How hard isvb3 upgrade?

[Chris]

How hard or complicated is the upgrade to vb3? I sorta do not look forward to having to recustomize things, re-add hacks like quick reply, etc.

[MarkB]

The re-adding of hacks will be the most tortuous aspect of it.

If you've not made any large database changes, then the upgrade will be relatively painless (I always meant to write a tute on this... ahh, if only I had time to scratch myself!). You'll need to recreate your style* - I did, but it was rather modified from the default.

The entire process only took at best an hour or two - reindexing is a huge pain in the *** :)

Note, I upgraded when I was on the private beta team. The vB2 -> vB3 upgrader may be more streamlined by now!


(*possibly)

[MarkB]

I should have mentioned that quick reply is a standard vB3 feature :)

What other hacks do you use?

[Chris]

Just a small hack to remove sessions.

But also some layout changes to remove columns from the main forum view (like the moderator column -- a waste of horizontal space).

[MarkB]

You can remove the moderator column in the admincp I believe (I don't have it showing on mine). Same with sessions I think.

It also shows, in the Who's Online page, what bots are crawling :)

[Chris]

Then I guess the biggest issue will be changing all the images.

[MarkB]

Pity you didn't grab one of the RC's - they had the old images, but in the new image paths :) (the filenames remain the same)

[fonzerelli_79]

i thought the upgrade was fine
with this forum you can keep the header and footer - obviously remove the top nav buttons and replace them with the new vb3 text drop down menu - ive got 3 forums and 2 are now at vb3 - the last im waiting for a skin to be developed

what i always do is setup a testforums first - install the version you are using now and then upgrade to the current version so that you wont be surprised by any little problems

if your having difficulties let me know :)

[MarkB]

I think the only problem Chris will have, style wise, is adding his colours to the new CSS options available.

[MarkB]

Oh, one request - could you make external data feeds available? I'd love to has an RSS feed from here so I can keep up on latest threads via Feed Demon...

[Chris]

Originally posted by MarkB
Oh, one request - could you make external data feeds available? I'd love to has an RSS feed from here so I can keep up on latest threads via Feed Demon...

Is that something that is part of vb3?

[MarkB]

It is, indeed.

Under admin options, you'll have a section called External Data Provider.

You can enable RSS, XML and external javascript feeds. You can then promote feeds by forum id.

example: http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/external.php?type=RSS&forumids=48,47

[Yoda]

As is vB's custom (and as Mark has already pointed out), many popular hacks for vB 2.x now come standard. The Admin CP is completely massive; it's the one thing, in my opinion, that genuinely sets vBulletin apart from its freeware alternatives. It's jaw-droppingly powerful.

That said, given that this is not a very heavily hacked board, I don't think it'll be much trouble. It should save your old style, but if it doesn't, it shouldn't take too long to change the colors. Hack re-application will be based primarily on whether or not updated versions of the hack exist, as I don't believe anything beyond the simplest of code modifications will be compatible with the vB 3 rewrite.