New forum software

Welcome to De-Commissioned, a place for former members of the Great Commission movement (aka GCM, GCC, GCAC, GCI, the Blitz) to discuss problems they've experienced in the association's practices and theology.

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[puff of purple smoke]

DeComm has switched forum software from PHPBB to SMF (Simple Machines Forum), because of SMF's increased security, features, and customization options. All of the boards, threads, private messages and users were converted to the new software, so this will be nowhere near as drastic a change as the move from a blog to phpbb. For most it will just be a matter of getting used to the new layout.

This thread has been created to assist you in making the transition as smoothly as possible. I will attempt to answer any questions asked of me here, so that others may benefit from the answer.

The first thing you will notice when logging onto your account is that every thread ever posted is marked as unread. This is a side effect of the conversion, and can be easily resolved by clicking on the "Home" tab up top, and then scrolling to the bottom of the page until you see the "MARK ALL MESSAGES AS READ" button. To make sure you didn't miss any new threads be sure to check out the recent posts page.

I will be posting about other changes and features of the new forums in the not so distant future. In the meantime, keep posting and stay tuned!

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Just in case anybody has login issues with the new forum, you may email gcmwarning@gmail.com for off-board assistance.

[lone gone]

Thanks for your efforts.  this new format is great!

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Now that people have started using the forum, I'll go over a change to "usergroups" in the new software.

Usergroups on the old site were groups you could opt to join in order to show people where you were located. There were groups for east coast, west coast, Colorado, Iowa and Minnesota. This was somewhat clunky as you could join multiple groups (such as both the east and west coast groups), and some had difficulty figuring out how to join.

With the new software your location is tracked in the "Location" field in your Profile, and shown next to your name when you post.

To access and change your profile location:

• Click on the "Profile" tab on the top of the page
• On the left side of the page, there is a link to "Forum Profile Information"
• Change the "Location" text box and then click "Change Profile"

The old software also had a Location field, but it wasn't our primary method of letting people identify where they lived. For users who never filled out their Location but did sign up for a Usergroup on the old forum, I have manually filled in their Location on this forum based upon the usergroup they were in. You may want to verify this is accurate by following the above directions.

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Some additional changes:

• We have enabled ranks, which are titles shown next to poster names based upon the number of posts a registered user has made. The current ranks are: Lurker (No Posts), Obscure Poster (1-14 Posts), Regular (15-99 Posts), Veteran (100-249 Posts), and Household Name (250+ Posts).
• Using a feature that allows admins to reassign ownership of posts, many of the "archive" posts have been changed back to posts owned by their original authors. This should make reading old threads easier. There are many posts left to transfer over and this may be a long term project.
• On a trial basis, I have enabled Guest posting, which allows people without accounts to post and reply to topics under a specified name. There are still several benefits registered users have that guests don't, including the ability to track unread topics across sessions, post polls, read and send private messages, and so on. We'll try this feature out and see how it goes. I am still thinking through the ramifications of this
• The Site announcements forum can now be replied to by users. Before only admin could reply to posts there. New posts can still only be started by admin.

[MidnightRider]

I use NewsGator.com to look at the RSS feed for this site. Before the switch-over to the new forum software, the list of messages would show the subject and the author of each post. Now just the subject (and it is the message's subject, not the thread's subject). Is there anything you can do about that?

[puff of purple smoke]

I use NewsGator.com to look at the RSS feed for this site. Before the switch-over to the new forum software, the list of messages would show the subject and the author of each post. Now just the subject (and it is the message's subject, not the thread's subject). Is there anything you can do about that?

Yeah.. I have been looking for a way to customize the rss subject lines but haven't found a way yet.