Important Announcement

[Grant 4,298]

You may recall towards the end of last year, I was saddened to hear of the death of one of the software developers and unfortunately the major impact it had on the development of some of the modules we were implementing at NZBees.

 

I've also since seen some considerable impact from changes the software vendors have made to licensing arrangements and access to third party add-ons, which has ultimately had a knock on effect with regards to development growth and updates.

 

As a result I will need to make some significant changes to the site in order that it can remain secure (updates and patches) and also develop in the areas that I want to, and this will unfortunately mean a change to the platform.

 

With 10 years of historical data the site is as you can imagine, pretty big. But a lot of that data is now irrelevant - think TBH, NBA. Another large chunk of it was written prior to changes to international data handling and privacy and we have huge number of member registrations that are dormant or banned, so I have a reluctance to transfer it all over. 

 

The intention therefore is that this site will become a read only archive that will remain active for reviewing previous posts, and a new forum will be implemented going forward. There will be links back to this site for continuity, but there will not be a seamless integration in this instance (as we have done previously)
 

Data that would be good to take across would be:

• Active blogs
• History topics
• Relevant documents from the downloads section
• Swarm listings

 

• User post count and reputation
• Member subscriptions

 

It's not an ideal situation and one I can arguably avoid by just letting this site tick over as is, but the problem then would be site security down the line. An announcement will be made in due course, when the transitional site is upto spec to allow suitable transfer. In the meantime if you have any questions or suggestions regarding content you would like incorporated, please let me know.

 

 

[yesbut 6,230]

I don't know if this is what you want to hear but I recall the site was once straightforward simple and intuitive. Last year or so it's gotten fatter with features no-one understands and steadily less intuitive. Going forward I vote for simplicity.

[Grant 4,298]

It actually works out really well for this. By having the features we want from the start it's going to be a case of one way of doing things.

 

A good opportunity to provide clear instructions too.

 

Things like adding calendar event that creates a discussion thread should help @Maggie James as that was one of her feature requirements.

 

A place for advertising, saves us having to spam block everyone who tries.

 

That sort of thing.

[Grant 4,298]

We are at the stage, where members can start to transfer across to the new site. https://forum.nzbees.net

 

As a gesture of goodwill, all current members from NZ Bees will be given a FREE 2 month user upgrade to BRONZE membership upon re-registering on the new site. Those members who have current active subscriptions, will need to advise @Grant so that their subscription can be transferred. Please do this BEFORE cancelling your subscription on the this site.

It is expected that while this site will remain active, it will go into archive mode (read only) at the end of Jan 2021.