Due to the negative feedback about the new version of ET that appeared last week, and unexpected software problems from third party vendors that was completely out of my control, I had no choice but to roll back to the old ET for the time being. I discovered that the importing software I acquired to transfer data from the old message board to the new one had a critical bug, which caused a ton of threads and posts to vanish on the new site. And honestly, once I did the upgrade, I was shocked at how many members expressed how they loved the old ET just like it was. Yes, I want to upgrade the site eventually, but I want to do it in a way that's a much softer rollout next time, with better explanation in advance of the changes and new features to come, so it's not so much of a shock factor. The biggest downside to this debacle means that last week's posts went into a black hole. There's no point in me even trying to stitch that content back into this format because it would just cause way more downtime and aggravation for all of us. The bright side of course is that one week is nothing compared to the 1 million+ thread and posts I discovered that were missing on the site upgrade (those are all in tact on this site now). This has been the toughest month of my life... period. I kid you not when I say that I have slept about one night for every three days this past month trying to get this migration done. Considering the outcome, I regret having to put you guys (and my family) through this. ET is my life and I appreciate every one of you who takes the time to participate here. Always have. I tried so hard to move us forward, by my effort didn't work out like I hoped, so I fell short, and for that I'm truly sorry.
Thank you for your efforts, that was a monumental task you took on. I'm sure some time in the future, with the experience you gathered here, changes will be implemented. Maybe incremental instead of comprehensive to smooth the transition and ease us all into it. Anyway it's nice to see an old friend again. She does the job without glitz or fanfare. Simple. Clean. Straightforward. And as the old song says, "You don't know what you got until you lose it..."
Baron, The usual way to do this is to run a mock site where people can see what it looks like. So in parallel, show a site with some fake threads, and allow people to post to it. If you allow real threads on a seperate database, you can even merge the databases later. You can set the IP to www.elitetrader.com/Beta or something like that.
I liked the new format. Not surprising that many did not, though. Change is tough for lots of folks to adapt to. But if this has been the toughest time of your life, Baron, getting a message forum to function correctly, then let me be the first to point out that you have lived an extremely sheltered life.
Let me say that I liked the new ET format generally. I recognize there were issues with porting previous threads and other issues. The only thing that I did not like about the new ET was that it did not allow the preview of the 5 most recent threads in each category on the forum page.
i prefer the old format. the real issue is threads getting lost. old school content lost, which is what makes this forum irreplacable and no other forum can match that content. as far as formatting goes we can all get used to eventually, though current 'old' format is just fine and functional. baron, thanks for the effort and intention to make forum better!
Yeah, I agree. I had a beta site going but just didn't make it public. It was more for development. But I will do this next time for sure.
Thanks for your efforts. I prefer the old format because it seems much easier to read. Perhaps with time you can introduce, a few of the nice features that were well received and R.I.P. those that did not get a very enthusiastic reception. The one feature I found really useful in the new version was being able to quickly locate your recent posts by just clicking on "your content" without having to do a search. Thanks for being responsive to the users.