Christmas, giveaways and the near future. (Jan 2023 server migration)

[Kestryll]

First off, Merry Christmas all! I hope everyone has a good day filled with fun and family.

I'm sure some of you noticed that this is the first year I haven't had a Christmas give away. It's been a bit of a tradition and one I planned to continue however this year the last three months I have been focused on my Father and by the time I thought about it we were in mid-December.
Barring anything else catastrophic coming up the give away will return next year.

And the future, things are going to get fun soon.
Our current host, Professional Edge, is shutting down. mcubed is moving on to other things and the hosting has been a losing deal for some time now. It's a hard business for a smaller company to survive in.

We will in the very near future be moving to a new hosting company and this will cause some other changes.
Our current software is far beyond long in the tooth and nearly all hosting companies no longer support the older version of PHP that this software requires. Whether we want to or not we are going to have to update to the latest version of vBulletin likely early in January.

I've held out as long as possible mainly because I have no idea if certain things like iTrader will run on vB 5.x. iTrader is a 12+ year old plug in that hasn't been supported for at least the last eight years.
I know how important these ratings are to everyone and have tried to keep this version of vBulletin viable but we're 5+ years past end of life.

I will of course try to load and run the plug in but I can't guarantee that it will work. If not I'll find a new rating system we can use, hopefully one that can port over the iTrader info.

I'm sorry this is going to be so abrupt and with sort notice. As I said I was hoping to have had the last several months to work on it and give notice but when my Dad fell and broke his hip everything became about taking care of family.

That's pretty much the latest on what is going to happen. Merry Christmas and take a moment to remember tomorrow whose birthday this is and why Christmas time is here.

[SkyHawk]

Merry Christmas!!

[sealocan]

I know it's more abrupt than most people will want, including myself, but you had been mentioning this would be coming eventually, a few times in the past.

Thank you for pushing it off as long as you could.

I am sincerely sorry that your dad passed so recently and you now also have to deal with something like this extra issue on top of that.
Let us know if there's anything we can do to make the move easier for you.

If we lose some things like the best threads of Calguns or even I Trader I feel folks will eventually rebuild it and after some to be expected bumps in the road it will be just as good or better.

Thank You Kestryll!!!

.

[LuckyGuy]

Originally Posted by sealocan

I know it's more abrupt than most people will want, including myself, but you had been mentioning this would be coming eventually, a few times in the past.

Thank you for pushing it off as long as you could.

I am sincerely sorry that your dad passed so recently and you now also have to deal with something like this extra issue on top of that.
Let us know if there's anything we can do to make the move easier for you.

If we lose some things like the best threads of Calguns or even I Trader I feel folks will eventually rebuild it and after some to be expected bumps in the road it will be just as good or better.

Personally though, I'm going to just stay right here as the lights all turn off, the music stops playing and this website disappears. I might even glue myself to the floor.

Thank you Kestryll.

Thank you Kestryll, you have done an excellent job on this site and and a good person for our cause. So sorry to hear about your dad, I know just how you feel. Been there and done that. Again,, take care. I know you are doing the best that you can. Merry Christmas.

[Kyle1886]

May God bless each and everyone this Holiday Season and the New Year.

Merry Christmas and a safe healthy New Year to all.

Thank you Mr. Kestryll, best to you and yours and good luck with the transition of this site.

Respectfully
Kyle

[VictorFranko]

Yes, it would be a bummer to lose our iTrader ratings and the comments from our transactions with each other but if it happens, it happens, it won't be from your lack of trying to preserve them.

All your work behind the scenes Paul goes greatly unnoticed and unmentioned but is greatly appreciated by most, if not all, I'm sure.

Merry Christmas to you and Mama Kestryll

[2017mini14]

Where’s hanko? He should be doing backflips right now.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[-hanko]

Originally Posted by 2017mini14

Where’s hanko? He should be doing backflips right now.

Just sending a Christmas greeting to Kes and prayers to him and his family.

No backflips today.

[wpage]

Merry Christmas to all...

Mr. K thanks for all you do. God bless you and your crew for the work you do. This is a excellent site. Regardless of any future issues the folk remain. That like Christmas is what its all about!

[Jeepergeo]

Ripping the bandage off quickly usually generates the least pain in the long run.

This is a great forum. The change will allow it to be greater.

[Jumbo7531]

Thanks for the communication and I am sure all will understand. Thanks for what you do and Merry CHRISTmas to all!

[Spanky8601]

Merry Christmas to you and the Mrs.

Thanks for keeping us updated and I am sure you are working to deliver the best product possible. The community will bit** and moan, along with surviving the change.

[ojisan]

Thank you for running this forum and the community which has resulted.
It's a special gift every day.
We won't go anywhere, this is our home.
Merry Christmas to you.

[foothillman]

Merry Christmas......ALL
CalGuns gives all year long.
Thanks to all the behind the scene workers.

Have a wonderful New Year

[Dirtlaw]

Originally Posted by Kestryll

First off, Merry Christmas all! I hope everyone has a good day filled with fun and family.

I'm sure some of you noticed that this is the first year I haven't had a Christmas give away. It's been a bit of a tradition and one I planned to continue however this year the last three months I have been focused on my Father and by the time I thought about it we were in mid-December.
Barring anything else catastrophic coming up the give away will return next year.

And the future, things are going to get fun soon.
Our current host, Professional Edge, is shutting down. mcubed is moving on to other things and the hosting has been a losing deal for some time now. It's a hard business for a smaller company to survive in.

We will in the very near future be moving to a new hosting company and this will cause some other changes.
Our current software is far beyond long in the tooth and nearly all hosting companies no longer support the older version of PHP that this software requires. Whether we want to or not we are going to have to update to the latest version of vBulletin likely early in January.

I've held out as long as possible mainly because I have no idea if certain things like iTrader will run on vB 5.x. iTrader is a 12+ year old plug in that hasn't been supported for at least the last eight years.
I know how important these ratings are to everyone and have tried to keep this version of vBulletin viable but we're 5+ years past end of life.

I will of course try to load and run the plug in but I can't guarantee that it will work. If not I'll find a new rating system we can use, hopefully one that can port over the iTrader info.

I'm sorry this is going to be so abrupt and with sort notice. As I said I was hoping to have had the last several months to work on it and give notice but when my Dad fell and broke his hip everything became about taking care of family.

That's pretty much the latest on what is going to happen. Merry Christmas and take a moment to remember tomorrow whose birthday this is and why Christmas time is here.

My best wishes for your father. It probably sounds trite, but if you ever need an ear ...

[clb]

Family's always first.
Merry Christmas
Godspeed

[19K]

Take care of your real family first. We will be here patiently waiting.

Merry Christmas!

[70runner]

Merry Christmas back at you and your family.

I'm a relative short timer here and this is one of my favorite stops on the interweb. It's success is a testimony to you and the others that invest their time here.

[Batman]

Merry Christmas, Kes! Appreciate you keeping this place running and keeping us informed as to what's going on.

Take care of family, as everything else is just details. Just had to put my mom into assisted living, so I feel your pain. I wish you and your dad the best, and hopefully you had a very Merry Christmas!!

[Striker62]

Thanks for the updates Kes. So sorry to hear about your dad and I’m sure I can say we all understand the stressful situation you’re in. If there is anything we can do to assist as in testing or anything, please let us know. As an IT professional, I also understand there is only so much one can do. Merry Christmas to you and your family Sir.

[Garand Hunter]

THANKS FOR THE LOOONG TIME hard work ! God Bless you and your family !

Psalm 1

[Househusband69]

Thank you for all you do!

[M76]

Merry Christmas and thanks Kes

(it’s Christmas season until 01/01/23!)

[Full Clip]

I thank you, Head Janitor, for the update.

[timberwoofers]

Thank you for all you do for us.

Merry Christmas and my thoughts go out to you and your family.

[Supersapper]

Kestryll and everyone,

Merry Christmas to you all, and for those that do not celebrate it, Happy Holidays.

Sorry to hear about your dad and I hope things are well with him. As other's have said, family first.

As to the new system and it's effects on iTrader, one thing we could do is to screenshot our iTrader pages (could be multiples for those with bigger numbers) and then have a place in the new system put those screenshots as a reference for those of us that have been around for a while.

It would have minimal extra work in the new system and the screenshots would serve as verification of past trades/sales.

Another way might be that somehow, in the new system, if there's the ability to do something like an iTrader, then everone in the new system gets a first rating. That rating is a summary of all of your trades, with the percentage, that is a legacy number. If you have no original sales from this platform, then your rating is a blank one. To do this, perhaps the moderators might be able to help out? I have xero idea how many you have, so that might be a problem.

Just thinking about other ideas that might help.

Sapper

[Kestryll]

I have the new dedicated server set up, now it's a matter or arranging the move.
GeoVario/Professional Edge is closing the end of the year so we're looking at days unless something really odd happens.

[2017mini14]

I wonder if marketplace transactions should pause for awhile?

[Supersapper]

So how will we know what to do to log in? Will we all have the same usernames and passwords?

I've taken screenshots of things like my iTrader, join date, etc, but if the platform is different, how will we know where to go to log in or, in the worst case, reset up an account?

[dC0m]

First in foremost, thanks for all you do, Kestryll.

I may not be the most tenured member here, but I sure as hell appreciate this forum as well as the knowledge it has provided me.

Secondly, dating back to my "tech forum" days, have you looked into an external platform for the rating feedback? Back when I used to surf the computer tech forums, we used heatware.com (I am in no way sponsored by that website), which was an external site that operated similarly to iTrader. The best part was that it allowed its user to note profile from several different sites, such as eBay, several major tech forums, etc. Perhaps something to look into?

[Kyle1886]

I assume this will affect 'Calguns.org' as well?

ETA: Went over to to the sister site and it looks like "Simple Machines" runs it.

Respectfully
Kyle

[Singleshot 7369]

New old guy to the site. We will piss, moan, bitch & complain, kick rocks, cry, but most of all, WE WILL GET OVER IT. Thank you for the site.

[Gryff]

Thanks for all you do for the CGN community, Kes.

[TrappedinCalifornia]

So long as it doesn't exclude anyone using an OS older than Windows 10 or one (or more) of the major browsers, you do what you gotta do and we'll do what we gotta do to work with it.

You do that voodoo you do and we'll look to James Bond for inspiration or, at least, to vent any short term frustrations...



... viewing the new system as Jane Seymour and hoping it holds up like she has.

Of course, we know your, personal version, is going to be more along the lines of Lynda Carter...



But, most of us understand that the Head Janitor's big... uh... key ring... grants them special privileges.

[Kyle1886]

Originally Posted by TrappedinCalifornia

So long as it doesn't exclude anyone using an OS older than Windows 10 or one (or more) of the major browsers, you do what you gotta do and we'll do what we gotta do to work with it.

You do that voodoo you do and we'll look to James Bond for inspiration or, at least, to vent any short term frustrations...

That's been my concern for a while too. I know a few that are still running the 7 & 8 series of Windows, including myself.

Good luck Mr. Kestryll, and thanks again.

Respectfully
Kyle

[sunnysmarine]

Originally Posted by TrappedinCalifornia

So long as it doesn't exclude anyone using an OS older than Windows 10 or one (or more) of the major browsers, you do what you gotta do and we'll do what we gotta do to work with it.

You do that voodoo you do and we'll look to James Bond for inspiration or, at least, to vent any short term frustrations...



... viewing the new system as Jane Seymour and hoping it holds up like she has.

Of course, we know your, personal version, is going to be more along the lines of Lynda Carter...



But, most of us understand that the Head Janitor's big... uh... key ring... grants them special privileges.

You just had to dredge up that memory...... I'll be thinking about her for the next month or two. I miss those days so much

[sealocan]

Kestryll (and possibly any mods involved?) has a lot going on and not a lot of time to do the complete transfer as smooth as possible, while trying to maintain all the great information/ threads and ITrader information.
It sounds like he's on top of all the tech stuff that's needed.
I also think there are plenty of members, currently working in that field, that are here and they might be able to help with possible answers to the many questions involving such a switch over (that are way above my own limited server/ transfer info. level of knowledge).
As someone else posted, I suggest to everyone that you might want to take a screenshot of your personal I-Trader rating or any other things you might want to save just in case some information is lost.

If there's anything we can do as members to help, Please let us know.

For me personally and I think for others as well, the one important feature I would like to see continue is the iPhone version of Calguns.
Even though I'm on an Android phone using that particular iPhone version of Calguns makes it easy to read on the small phone screens.
It's not perfect but it works better than All the other possible options that are currently offered.

I did see this on another thread, that states another gun related forum did a similar transfer and it sounds like everything went ok for them. ...


" 12-26-2022 | 8:34 AM
MeatyMac "

" Kes, if you’re reading this thread be aware that The M14 Forum went through this same issue two years ago with their iTrader rating and was able to import their members old iTrader ratings to the site’s new software, it took a little while but they were able to do it. Maybe hit their admin up for some input/guidance, many of their members are CGN members too.
Last edited by MeatyMac; 12-26-2022 at 8:36 AM.."

Even if everything is lost I feel grateful that I found this forum and I have hope that it will continue as strong as ever.

.

[NavCop]

My condolences for your loss, Kestryll, and may God grant you the strength and peace to deal with this. Thank you for your efforts in keeping this forum working.

[SteveinHNL]

Thanks so much for this site, for all your work, and God bless you!

[sunnysmarine]

Thank you for all you do and have done, Hope your dads recovery is a quick one