org/
January 25th, 2011 at 14:04:33
@Ian: looks good, but personally I wouldn’t buy anything that forces me to work with tools only available online. If you shut down or disappear, it turns into a useless piece of hardware.
January 25th, 2011 at 15:01:38
Now seriously — what are the chances of an embedded prototyping platform’s online facilities ever shutting down or disappearing, eh?
January 25th, 2011 at 15:06:28
So… Any news on the state of the new forum?
January 25th, 2011 at 15:26:35
“ever shutting down”
100%
How come no news on new forum update??????????????????????????
January 25th, 2011 at 16:04:01
Has the new forum been opened or not? I have not been able to find a link to it, or any other word about its’ status other than this blog posting and comments. I really hope the people behind this decision are going to keep their faithful members up to date. Lack of communication does not build confidence; if something is not going right, it’s okay, most of us are IT Professionals, we know how migration and conversion projects go: not as planned 🙂 Ask yourselves what the worst thing you can do for the business units you have to answer to? Lack of communication is a killer. The forums are arguably the most powerful tool in Arduino development.
January 25th, 2011 at 16:07:44
100%
January 25th, 2011 at 16:11:53
isn’t is over 🙁 !
January 25th, 2011 at 16:36:19
all this delay gives me time to improve on my project before I post it on the exhibition. it’s an arduino music box interactive art piece. Being a scientist this is my first interactive art piece. All you have to do is to complete your projects and meditate until the new forum is up and running so we can all post like crazies.