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Astralis
Senior Member
USA
1218 Posts |
 Posted - 11 June 2004 : 05:46:36
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What's going on with Snitz development. The last I knew is that an International version was being made. What changes will this make for those who don't need internationalization?
My Snitz forum has really been very useful to me but I'm seeing more and more of my competitors with newer boards with better features for the user - mostly developed in PHP, unfortunately.
I try to keep up with them by making sure I contribute to mod development and add the mods I think are important. But, adding all these mods which are coming as standard features on the newer boards is becoming a right chore! And any tiny additional development in Snitz potentially throws off all the mods and renders them useless because they are not considered part of the base site.
I really hope the dev team considers extending the base forum with the features that members are starting to take for granted as normal features of other boards.
I highly recommend examining vBulletin among others I'm sure everyone is aware of.
Any thoughts? |
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MarcelG
Retired Support Moderator
Netherlands
2625 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 05:57:45
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I think it's tricky to compare snitz with the dozens of PHP boards out there.
Each one has it's fancy base-features, but the question is more whether or not they are as moddable as Snitz ? As a whole they might have all the features you might want to see in Snitz, but does a single PHP vBulletin also have those features ?
Okay, I completely agree that some features should be added to the base code:- Avatars
- Private Messages
- Upload facility
- Time Zones
- Active Users
- Custom Policy
- Forum Themes
- Anti-spam registration
- IP Ban
- Message Icons
- Smile Manager
- Events Calendar
But that's about it....
Mmmm..rather long list. But still, in MY opinion these should be the base features.
Is there any PHP forum out there that out of the box contains these features ánd is as open and easy to mod as Snitz ? |
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Astralis
Senior Member
USA
1218 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 06:27:04
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Those are the features I was thinking about. I would also add:
- Active Users
- Reply URL
- More extensive PM management
- IP Ban / Ignore User
- Topic Links
- Links Manager
- Newsletter
- Maybe user paging
Snitz is great to mod and I don't know if the PHP community is involved in modding their forums like the Snitz community but I don't see how it would be different. They already have all the mods that we spend the time trying to mod into the base code.
My point is that the list of 'required mods' is becoming longer and keeping these required mods updated with each change is become a greater and greater task.
If these additions were added to the base code, then Snitz users can concentrate more time, creativity, and ingenuitey on newer mods no one has thought of yet that people won't be able to live with without. =) |
Edited by - Astralis on 11 June 2004 14:47:43 |
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jensen
New Member
United Kingdom
97 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 08:47:18
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It would be great to see many if not all of the above mentioned mods adding to the snitz base code.
It is fun experimenting and applying mods, but its not so much fun reapplying mods at upgrade time.
I agree with Astralis, If these additions were added to the base code, then Snitz users can concentrate more time, creativity, and ingenuitey on newer mods no one has thought of yet that people won't be able to live without.
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Edited by - jensen on 11 June 2004 08:48:03 |
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Shaggy
Support Moderator
Ireland
6780 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 09:24:02
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This debate comes up every now & again with some good suggestions from people. The only problem is, as the Dev Team will tell you, what one person may consider to be essential to their own forum may be considered superfluous junk by another. I, for one, don't use even half the mods mentioned in this thread - there will be those that use more and a lot that use less - so the result for me would be a severely bloated base code with a plethora of redundant features which I'd only end up ripping out eventually.
Also, part of the beauty of Snitz is how easy it is to get it up and running; the more features that are included in the base code the harder it will be for new users to get off the ground which will evetually frustrate them and drive them elsewhere.
And, finally, applying Mods is the best way to not only learn how the innards of Snitz work but is also a great way of teaching yourself ASP. If everything came pre-installed a lot of people might never get to grips with ASP nor the finer points of customising Snitz.
Just my 
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“I was having a mildly paranoid day, mostly due to the
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Edited by - Shaggy on 11 June 2004 09:26:14 |
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Da_Stimulator
DEV Team Forum Moderator
USA
3373 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 13:46:26
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| hm maybe I should get back into dev mode... |
-Stim |
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Astralis
Senior Member
USA
1218 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 14:47:07
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Hi Shaggy,
quote:
I, for one, don't use even half the mods mentioned in this thread - there will be those that use more and a lot that use less - so the result for me would be a severely bloated base code with a plethora of redundant features which I'd only end up ripping out eventually.
With an efficient admin section, you can easily turn on and off the mods you use just like you do now and mods do not bloat the code if they're added as the base code - you can easily mod around them. There are probably mods that have been included in the Snitz base code that you don't use right now but others do such as the quick reply, group categories, private categories, etc... The lowest common denominator, though, has risen. |
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proeder
Junior Member
Australia
230 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 19:31:00
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quote:
With an efficient admin section, you can easily turn on and off the mods you use just like you do now and mods do not bloat the code if they're added as the base code
But even features that are turned off use server ressources (in application objects and many variables) Correct me if I am wrong, but I think it is more the existence of a mod than its use which uses ressources. For the server it is the same workload knowing a feature is turned off or turned on, as soon as a mod is mentioned in config.asp it will use ressources.
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Looking for german Snitz forum? Suchst Du ein deutsches Snitz Forum?
Hier findest Du eins...
Hosting with ASP Support available: http://www.sharepointing.com |
Edited by - proeder on 11 June 2004 19:32:42 |
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laser
Advanced Member
Australia
3859 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 19:41:56
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quote:
What changes will this make for those who don't need internationalization?
You don't ??  I know all my members speak English, so that isn't a drama, the BIG thing I can see is the Timezones in 'your' time.
As for MODs, some will possibly be included but I wouldn't expect the lists that have been proposed here. Have a read thru previous threads in this forum and you'll see why. |
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Astralis
Senior Member
USA
1218 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 22:10:36
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As long as the date works and the time is set for one timezone at least, that's all I care about. In fact, I haven't even changed the time from where the server is located and I live in a different time zone. This hasn't bothered me nor my members for over two years.
My members speak English and anyone who comes to the board will probably speak English. If they don't, I can't know what they're saying and I can't moderate it.
I've read through some of the posts and I may be missing it, but I don't see why a majority of these mods couldn't easily be added. |
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RichardKinser
Snitz Forums Admin
USA
16655 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 22:17:16
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Because it's not a matter of just adding the MOD. When code is added to the base code, it's done pretty much from scratch. We have to make sure that it doesn't break something else, or affect performance. We want to keep the # of database queries to a minimum. When you start adding in other things, the # of database queries goes up, so does the amount of memory the forum uses (for application variables and things like that). Right now, we are pretty pleased with the performance of the base code. We did alot of work to optimize it as much as possible (reducing the database queries, etc..) I think things such as CSS and further optimization are more important than adding other features.
The internationalization project, at least what I looked at when Bozden was working on it, affected the performance of the forum pretty significantly. |
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laser
Advanced Member
Australia
3859 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 22:18:51
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| OK, I'm going to give up on this thread now. I notice there's no Dev involvement and I bet their response is the same as mine before : "Have a read thru previous threads in this forum and you'll see why." |
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Astralis
Senior Member
USA
1218 Posts |
Posted - 11 June 2004 : 22:25:48
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Richard,
I understand the problem of adding the mods and making sure they work right, but why not spend the time doing this? I understand that limited resources determines what is developed first. The team decided, apparently, that Internationalization is the most important change. I guess CSS is next (which I applaud!), but adding more features seems to always be balked at as if the base code is sacrosanct. I don't understand why the base code can't grow and incorporate the features which members expect today.
Laser,
If you can point me to some of the posts where this has been discussed I'd appreciate it. |
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laser
Advanced Member
Australia
3859 Posts |
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PeeWee.Inc
Senior Member
United Kingdom
1893 Posts |
Posted - 12 June 2004 : 10:35:08
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It's so easy to add Mods, so why not just add whats needed when needed? Keep the base code down to what it is now. Seems the best way for things to work.
As it is now, i've found myself stripping out code that i dont need in the base code, i would have hated to have to go ito it more to strip things like Smile Manager, Events Calendar and Forum Themes.
what might be a better idea is if the Dev team and Mod team both make a new team, something like a "portal team" and then make a base code portal, supported by Snitz. That would be a good idea :) |
De Priofundus Calmo Ad Te Damine |
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MarcelG
Retired Support Moderator
Netherlands
2625 Posts |
Posted - 12 June 2004 : 12:55:12
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Mmmh... interesting thought! But, wouldn't it be 'just another image/crash forum ?'
If there would be two versions, base snitz and premod-snitz, where it would still be snitz, I'd think it would work. |
portfolio - linkshrinker - oxle - twitter |
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