Updating psychonaut.com

[mysticwarrior]

It's a long post and even if you don't understand everything, please keep reading till the end and say what you think.

The last period, a lot people did complain about the forum which is getting a little bit to old. It has LOTS of bugs, and every member who visits psychonaut, will finally one day meet them At the sametime this forum has lots of intelligent people who are building an great archive, some people even compare psychonaut with the hive etc, and it would be a good thing to keep it that way and so we need to keep those people here and they may not leave the forum because there are technical issues.

So a while ago, i started rebuilding psychonaut on a newer version of the phpbb forum. It will have the possibility of lots of new futures and is just much more advanced. I am sure a lot of you people would like to see this upgrade coming. But before we can upgrade the forum, i myself have to solve lots of technical issues that are very nasty to solve. It's my goal, to maintain the design which is not hard. But i run against some problems, which i think we need to discuss. So i have some question and it's very important that these are going to be answered for me, so i can move on and get it finished as soon as possible. Maybe what i am going to write is a little technical, but i want to try and explain it as easy as i can.

The forum which we use at the moment is build on Joomla and PhpBB, which are two pieces of great software. In fact it comes down to this, the frontpage is displayed by Joomla, which is a Content Management System which can be used for many different purposes. In the past, the people who made the forum, used an module which made it possible to let work Joomla and PhpBB together. This is also one of the reason why we meet so much bugs, because the module is far to old and there is not an new module which could link joomla with the newer version of PhpBB 3.0. This module is infact really needed if we want to solve all the technical issues. So I've done lots of research and came to the conclusion that using Joomla and PhpBB are not failed options any more.

So i had to find another Content Management System which is able to work together with the newer version of PhpBB3. And of course I have found one system called [link=http://www.drupal.org]Drupal[/quote], which is an very powerful CMS and has much more futures and possibility's then Joomla would ever dream about. But still it would never work the same as Joomla does, so here the technical problems are starting for me.

One of the main problems is that psychonaut.com is an multi-language website. Joomla and PhpBB could function properly as an multi-language website, but since we need to use another CMS, i can't find a good solution to keep the whole site in multi-language. Of course the new CMS that i am going to use, is also an multi-language platform. But it won't be easy to let work phpbb and drupal together as an multi-language site. Finally i would get it to work, but this is properly going to cost a hell of a time.

So one of my questions is, do you mind if for a certain period only the forum would be multi-language supported? I mean by this, that the frontpage and the top menu of psychonaut would be displayed in English and the forum it self can be displayed in multi-language.

If people do not mind if the frontpage and the top menu will be displayed only in English for a period of maybe a couple of month's, i can get the upgrade of psychonaut online as soon as possible(this month or next if everything works out fine). If you guys do not like this idea, then it takes me some more work to put the upgrade in place, but of course it will finally be realised without doubts. But if we could place the upgrade without the whole site being multi-language supported, it would probably speed up the process.

There was also another topic about your suggestion for psychonaut. If you have still some suggestion's, please post them over there! I will read the whole thread and will try to integrate some of the suggestions that are be made. Of course i can't realise all the suggestions, but the most important ones i will surely integrate. It's something we can discuss about with each other.

Next week i am going to work on the upgrade again. So that's why i had to tell/share you my perspective on this subject. All with all, i hope that soon psychonaut will be much more up to date and that we can grow and expand again

Because i already worked at the upgrade, i have already an forum online with a design that looks like the one where using right now. The forum is still not ready, it's only still a small review and lots of work needs to be done. But for the members who already want to see something:

http://www.anarchoinfinito.nl/psycho will be the place to see it working

Greats and much love,

Mysticwarrior.

 

[JustinNed]

Personally I don't even visit the front page I just got bookmark set straight to the index. I wouldn't think too many people would mind in order to get the forum running better, etc.

 

[Guest]

As I said, this idea is great and the software you're using is brilliant, it would definately give a second youth to psychonaut.com

How hard would it be to make the migration ?

 

[mysticwarrior]

How hard would it be to make the migration ?

Hmmm, to be honest for me it's not to easy to do, yet it is not impossible, i am sure i will get it done. A month back, i had it almost finished, but then my computer started to crash and i lost lots of data and also the psychonaut project. My motivation faded away because it. Lucky enough it's back and i had also still a part online, so i don't have to start from of the beginning. Yes i know, i need to backup everything

Anyway it seems, since there are not lots of reply's, that no one bothers it, if the top menu and the frontpage are in English. So i first going to make it work in English and then find away to let communicate drupal and phpbb properly about the language. As soon i got finished the first part, i will let you guys know, so we can test the new version of psychonaut. And if everyone is okay with it, then where going to put it online.

Sadly enough, i can still not say when it's ready. This is because you never know what problems you will meet when your building a website like psychonaut. But if everything's going fine and the site owner agree's with it. I think it can be done in one or two month's.

 

[Guest]

Well, kudos for all your hard work MW, I'm really impressed when I see people as involved as you are

 

[mysticwarrior]

Well, kudos for all your hard work MW, I'm really impressed when I see people as involved as you are

That motivates me! thanx

 

[JustinNed]

Agreed, good work. I know how those unexpected problems work though as I use to program.

 

[????????]

i personally could care less about the language. it randomly changes anyway for me, like right now, it's in portuguese. mystic you should have made a poll!

 

[Guest]

Yeah, I guess that everyone got used to the forum now, most of the users don't even read the buttons's labels and stuff, so language is really not a priority.

 

[mysticwarrior]

Then where just going to get it work! Thanx for your opinions, i did ask it because i needed to be sure, that no one was thinking that it is wasl problem.

Next week, i am going to continue my work

 

[Guest]

Btw, out of curiosity, what still needs to be done ?

 

[mysticwarrior]

Mainly the frontpage still needs to be done. What means that phpbb needs to integrated into drupal. And maybe adding some modules for phpbb, to make the forum even better. But the last thing, can be done even when the forum is already online. It isn't much work, tough it can gets complicated Especially to intergrate, all the members and topics into the new system could become u HUGE problem. Since the phpbb version that's right know used by psychonaut.com, is edited to let work joomla and phpbb together.