List of issues with the new forums engine

[kenoxite 156]

Bugs and glitches:

• Links to latest posts are malformed for not logged in users. They lack the ?view=getnewpost parameter. Only the link to the date (such as: Yesterday, 14:50) has that parameter.
• Threads with polls light up as unread every time a vote is made.
• You can vote on your own threads. I mean, the stars at the top of a thread.

Missing features:
Features that were present in the previous version of the forums that haven't been implemented in the new version yet.

• Missing ability to set the amount of posts to be displayed per page.
• Missing badge display in posts for supporters. Currently badges are only displayed in the Profile page.
• Missing the Community groups.
• Missing bottom panel showing server time, etc.
• Smiley selection is way too limited. At least compared to the previous version.
• Missing ability to set format of time and date. To 24h, american date formatting, etc.
• Missing ability to state a reason when displaying the "Edited by" text.
• Missing ability to export PMs as xls. While the "Archive this conversation" feature might help with saving PMs it still seems quite limited compared to the ability to export as xls.
• Missing button to easily insert videos in posts. Meanwhile, you can embed videos using this format:
  

  [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=<ID of your video>[/media]
  

  or just:
  

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=<ID of your video>

• Missing more forum layouts. There's currently an user made Dark Theme that could be of use to you devs.
• It's not possible to embed Daylimotion videos.

Partially solved or unkown status issues:

---

 

Suggestions and Inconsistent/Suboptimal behaviour:

• You are directed to the main forums page whenever you log in. You should be redirected to the page you were viewing before logging in, as it happened in the previous forums.
• Quote or multiquote isn't available in the "Reply with more options" or "Full editor" screen. I mean in the list of posts shown there. IIRC this was also the case in the old version, but it'd be nice to have.
• The Friends list doesn't seem to serve a purpose right now. One would imagine that they would work, among other things, as a "Contact list", so you can easily select any of them when creating a new PM. Yet, there's no link nor any other way to access your Friends when composing a PM.
• No inheritance in forums selected via "Filter by forum" in New Content. While not an issue per se, this isn't the behaviour I was personally expecting. I thought that by selecting the parent forum ("or subforums hub", such as the ARMA: COLD WAR ASSAULT / OPERATION FLASHPOINT one) all the children elements inherited that selection. Actually, you have to manually click every single subforum for this to work as (I) expected. If this behaviour stays, you could as well remove the parent ones, as selecting them does absolutely nothing and just confuses things.
• uBlock must be disabled to proceed correctly through the login process. The conflict lies here: Static filter /setcookie? . As in: https://account.bistudio.com/setCookie?client_id=... It's part of the EasyPrivacy filtering. APB seems to also conflict with the login process.
• Font styles and link format bleed to the blank space after a word or line break. As in: underscore strikethrough link etc. It'd be preferred to contain all that to pages and have styles close after line breaks.
• The current forum layout uses way too much vertical space.
• Multiquote limit is inconsistent. While it allows you to multiquote a whole page (20 posts) you won't be able to post that unless you trim it to 10 or less quotes.
• Search function doesn't allow common scripting/modding or military terms if they are under 4 characters. Such as sqf, sqs, COP, FOB, etc.
• There's a hard limit of 10 maximum images per post. This limit seems a bit too strict.
• Latest unread post in a locked thread.
• Ignore signature popup is clipped.
• Member since display on post bio. Only shows up on the profile card when you hover over username.
• Mark threads/indication if BI staff have replied.
• Custom Syntax highlighting of code.
• Tapatalk integrated functionality. It is installed however there are issues in the testing we have been performing.
  Unfortunately, there will likely need to be possibly some changes to Tapatalk client software, because of the unified BI account system.

Solved issues:

• It's not possible to upload or link new avatars.
• All the editing subforums for OFP are gone.
• You can state the reasons of your "ban" yourself.
• Hotlinks to specific threads or posts are all broken now.
• Some existing users seem to be having problems logging in due to internal server error.
• The private message limit seems to have lowered considerably now. With only 50 stored PMs  - Currently it has increased to 1000
• Too much empty and unused space for those with high resolutions
• Quotes are barely noticeable.
• You can like your own content.
• Broken links to threads whenever the title of a thread changes. I don't know what to do with this entry. Maybe it wasn't an issue?
• Email notification isn't properly configured.
• It's not possible to save drafts when the recepient has his/her PM bin full. Not solved, but bypassed by increasing the amount of PM you can store to 1000.
• Missing ability to easily create nested lists. To nest a list press the "Increase Indent" button.
• Inconsistency in the number of the displayed page when browsing through page numbers.
• It's too easy to get "trapped" inside a quote when editing one.
• Username all lowercase issue. If your username has become all lowercase, you can resolve this by changing your username at account.bistudio.com
  1. after you login, go to account.bistudio.com
  2. change your username in the top left corner
  3. save changes in the bottom right corner
  4. click on logout
  5. go to forums.bistudio.com and logout(again)

  After those steps, after you login again, your username should now have the proper case that you saved it as.

• Member Title and group name issue.

• Social link meta data.

• Subscribed threads from old forums

• Video player in signatures

• Display of 0 warnings.

• Report a post needs more distinction.

• Better separation of posts

• Right-clicking an embedded picture displays the picture instead of showing the browser's context menu.

 
Non-issues that were reported as issues:

• When something is copy/pasted in the new post editor all the formatting is lost (font weight, links, color, etc). - Actually, this was not an issue. Turns out that if you check or uncheck the option to "Paste as plain text by default" it will only work after you reload the page. The formatting affects both elements from the post or copy/pastes from external pages.
• Possible conflict when two different accounts share the same email and password.  - I was apparently not an issue.
• Missing ability to hide signatures. - Available in My Control Panel > Settings > 'Ignore' Preferences

 

Won't fix / Add / Re-Implement:

1. Implement ability to quote only the part of the post you have currently selected.

Edited August 15, 2015 by kenoxite

[BohemiaBeck 305]

These are some of the issues I've encountered so far since the migration to the new software:

• Nested lists aren't possible anymore. You can only have one main un/ordered list. To clarify, you can't place a bullet point list inside a bullet point of a list.
• Previously removed avatars are showing up in the new version. I personally either disabled or deleted mine in the previous forums version, but it has shown up as default in the new ones. I can't recall if the option was to actually delete it. If so, well, you were lying there, as it's still here.
• It's not possible to upload or link new avatars. Apparently there's now no size restriction (nor in kb nor in dimensions). With that said, I've also tried uploading a 100x100 and about 11kb image, but it still doesn't work.
• This new engine loves to throw you back to the main page of the forums whenever something doesn't go as it expects. That's incredibly frustrating. Particularly so when it does after you've written or edited a new post or reply. Furthermore, in that case you can't just go back, as the pages have "expired". Writting the whole thing down on an external text editor or copy/pasting it before hitting the submit button seems to be now mandatory.
• The login timeout seems to be way too short. It logs you out way too early, increasing the chances of finding yourself in the position described in the point above. EDIT: Actually, it seems logout timing has been increased in the past hours.
• There's no or no obvious way to insert videos anymore. If anyone knows how to do this (as I've seen some videos already embedded) feel free to explain here.
• All the editing subforums for OFP are gone. That's very worrying, as I fear they have been lost for good during the transition.
• You can like and vote your own content. While this isn't an issue per se I don't see the point of it.
• You can state the reasons of your "ban" yourself. This is both silly and something that should only be visible to moderators/admins and only if you're banned.
• Actually, the whole OFP subforums section seems to have been badly ported or glitched when doing so. Instead of being a hub of subforums it's actually a forum itself. You can even post there, such as here. This might be the root of all the problems with the editing subforums mentioned above.

And, as reported by others:

• Hotlinks to specific threads or posts are all broken now. Including the results from Google queries.

Also, while I don't think this is an issue caused by IP.Board itself, there seems to be something fishy with it. uBlock must be disabled to proceed correctly through the login process, among other things. While it might be a problem with uBlock not having updated its default whitelists it still makes you wonder.

 

On the plus side, I like that the members page is back again. We can now search and contact old users again without major headaches.

 

Feel free to add here any other issues you've found. I'll try to update the first post whenever I'm around.

 

EDIT: new issues

Hello kenoxite,

Thank you for taking the time to point out issues you are having. I will look at each one of them and follow up.

BohemiaBeck

[ImperialAlex 72]

If the links remain broken that'd be a major blow to the BI-games community. Links to threads on the BI forum aren't just being used inside the BI Forum they're also used across a vast number of other arma community websites. They've become known as a stable fix-point in an community that, due to being around for more than a decade, has become used to third-party websites coming-and-going. Especially for content-creation, many tutorials and important infos are buried deep in these forums. Should the links remain broken, these resources would most likely fall of the map and be lost.

[Guest]

My fellow admin Big, from Armaholic, can not login to this new forum anymore. When he tries he gets this message: 

"oooops internal server error".

He tried on different PC's and different browsers. Retrieving his password also does not fix a thing (as in allowing him to login).

 

And, you may want to check the email that is sent when a user requests his pass as you wrote your own company name wrong.

[mobilemick 13]

Looking good..

 

Only fault i found,  when i do a search from google,  it takes me to your homepage rather than the specific thread.

 

thank you

[neodammerung 8]

For me the main problem is :

Each and every link is broken

It means every link forwarding to mod topic or anything else on Armaholic is broken and takes you to the homepage.
Also every link forwarding to important topics within the forum itself prior to this update are broken.

 

[old_painless 183]

I can not seem to find the option to turn off signatures when reading threads. Is that not an option anymore?

 

Edit - it is possible: under Profile-My Settings-Ignore Preferences, you can tick off to ignore all signatures

 

Also, there was an option to change the number of posts shown on each page, default is 10 I thínk. I had that turned up to 50 (or some highish number like that) - is that not customizable anymore?

 

I am not getting the mobile version of the forums on my Windows Phone - I get the mobile version on arma3.com

 

And the quick navigation dropdown at the bottom of pages is gone? That was a real timesaver for manouevering the subforums, is that gone with the new software?

 

I would be grateful to see these issues adressed (or at least replied to) :)

[kenoxite 156]

@BohemiaBeck: good to hear. I see you've at least dealt with the banning reason thing.

 

About the broken links, this seems to be the move from flashpoint1985.com to bistudio.com all over again. Google still spits out some flashpoint1985 results even nowadays.

 

I've updated the first post with some of the mentioned issues.

And the quick navigation dropdown at the bottom of pages is gone? That was a real timesaver for manouevering the subforums, is that gone with the new software?

It seems that menu is now located at the red pinpoint icon at the top left of a thread.

[WhatTheF 1]

Hey guys...PhonicStudios here

 

aka this guy: https://forums.bistudio.com/user/781990-phonicstudios/

 

I can't login...internal server error all the way...

 

Also is there any way for me to change the design of the forums? I am really not digging these colours nor do I like the compressed width (I have a 1920px wide monitor, why is the forums only using like 1000px?)

 

I feel like the new forums is a downgrade and I primarily wonder why. The old forums worked great, didn't look hideous..a legacy option would be amazing but I doubt it's possible..

I would like to login again though..

 

I just really wonder why this change was necessary? Is it so important to try and integrate the forums directly onto the main site? In my opinion, totally not worth it.

 

Sorry for the negativity but it seems like this change is causing more problems than what it's worth.

 

Kind regards,

Sanchez (someone who can't login nomore.)

[wanttobechrisb 3]

Hello

 

Just want to be ChrisB again, but can't login. Though making a new account is pretty straight forward, but I would like my old account back and be able to login without the :

oooops internal error.. thingy.

 

Thanks

 

Feel free to close this account once my old one is accessible again. ;)

 

Good to play with the 'Like This' option too. ;)

[Flax 397]

Moved to correct thread.

[djrafik3000@gmail.com 0]

Internal Server Error all the way for my 'real' profile. Will click like buttons for a fix, just let me in

[sampsonite3 10]

I'm having the same internal ooops when trying to login with my proper account.

 

I made this a while ago because the real one didn't work as a "Bohemia account" for some reason. So there must have been something wrong with it even before the update.

 

 

edit. the old account works now. :)

[wanttobechrisb 3]

Will click like buttons for a fix, just let me in

Tried that, doesn't work, there again..

[WhatTheF 1]

Lol..didn't even see the button that said 'like this'...guess Bohemia wants to turn their forums into Facebook...sigh...let me login pls.

[Kydoimos 916]

 

These are some of the issues I've encountered so far since the migration to the new software:

• Nested lists aren't possible anymore. You can only have one main un/ordered list. To clarify, you can't place a bullet point list inside a bullet point of a list.
• Previously removed avatars are showing up in the new version. I personally either disabled or deleted mine in the previous forums version, but it has shown up as default in the new ones. I can't recall if the option was to actually delete it. If so, well, you were lying there, as it's still here.
• It's not possible to upload or link new avatars. Apparently there's now no size restriction (nor in kb nor in dimensions). With that said, I've also tried uploading a 100x100 and about 11kb image, but it still doesn't work.
• This new engine loves to throw you back to the main page of the forums whenever something doesn't go as it expects. That's incredibly frustrating. Particularly so when it does after you've written or edited a new post or reply. Furthermore, in that case you can't just go back, as the pages have "expired". Writting the whole thing down on an external text editor or copy/pasting it before hitting the submit button seems to be now mandatory.
• The login timeout seems to be way too short. It logs you out way too early, increasing the chances of finding yourself in the position described in the point above. EDIT: Actually, it seems logout timing has been increased in the past hours.
• There's no or no obvious way to insert videos anymore. If anyone knows how to do this (as I've seen some videos already embedded) feel free to explain here.
• All the editing subforums for OFP are gone. That's very worrying, as I fear they have been lost for good during the transition.
• You can like and vote your own content. While this isn't an issue per se I don't see the point of it.
• You can state the reasons of your "ban" yourself. This is both silly and something that should only be visible to moderators/admins and only if you're banned.
• Actually, the whole OFP subforums section seems to have been badly ported or glitched when doing so. Instead of being a hub of subforums it's actually a forum itself. You can even post there, such as here. This might be the root of all the problems with the editing subforums mentioned above.

And, as reported by others:

• Hotlinks to specific threads or posts are all broken now. Including the results from Google queries.
• Some existing users seem to be having problems logging in. While in this case it seems to be a case of server hiccup there's also the problem when logging in with extensions that block scripts or ads (such as uBlock) or that automatically fill in the login fields, such as LastPass (as the forums now require the email and not the username to login). Maybe some kind of warning about this change should be placed on the login screen, at least for the time being.
• Missing features present in the previous forums software: ability to hide signatures, ability to set the amount of posts to be displayed in a thread.

Also, while I don't think this is an issue caused by IP.Board itself, there seems to be something fishy with it. uBlock must be disabled to proceed correctly through the login process, among other things. While it might be a problem with uBlock not having updated its default whitelists it still makes you wonder.

 

On the plus side, I like that the members page is back again. We can now search and contact old users again without major headaches.

 

Feel free to add here any other issues you've found. I'll try to update the first post whenever I'm around.

 

EDIT: added some of the new mentioned issues

 

Can I just add that there's no badges either. Not a massive issue, but still - be nice to have them back :)

[BohemiaBeck 305]

Hello

 

Just want to be ChrisB again, but can't login. Though making a new account is pretty straight forward, but I would like my old account back and be able to login without the :

oooops internal error.. thingy.

 

Thanks

 

Feel free to close this account once my old one is accessible again. ;)

 

Good to play with the 'Like This' option too. ;)

Investigating this issue, and all others. Try turning adblock off if you are using such a plugin. Are you using Firefox with adblock on?

[kenoxite 156]

Can I just add that there's no badges either. Not a massive issue, but still - be nice to have them back :)

Just added that to the 1st post.

[old_painless 183]

@BohemiaBeck: good to hear. I see you've at least dealt with the banning reason thing.

 

About the broken links, this seems to be the move from flashpoint1985.com to bistudio.com all over again. Google still spits out some flashpoint1985 results even nowadays.

 

I've updated the first post with some of the mentioned issues.

It seems that menu is now located at the red pinpoint icon at the top left of a thread.

 

Ah, excellent - talk about hiding something of value. Thank you so much

 

And for the login issue that many are having, I could not login either, until I realised that you login with an email, not the forum username. They changed that some time ago in the old forums. Perhaps some of you are stuck in this as I were

[WhatTheF 1]

Nah that's not the issue. Trying to login with the e-mail that is connected to my main account (no adblock, google chrome) -> internal server error....I gave up now anyway.

[freesets 11]

i was about to start a topic  like that...

here are what i encountered this far: (link where it happen---issue)

 

https://forums.bistudio.com/topic/182043-australia-work-in-progress-release/---images preview links are broken sometime(imgur)

 

 

https://forums.bistudio.com/topic/182331-dutch-aviation-emergency-services-daes/---links to the older forum format inside anther thread also dont work (links with "showthread" )

 

 

and please increase the contrast of the text a little more

[MorrisonCAA 0]

I can't login with my old account. Any hope?

[nemesisthrowaway 0]

I have the same problem. Maybe its related to me not linking my forum account with my BI account? (Or whatever what was going on at the time, all i can remember is that i didnt want it)

 

EDIT: Tried resetting password, but the page keeps timing out.

 

EDIT: I also cant login into the store

[kenoxite 156]

https://forums.bistudio.com/topic/182043-australia-work-in-progress-release/---images preview links are broken sometime(imgur)

 

 

and please increase the contrast of the text a little more

 

I think I know what happened to your images. You wrote them in lowercase and the parser they have used to migrate was surely case sensitive. I say this because all my imgur ones were ported okay, and the same applies to the rest of other imgur ones that I've seen elswhere around here. If you used the "insert image" button in the old forums toolbar then the tags would surely be uppercase, and hence properly parsed.

 

I agree on enhancing the contrast.

 

Anyway, it seems some things have been fixed already, such as the avatars. I will update the main post reflecting that.

[D-Man 0]

I couldn't login into my old account (DegmanCRO), no matter what I tried, so I had to create this temporary one in order to let you know. Also, I believe that good amount of people out there have the same issue. This should be the priority in compare to color and fancy buttons (which are better than before).

 

Cheers!