<p> Howdy all, </p><p> Just a heads up about scheduled downtime this evening. The months I've put in on the new website have finally brought it to a state that I'm satisfied is significantly better than the current website. </p><p> So, I'll be taking down the OpenACS site that we've all come to both love and hate over the past two years, and in its place I'll be firing up a brand spanking new Joomla-based website. </p><p> I'm excited to finally be able to call the new website ready, and let all of you bold Early Adopters give it a try. There will be some discomfort to begin with, because Joomla uses a different password hash than OpenACS, as well as a different set of policies regarding usernames and email addresses and how you login. So, logins will change! I will be sending out an email to all registered users with your new login name and password (which can be reset to whatever you prefer). This will be a one time mailing. </p><p> The downtime will not effect email or the software repositories, so we will still be accessible if you have any emergency support queries. I do not expect the downtime to last more than an hour or so. It will begin at approximately 10:30 Pacific time. </p><p> Regards, <br> Joe</p>
Sounds great! May it be as painless (at your end) as possible.
Remember to allow your users to edit their own posts, bug report, support tickets etc. This is my greatest misgiving of the old system! ;-)
All the best!
Howdy AH,
Thanks for the good wishes.
It's PM, and it's done. ;-)
We do have some plans to begin integrating GPL into the conversation here at Virtualmin.com with quite a bit more completeness--better documentation coverage, installers for GPL, etc. And, there are new features in development for Professional users that I think folks will like a lot--it's actually a lot of the same features we are integrating into a new product (a pretty pricey one, for big hosting providers). So, on both counts, I believe you'll get your wish.
I see now that we've got a few quirks in the migration...but nothing too dramatic, actually. Went smoother than I'd expected, and we were only offline for about 15 minutes.
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Hi Joe,
Congratulations on a successful migration! The new site looks nice, and I know you put a ton of work into it. I am still just exploring at this point, but the first thing I wanted to do was to subscribe to e-mail "notifications" on all forums as I had before. I don't see an option for this, only to subscribe to individual topics/threads that have already been created. Is it possible to do this on the new site, or do we have to actually login to the web site to look for new posts?
Thanks,
Alan
Hey Alan,
On the notifications thing, it looks like you're right. That's a nuisance. It'll be fixed soon. In fact, that's probably the first thing I'll be tackling.
In the meantime, the RSS feeds actually work! ;-)
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Maybe it's still a bit too soon to be trying the new features. I just got this error when clicking on the "Bugs and Issues" link:
Not Found
The requested URL /bugs/index.php was not found on this server.
Apache/2.0.53 (RHEL) Server at jdev.virtualmin.com Port 80
Fixed. That was a bug I introduced while doing my "pre-flipping-the-switch" testing. ;-)
Thanks for the heads up.
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15 minutes! Faster than it takes me to say virtualmin ;-) Of course, anyone with some experience in IT management will know how long it takes to get to this stage. So congratulations!
A few quick feedback for you...
1. When I edit my past posts at the forums, I get "Hacking Attempt!" Hehehe...
2. Bug reporting section has gone fishing for 404 prawns.
3. You need a space after the full stop at the front page:
"Virtualmin is always available, no matter where you are or how you want to work.Virtualmin..."
Thanks for the feedback.
I'll look into the hacking attempt thing...This forum is a bit fruity. Too much weird crap going on. But it's the best available for Joomla (it's Fireboard 1.0.0 with a quite few little customizations)...I'll be doing some more work on it over the coming week to get rid of the remaining annoyances.
Bug tracker is fixed.
Full stop fixed.
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Thanks, I'll check out the RSS feeds in the meantime.
Regarding the bug tracker, how do users create new bugs and open tickets? I only see a list of the existing items.
Argh. It broke. It's not recognizing users after the move. I'm not seeing immediately what's wrong....but I'll get it fixed shortly.
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A couple other things I noticed about the bug tracker....
I had updated my username in my main profile for Virtualmin.com, which automatically propagated to the forums, but it did not seem to associate me in the bug tracker. So, I changed my username back. Now I see a few more options in the bug tracker, but still no option to create or edit existing records, including no ability to comment on my own bug reports.
Also, like the forums, it looks like we can "watch selected tasks" in the bug tracker, but I don't see any option to be notified of new bug reports, neither e-mail or RSS.
Yep, it's a username changing bug in the FlySpray bridge. Try it again and see if the username keeps up when you change it. I think I fixed it.
I'm looking into why you don't get an Add new task link. The username bug doesn't explain why you aren't getting the option after changing your name back to AlanDobkin (that was quick troubleshooting, BTW), though. That may be me forgetting to add everyone to a group in the bug tracker or something. I'm digging.
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OK, I auto-assigned the wrong group during the migration. Fixed now, I think. Give it a look (both the username changing and see if you have a "Add new task" link).
Thanks for spotting these troubles.
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OK, username changing still isn't working for the bug tracker. I need to spend some more time with it.
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> I'll look into the hacking attempt thing...This forum is a bit fruity. Too much weird crap going on. But it's the best available for Joomla (it's Fireboard 1.0.0 with a quite few little customizations)...I'll be doing some more work on it over the coming week to get rid of the remaining annoyances.
Yes, this BB is very fruity. For example, when I click "QUOTE", I get quotes from an earlier post, not the one I chose.
I thought you were going to go with SMF. There's a Joomla-SMF bridge you know.
Yeah, I tried SMF, too. It's good, but too much. It is so focused on being everything on a site that it gets in the way of being a good part of a much larger site. And, while you have only seen a small portion of the pains I've been through with the Flyspray bridge and making it all work together, I can say with confidence that had I introduced another bridged component it would still be another two weeks before I finally got to launch it (and the end result--where we'll be in a month or two--would be worse). Keep reporting the problems you run into, and I'll fix them.
Actually all of my major complaints (aside from a few bugs, like the quote thing) about Fireboard are that it does too much and has too much stuff on the page, even with all of the options turned off. SMF is way busier.
Anyway, the old site and its opaque nature led us all to begin to think of things on Virtualmin.com as immovable objects. This site will change daily, and problems will get fixed. I'm not a PHP expert, by any means, but I've got the chops to knock out simple web app problems like these. It is a new era for Virtualmin.com, and it will become exactly the site we've been wishing for. ;-)
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Also... the "bugs & issues" section only shows Bug Reports. All the past Customer Issues are gone.
Thanks for fixing the bug tracker. Aside from being able to change usernames (which really isn't a big deal, although I did try changing it again and then changed it back again when it still didn't work), the add task link now appears. Being able to comment on all bugs is a huge improvement!
No probs, Joe. It's already been a long day. Time to take a break and give yourself a pat on the back. ;-)
Incidentally, because my previous user name was deemed too short (2 characters) by Joomla, I couldn't change back to it at the PROFILE. As a result, I don't see "Add Task" etc. at FlySpray. No hurry. When you get a chance...
Howdy AH,
I actually kinda like your new nick. I'll change it to allow shorter names. No reason not to. But the bug tracker user synchronization bug will get fixed soon.
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Another suggestion:
Re-order the boards at the forum in this order:
News
Virtualmin
Webmin
Usermin
General Discussion
Help! (Home for Newbies)
Developers
Hacks
Internationalization
Jobs
Where are we going? (can we rename this to something more informative like FEATURE REQUESTS)
Feedback for Virtualmin Team (new board for praises and feedback)
[quote]
Another suggestion:
Re-order the boards at the forum in this order:
...
{/quote]
Done. With a couple of changes to your suggested order, but not much. I pretty much agree entirely with your suggestions, but I believe Help! needs to be higher up. So it's now:
News
Help
General
Virtualmin
Webmin
Usermin
Blue Skies
Developers
Hacks
Internationalization
Jobs
"Where are we going?" has become "Blue Skys". It used to be called Feature Requests, but I believe those are better handled by filing bugs in the tracker. We can close them if we disagree, but if they're in the forum they tend to get forgotten. Going forward, I'd like "Blue Skies" to be where we talk about the distant future of web hosting management. These are things that take more than a few days to implement, and will require some design, forethought, and planning--things that are worth discussing in detail rather than just "OK, that's a good idea and I think others will agree...I'll add it to the next revision of Virtualmin", which is what "Feature Requests" generates. And then they get ignored or forgotten about quite easily.
Feedback is a really good idea, but there might be a better way to handle it than a forum (I'm trying to resist the temptation that many sites with forums resort to, which is that everything of interest happens in the forum, and if you aren't following it daily you miss really important issues and opportunities to be heard). I could make a custom form that would allow folks to say what they think, include their website links, etc. and we can merge those comments into the testimonials you see at the top of the page. Now that bugs and issues can be discussed by anyone, we don't need to resort to belly-aching in the forums quite as much, so that only leaves praise and I want to be able to easily merge that into our "quotes" file! ;-)
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Thanks Joe for changing the username restriction.
You have changed it from "more than 4 characters" to "more than 2 characters". But as my previous username is 2 characters, so I still can't change back. Could you please change the username restriction to "more than 1 character".
Actually, I haven't figured out how to change it yet. I thought I'd found the right form, but it doesn't do anything (I don't think I did anything that would have changed it from 4 to 2, either, so maybe I'm completely confused about what I'm poking at!). Turns out it isn't a configurable option--has to be changed in code. Joomla often chooses silly defaults and the hard codes them in (every single component we're using has been customized--mainly by stripping things out and getting the unnecessary "look at me, I can make lots of features!" crud off of the page). ;-)
Anyway, I'll get it figured out soon. It also looks like this limit has been reduced to 2 in the 1.5 Joomla branch. Unfortunately, it's a completely different code base, so I can't copy/paste their solution.
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> It used to be called Feature Requests, but I believe those are better handled by filing bugs in the tracker. We can close them if we disagree, but if they're in the forum they tend to get forgotten
OK, I see what you mean.
Then perhaps you may want to flag "what is where" more distinctly at the bottom of the page, under "Talk and Get Help", by having an individual links instead of lumping them into one called Bugs & Issues.
Instead of
"Bugs and Issues"
have
"Report Bugs"
"Virtualmin Pro Customer Support"
"Feature Request"
instead (and of course, set the default task type accordingly in the links). So, if I click on Feature Request link below, I get to an input screen where task type is already defined as Feature Request.
Also, in the board description for Blue Skies, perhaps you'd want to link directly to the bug tracker and feature request sections.
Example:
"Note that for specific problems that you believe need to be fixed, like bugs or lack of documentation, there's a <a href='http://www.virtualmin.com/bug-tracker/' target='_blank'>public bug tracker</a>..."
"If you have specific feature requests, please <a href='http://www.virtualmin.com/bug-tracker/' target='_blank'>lodge here</a>"
Something you'd want to fix on Fireboard...
After making a post, one is directed to the first post, instead of the last post.
My default is "First post first".
Again on FireBoard...
Show the most recent post <img src='http://www.virtualmin.com/components/com_fireboard/template/virtualmin/i... style='border:0px'> leads you to the first post instead of last post.
<div class='quote'> Show the most recent post <img src='http://www.virtualmin.com/components/com_fireboard/template/virtualmin/i... style='border:0px'> leads you to the first post instead of last post.</div>
This seems to be fixed.
Joe, you may want to insert Virtualmin logo as your Avatar. Easier to find *your* posts in a thread.
> 10:30 Pacific time.
Is that am or pm? ;-) Or is it 1030 hr (military style, sir yes sir)?
May I also suggest that you clearly distinguish the Virtualmin GPL users from the PAID Virtualmin Pro users (using Joomla-based JACL Plus component?). The reasons are:
1. Since the functionality and user interface of the GPL and Pro version are different, it helps to know which version the person asking question is using.
2. Priority should always be given to Pro users when answering questions.
3. Distinguishing Pro and GPL users allow you to implement different access privileges. Pro users should have better access to resources than GPL users.
There's no button or link to add something to the bug tracker..:(
<b>hescominsoon wrote:</b>
<div class='quote'>There's no button or link to add something to the bug tracker..:(</div>
Yes, there's a bug in the user synchronization that I haven't quite figured out, so when the username is changed for Joomla it doesn't change for the bug tracker, and so as the new user you don't exist in the bug tracker with the new username. I hope to have this problem fixed today.
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Joe, I think you have fixed the username change issue with FlySpray. I changed my username and submitted a comment OK. Good job!
Take it easy, mate! No one is going to die if somethings are not fixed within the next 5 minutes! ;-)
I personally think you may have made a mistake in choosing FireBoard as the BB for Virtualmin.com. It is way too buggy. SMF is tried and tested, and more importantly, very secure. Many of the features can be switched off at the admin interface if you don't want them. Anyway, it is something you can look at a later stage. There are more important things to do in the meanwhile... like... sleeeeeeep.
<div class='quote'>Joe, I think you have fixed the username change issue with FlySpray. I changed my username and submitted a comment OK. Good job!</div>
I'm awesome. Thanks for the update. I thought I'd fixed it, but I wasn't entirely sure because of other mildly weird behavior. ;-)
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Is there a way to edit the entries I submitted on FlySpray?
Like I said before, my greatest misgiving of the previous website is the inability to edit one's own posts and bug reports. Sometimes, things which shouldn't be made public are posted when urgent help is needed. The author should have the ability to edit his own submissions to remove these information.
Joe, I see that you have fixed the EDIT post function. Well done!
I can edit posts that I made using the new username.
However, I can't edit posts that I made <b>before</b> the username change.
Given that I can't change my username back (needs to be 3 characters or more), I am stuck!
Ooops... said too early. The EDIT function works <b>only</b> on threads that I started. For threads that I didn't start (like this one), it still doesn't work.
<div class='quote'>Ooops... said too early. The EDIT function works only on threads that I started. For threads that I didn't start (like this one), it still doesn't work.</div>
Yeah, I noticed that. It just bounces over to the thread start. That seems like a bug, but it might be a bug in the OpenSEF URL rewriting stuff rather than the forum. (URLs in Joomla are just stupid. It's ridiculous that it takes hundreds of database entries to make URLs sane...OpenACS handled that problem so much more cleanly and without bugs related to rewriting every URL. There are some things that I'll miss about OACS!)
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<div class='quote'>Should be a addon or code that we can add in to set our timezone so when we see the posting times we know how long ago it was really posted relative to each use TZ.</div>
Argh! You would pick the hardest possible thing to implement to request. ;-)
It seems easy...but it requires changes in a bunch of locations to call a TZ aware date function (plus a new form for users to set their time zone). Fireboard has a "Timezone offset" configuration option, but it's global rather than per-user. This one will be a challenge...
How about if I punt, and change Fireboard to say "X hours ago" or "X minutes ago" instead of an absolute time if the post was 24 hours or less ago? That might be low-hanging fruit, and provide the detail you're after.
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Hi Joe,
Not a major issue but the serial number (download) page listed my license as;
<i>Max Domains -1, Domains Used 0, Max Servers 1, Servers Used 0</i>
Just pointing it out as it is linking license to people to their server.
Regards,
Charles
Hey Charles,
I believe the serial number issue for Virtualmin Unlimited has been fixed. It should show up correctly now. Thanks for the heads up. (-1 is the correct identifier for Virtualmin Unlimited, it's just supposed to be prettified before showing up for customers.)
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The "OK" nag screens is annoying as hell. Can you get rid of those please?
Hey Scott,
Hell yeah we can get rid of it. Where do you see an OK nag screen? (Seriously, I don't know what you're talking about, but I'm all for getting rid of anything that isn't the job we want it to do.)
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<div class='quote'>The "OK" nag screens is annoying as hell. Can you get rid of those please?</div>
Yep, that one was stupid. It's gone now. I'm not convinced the "mark all as read" function on the front page is actually working, though...these wacky PHP kids and their adding comprehensive smiley support before the core functionality actually works... ;-)
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Click on "Mark all forums read" is the only one so far. Might be others but that one is really annoying.
Oh, I've never actually clicked that! Will fix it tomorrow (it's late...didn't sleep in this morning despite staying up late poking at the most egregious issues). Thanks for the heads up.
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Alright, I think...maybe...I've fixed the bug tracker rename problem. Would someone who changed their username and lost access to the bug tracker try changing your username a couple of times and see if the bug tracker keeps up. It worked for me, but I'm tired..I may have done something else to trigger the "working" behavior.
There is definitely one quirk that I haven't figured out...when changing usernames I sometimes go switched to the "All projects" project, which doesn't allow filing bugs for anyone. So, check the project field after changing your name to be sure you're looking at Virtualmin--if you are, and still don't have the rights needed to add new tasks and comment on existing ones, ping this thread.
Thanks!
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Ok.
Another thing too... timezone setting is missing from our account settings. All times here are 3 hours off and might be way off for other people.
Should be a addon or code that we can add in to set our timezone so when we see the posting times we know how long ago it was really posted relative to each use TZ.
Joe, you may wish to limit new threads in the NEWS board to admin user only.
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