http://www.fusionbb.com/forumThe latest announcements about FusionBB community software!en-usFri, 19 Mar 2010 14:25:01 GMTFri, 19 Mar 2010 14:25:01 GMThttp://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rssFusionBB 3.0 FINAL (www.fusionbb.com)01234http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11615http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11615
If you have questions about how to access the download area PT me or open a support ticket. I have posted articles about this before and will update this post to link to those shortly.

Big thumbs up to Couch, Josh, Chris, Greg and the Alpha team for making this happen. Due to the alpha teams time, dedications and great feedback to our team we have a better product to show for it.

This is a BETA release. As always we never recommend updating a live environment with a BETA release. Your license does allow you to run a test / sandbox install and we recommend you do a trial upgrade first.

Don't forget to always make a backup of your files and database before making an upgrade.

Please give us your feedback on this release as that helps us move forward from a beta to a gold / final release.

Some notes from Couch regarding the install:
1) Backup your site and its templates/skins/config

2) Now that you have a copy of your site delete skins and template directories

3) Copy all files from install over to site

4) Run the install

5) Change any custom templates to the new directory format. I would suggest examining the
fusionbb directory structure to see what is where. Also notice the new userpage and mail
directory structures.

Copy any custom templates over to server make sure to change the template directory name
to something other than fusionbb and smallscreen

6) Change any custom templates to the new directory format. I would suggest taking one of
the default ones and using that as a basis for any custom skins. This will be how the
format is from here out.

Copy any custom skins over to server make sure to change the skins directory name to
something other then the default ones

7) Go into the admin panel and set any new config variables.

Go to Admin Panel -> Site Tools -> Edit Skins and Edit Templates and import any
skins/templates that are not in the db, they should be the ones that appear with the
asterisk (*)

## If on a suphp or IIS Server your files will be owned by the site owner. If not on suphp
or IIS you will notice that files are now owned by the user that apache is set to write
files as. most cases it could be user 99, nobody, or apache. This will be dependent upon
how your host has your server setup. If for some reason your ftp program cannot change
file permissions or overwrite files there are two files included now to fix permissioning
one is in Admin Panel -> Miscellaneous -> Unlock Files, and other is in your main
directory called unlock.php which can be run as http://yoursite.com/yourforum/unlock.php

## Reasoning behind new setup for skins/templates directories is that it was becoming harder
to know what files were missing from each and the ever increasing time it was taking to
do an upgrade. From here on out it will be a lot easier, faster, and more reliable.




Discuss this post HERE.
]]>Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:41:31 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11597http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11597
I wanted to give a quick update as to the Status of FusionBB 3.1.

We have been Alpha testing it and the code and features are all performing well. So we are good to go on that front.

There were a variety of upgrade issues that our testers had been experiencing, and you may have seen some of these issues in the forum the last few upgrades. They were usually language file or permission issues. So the installer/upgrader is being reworked to make this process as smooth as possible. Everyone wants a smooth upgrade right?

I am pleased to report that our updated upgrader is performing well. Updated Upgrader? Say that three times fast.

We also used this opportunity to make a couple of other changes to the foundation of FusionBB. Many new forum admins struggle with getting file permissions setup correctly on your server. To make this even more difficult, everyone's server is different, so there's no steadfast rule about making stuff 755 but sometimes you need 777 etc... Then when you have directories, like those used to hold language files, templates, skins and configuration files, that are writeable, you run a slight security risk of someone being able to write your files.

This isn't a security risk from within FusionBB, but in some server configurations, if files are "world writable" so the apache user can update them, if another account on a shared server is compromised, it can allow a hacker to place files in writable directories, or update writable files. So we have made some changes here as well, washing most of this data, through the database. This helps improve the security as well as will make some stuff easier to update for the average site administrator. And this will make it a bit easier for some things, like headers and such, to not be overwritten during an upgrade.

We also discovered some issues, where when posts or forums are deleted, in some cases, attachments remain on the server. This can lead to file bloat on larger sites. So we're making some changes to resolve this as well.

So we are currently in the process of testing this and making sure the transition with these changes from 3.0 to 3.1 will go smoothly for everyone. Once we are comfortable that we'll be rolling it out here as a public beta.

Stay Tuned! ]]>Fri, 19 Feb 2010 03:31:44 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11349http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11349
What does this mean?
It means that versions of FusionBB 2.2 and prior will no longer receive FusionBB support.

Why Is FusionBB Making This Change?
Most issues that customers using versions 2.2 and prior run into could easily be addressed / fixed by simply upgrading to a current version.

We include bug fixes with every release so it does not make much sense spending hours fixing a bug or problem when an upgrade which usually takes less then an hour or can be done by the FusionBB staff for $49 (standard upgrade).

What will the EOL policy be fore FusionBB moving forward?
Moving forward FusionBB will only support the most current TWO stable releases of FusionBB.

Currently this means we will support 3.0 and 2.3.

When the next stable release of FusionBB is made we will mark 2.3 as EOL and 3.0 and the next stable version will be supported and so on.

What if I don't want to upgrade?
FusionBB will never force an upgrade on anyone. You are still more then welcome to run an EOL release (though not recommended).

You are also more then welcome to still post here on the forums, we won't ban you and other users can still chime in to help. If there is a quick answer to your problem or question a FBB staff member may still chime in. However FBB Staff will no longer officially support the product so a response from FBB Staff will not be required for problems with versions that have been EOL'd.

The official support will always be a a recommendation to upgrade to a current, supported stable release.

Is this normal?
Yes most software companies only support a certain number of current releases and regularly EOL older products.

Have additional questions or have comments about this post? Feel free to discuss this topic HERE .


]]>Sun, 12 Jul 2009 14:15:54 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11285http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11285
We think that both changes will help improve communication between staff and our user base as well as allow for more timely responses to posts here on the FusionBB.com site.

We know these were both hot topics during the 3.0 released and they were recognized as areas that we could improve upon. We believe these changes will be a big part of accomplishing those improvements.

First Chris Peterson is now our FusionBB Community Support Manager. Most of you know Chris, he is on here constantly and is frequently the first person to answer your FusionBB questions.

Second Greg joins us as a FusionBB Community Support Specialist. Many of you know Greg, he is a long time FusionBB user (one of the originals) and a member of the Alpha team. Greg is not only well versed in FusionBB as a product but he operates a popular board, www.truckersroad.com so he is very familiar with the pitfalls, challenges, ups and downs and the needs and wants of an active community administrator.

We hope you will join me in thanking Chris for his hardwork and in welcoming Greg to the team!

]]>Thu, 04 Jun 2009 06:47:36 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11242http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11242
As everyone knows there have been struggles with this release. There was a fair amount of feature creep, mixed in with some unexpected bugs the launch of 3.0 Final has taken longer then we had planned.

We appreciate everyone's patience with this release and now that it is here we believe that all of you will be happy with the quality of the final release.

It even includes this new skin that we are using here on the FBB site (Nitrogen2).

I know the big question is: "Great, how can I download it?"

The answer is simple! Click on the Purchase FusionBB link in the top right of your FusionBB.com screen (or HERE )

Then in the top left of the billing screen current clients can log into their license area using the Client Area link. Once logged in click on your license and view downloads and you will see a .zip and a .tar.gz zip of the 3.0 download.

Have fun with the new version and also keep an eye on the blog on my user page, HERE, for more tidbits about 3.0 and things to come with Fusion.

As always I have set up an discussion post HERE for any comments related to and regarding this post.

]]>Sat, 30 May 2009 20:56:51 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11189http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11189
We appreciate your patience while we have worked on getting 3.0 out.

As many of you know it has been a bit of a bumpy road due to a couple of bugs we did not expect.

We do however think it is worth the wait. This version of FusionBB is the most aggressive release we have ever made.

It is shock full of new tools and features that users have been requesting for some time.

Our alpha team has worked with this release for about a week and we haven't come across anything show stopping. We fully expect not to run into any other problems, and as long as nothing pops up we will be re-labeling this release as 3.0 final in about a week.

All users with active support can find both .zip and .tar.gz packages of this labeled as "FusionBB3.0-BETA" in the their downloads area.

Thanks to Josh, Couch, Chris and the Alpha team for their hardwork on this release.

You can discuss this notice HERE.

]]>Thu, 23 Apr 2009 20:28:09 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11070http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11070
When FusionBB was first launched many of you were direct development customers of Josh and Dave, they were already intimately familiar with your boards. That coupled with the relatively small user base made it very easy for them to log in to most users sites to fix their problems even though FusionBB has always used forum support as the only advertised support method.

Due to the forum support not being heavily enforced, along with some changes to our forums (i.e. any registered member can post questions) there has been a lot of confusion and some have come to expect us to login to their forum and basically manage it for them.

For this reason we have had to put our foot down. However we have also realized that forum based support is not the best way to treat every single problem.

So starting on Sat, March 7th, 2009 we will be opening our brand new support desk. Our support desk will allow users to log tickets which will allow for better 1 on 1 interaction with our staff. Also the new support desk will have a much easier to navigate and search version of our knowledgebase.

Our new support procedures will be:
1.) Post your question to the forums. This will be our first line of support. This is available to all users (with and without an active support subscription). Posting to the forums remains an integral part of our support. It allows our answers to easily be seen by many users and help them resolve the same questions, which is not done when answered privately.

If your question is not resolved via the forum post then users with current support subscriptions can use:

2.) Submit a ticket to our support teams. Tickets will be responded to within 12 hours and we will be able to resolve most users questions within 24 hours.

Via the support desk we will help users troubleshoot their server and software configuration problems, however we will ONLY login to your actual forum to fix an item or look at an item if it appears to be a problem with the actual FusionBB software itself or if it is a problem with a configuration we made while performing a paid service (i.e. a professional install, professional upgrade, etc.)

3.) For users whom need additional support we will offer a new hands on configuration service. Our hourly rate for custom configuration is $75, this does not include customization of the scripts themselves (please contact us for a quote on that) but on the actual system configuration. Though we are more than happy to discuss configuration settings via both the forums and support tickets we do know there are a lot of users whom would love to have us login and set things up or do initial and or complex configuration settings for them. There is a 30 minute minimum charge for this and we usually have to schedule our services at least 48 hours in advance.

We know that these new support policies are a bit different then what has been followed over the years, but they do give more options to our users then what we officially provide now. Furthermore it allows us to better support all users as our use base grows. Using the support desk will also make it more simple to track the status of your requests when multiple people are involved in helping solve a problem.

Please discuss this topic HERE.

]]>Thu, 05 Mar 2009 04:31:13 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11063http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/11063
You can access the member's area by visiting this page and clicking "Client Area" in the upper left corner.

NOTE/WARNING: This is a BETA release. It is for testing. It is not recommended you run a beta release on your live site unless you know what you are doing. ]]>Sun, 01 Mar 2009 23:37:42 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/10985http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/10985
I know it has been awhile since there has been a general "Here is going on with FusionBB" announcement and I know that lack of communication has some of you concerned.

As FusionBB is a small company and we have always prided ourselves in the tight knit community of FusionBB users that lack of communication is even more unacceptable then what you would find from a much larger company.

I'd like to start with an overview of what has transpired in the last year as well as what our plans are going forward.

I think the famous opening line from The Tale of Two Cities, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times", can accurately describe FusionBB's trip through 2008.

For the "Best of times" side of things, we achieved a number of accomplishments last year that we are very proud of. Use of the FusionBB software climbed to record numbers and we achieved the highest sales figures that we have ever achieved in 2008. We also launched a new billing system that allows us to give everyone access to the FusionBB forums, as downloads are now controlled by the billing system. Chris, Lori and Couch worked harder then ever on helping our new clients get their software setup, on coding 3.0 (by far our largest release), and writing lots of documentation.

With those great accomplishments came a number of challenges, and drawbacks that we have been fighting in the background. Though being a small company means that we get to know our customers and their needs it also means that we don't have a building with 100 developers cranking out code. So 3.0 (which will be our best release ever) has definitely presented a challenge as it is an ambitious release that probably could have actually been two smaller releases. Furthermore 3.0 has been plagued with "Feature Creep" there were many times where we were close to getting it out the door, but we added another "small" feature, which then turned out to be a bigger problem then expected.

We did have a few issues with the involvement of our Alpha Team, many members who used to test for us, did not participate in testing 3.0. This made the testing more tedious, and took us longer to find and resolve bugs before we could release beta. A big thanks goes out to our current Alpha Team as it stands now. They worked harder then any Alpha Team ever has to help make this a successful version. Once 3.0 is out the door and as we start on 3.1 we will be looking for additional Alpha Team members. If you are interested in joining the Alpha Team please PT Josh.

Probably the largest roadblock we stumbled on, especially towards the end of 2008, was support. We found ourselves sitting on the side of a double-edged sword quite a bit with support issues in 2008. Josh, myself and everyone at FusionBB has always strived to offer above and beyond support for FusionBB. Though our support policy has always been "Forum Only Support" we have many times logged into users board and given them some 1 on 1 support. This is something that many of our competitors charge large support fees for. However as we got deeper into 3.0 it became more difficult to offer this level of support at no cost. Though we officially only offer "Forum based support" I think that the not being able to log in and make fixes for customers that have received this in the past has created some frustration. We realize that we did not even offer an option and that we put some users in a hard spot with this. So for 2009 we will be offering some new support options.


So we would like to share with you the simple steps we are planning on, and are already implementing as part of our 2009 game plan:
1.) We are about 90% through with the bug fixes for 3.0, which I know has been long awaited.
2.) Before we start development with 3.1 we will be making some changes with our Alpha Team to get it back to the size of previous Alpha Teams. We also have plans in place on how to better involve the Alpha Team in the development process and have them start testing features earlier on in development which should make the Alpha and Beta testing processes shorter.
3.) We have created some new internal strategies and processes which will remove the dreaded "Feature Creep", which had greatly slowed the development of this version.
4.) With the launch of 3.0 will be coming the new support desk. All of our KB articles have been re-arranged for easier searching of them. This also allows us to use a true ticket system to more effectively communicate with the customer directly (especially when more then one of the FBB staff is involved in the ticket resolution).
5.) We will be offering additional support options for those times when more in-depth hands on support is needed, and we will be post the different levels of support more publicly so everyone knows what they can expect.
6.) As soon as 3.0 is launched both Josh and I will be regularly posting to our blogs (at least once per week) so that you can actively track the development work and future of FBB rather then waiting around for a post like this.

We feel that FusionBB is a great piece of software, but more importantly we love how much of a community has been built around our product. We try not to share too many of our plans as we don't want to get people's hopes up for features that are still 1 year + away, but we do have long development and company goals and we are well on the road to achieving all of them even more quickly then expected.

Thanks for being a customer!

Regards,
Billy Cooter
Managing Partner, FusionBB


If you would like to comment on this announcement please do so HERE.

]]>Fri, 30 Jan 2009 08:02:24 GMThttp://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/10780http://www.fusionbb.com/forum/showtopic.php?tid/10780BETA release to the members area.

For a complete recap of the new features in FusionBB 3.0 please review our Changelog

NOTE: this is a BETA Release. It is released to the public for testing. It is not recommended that you use BETA versions on your production sites unless you know what you are doing.

I want to personally pass along kudos to Couch who did such a good job helping us with this version. I think, once you have a chance to dig in, you will all agree he has outdone himself!

Also thanks to all of our Alpha Testers. Without you guys we wouldn't be anywhere. Since this version was so extensive, testing dragged on for longer than expected. Our Alpha testers really went the extra mile in helping us for version 3.0. Thanks guys! ]]>Mon, 03 Nov 2008 02:19:44 GMT