Micah Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 The site upgrade from 4.2.2 to 5.1.3 was an abysmal failure. vBulletin promised new features, fixed bugs and greater performance. We received the contrary in amounts that could not have been anticipated without an active user-load. High memory and CPU usage, memory leaks, features that just plain do not work, other features that only break under load, new features that were never finished, and it performs FAR worse than the last version. vBulletin as a company has failed to create a product that evolves positively. vBulletin.org runs 3.6.12 - That should have been a clear indicator that they cannot even adopt their own software. It was not, and I apologize greatly for this lapse in judgment. I am, however, no longer bound by the legacy left to me by previous administrators; nor the promises of a hypocritical software company. At the time, upgrading to the latest vBulletin software was the clear choice as the data migration is seamless and only takes a couple hours. I investigated migrating to other forum software solutions; all of which required significant amounts of downtime to migrate and there would have been an even greater difference in interface continuity. Hindsight is 20/20, but what this experience has taught us is that the old version was plenty - it just needed a facelift. Unfortunately, there is no migration path back to 4.2.2. Fortunately and unfortunately there is a way out - only one way out. Invision Power Board is the product of choice for moving forward. Other forums in our hobby run it as well - notably, http://www.nano-reef.com. IPB supports migrations from vBulletin 5.1.3 and has a nifty hosted solution which will reduce the load on our team considerably. We will no longer have to worry about the uptime, software patching, server patching, site attacks, backups, etc. They handle all of this. It's also a cost effective solution - 20,30 and 45 bucks per month based on actual usage. We're currently spending 40/year; not including software fees. This solution seems ideal, affordable, and way too good to be true. That said, we're going to buy a month worth - get it up and running, import a backup of our data and let you guys at it (Obviously not in place of the existing server, but as a development copy). After we've determined it's snappy, looks good and everybody is happy with it. We'll schedule a time and switch everything over. Once that's done - we can decommission our current hosting solution. Seems like a lot of work, but really, it's far less than I do keeping the lights of our current site on in any given week. Once I have this test iteration deployed, I will publish the link, encouraging everybody to hit it hard. We can create a thread on the test forum with bugs and such. Hopefully nothing too severe. I am very sorry for the inconvenience this has caused everybody but I ensure you that I am dedicated to getting this site to a stable and extremely usable state. Thanks, Micah 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micah Posted November 19, 2014 Author Share Posted November 19, 2014 It should be noted as well that last night, vBulletin released a bunch of fixes for our current software. None of the fixes address performance. Auto-subscribe to content you participate in is fixed though... Soon they'll have all of the advertised features working - just in time to release the next buggy version. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheClark Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 Awesome, exciting stuff! It is great you are able to bring up a site in parallel for testing based on a backup. Looking forward to checking it out, sign me up for the beta please Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheClark Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 Just went through the features presentation here: http://www.invisionpower.com/apps/board/ Looks pretty good. Looking forward to trying it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micah Posted November 19, 2014 Author Share Posted November 19, 2014 Awesome, exciting stuff! It is great you are able to bring up a site in parallel for testing based on a backup. Looking forward to checking it out, sign me up for the beta please We actually did that with the current iteration as well. Unfortunately 99% of the problems we're facing are due to server load, which was impossible to replicate without making it live.... and once it goes live, there's no going back. That's why this time I'll be making this a public beta... encouraging people to hit it HARD... I'll also be running a couple of automation scripts against it from remote sources to simulate traffic/load. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheClark Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 Wow, Nano-Reef is smoking fast. I signed up for an account to check it out. I wonder which plan they are on. Noticed a 'Like' button, cool. A hosted solution makes ALLOT of sense for our smaller community of volunteers. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheClark Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 So I am sure a test backup and restore are part of the beta given the old VBulletin history, just sayin... (rock2)(rock2) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Z Reef Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 Why can't we go back to 4.2.2...? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ssappington Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 well, this is good news! glad to hear the problem is being addressed! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micah Posted November 19, 2014 Author Share Posted November 19, 2014 Why can't we go back to 4.2.2...? Because when you convert to 5.x.x, the database schema AND data changes dramatically. vBulletin has not developed a regression path back to previous versions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bicyclebill Posted November 19, 2014 Share Posted November 19, 2014 Wow, what a pain in the arse for you Micah! I'm still in awe and so appreciative of what you and the rest of the people behind the scenes are doing to make life prettier for us forum surfers. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reefnjunkie Posted November 20, 2014 Share Posted November 20, 2014 [language filter], I might be able to spam the forum again-I happen to be at my PC and thought I'd pop in to see whats new since the current version is a resource PIG as you outlined-to the point its not worth my time being in the past I surfed while on the iPad, that's not feasible anymore. I will say its allowed me to focus on my fantasy football league tho. Send me a text when the platform is online LOL Thanks for all you do Micah, Its gonna suck when you're gone :( Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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