Preparations you should make for the change in software on LFGSS.com

As many of you know, LFGSS is going to be migrating from vBulletin to Microcosm in the near future (weeks, not months).

When we migrate the process roughly follows this:
1) Turn off the site
2) Backup everything
3) Produce an export of all of the data in a neutral format
4) Import from the neutral format
5) Turn on the site

We estimate that this will take less than a day to complete.

The reason for this thread is that there will be some changes initially. No two forum systems are perfectly alike and things exist in some systems that don't exist in another, and there are mild differences between systems.

The big message: Make sure your email address is correct, that you have access to the email account related to your profile, and if you have aliases these will all be merged into the oldest account that shares the email address... if you don't want your aliases merged you should make sure each one has a unique email address.

We have written our own exporter to export vBulletin to JSON.

There are some limitations to the exporter as some things are unique to vBulletin.

1. Reputation, a.k.a. comments. These are not exported as the reputation system in vBulletin calculates reputation in a very unique and complex way, and this only makes sense if the destination system imports and can use reputation in precisely the same way. This isn't true of any software other than another instance of vBulletin.

2. Forum hierarchies. We will be moving to a flat list of forums, ordered by popularity, we will no longer have hierarchies.

3. Private messages: If you have BCC'd someone, then this is converted to a CC as not all systems have the concept of a BCC.

4. Albums: As found here, https://www.lfgss.com/all_albums.php these are not presently exported but we will loop back and do this when Microcosm supports Galleries.

5. Tags: Not exported at all, and due to the fact that a lot of people regarded them as private we are not betraying that expectation by exporting them. They are also a hack on vBulletin, and we're concentrating on core data. #hashtags are available in Microcosm to aid search.

6. Social groups: As found here, https://www.lfgss.com/allgroups.html are not being exported as they are largely dead. Microcosm will allow you to create your own forums, but we're not bringing the old data from vBulletin social groups.

7. Profile comments: As found on your profile, these are not exported.

On importing into Microcosm some other things happen. The key one is that vBulletin treats the username as your identifier (why you can't change your username) whereas Microcosm treats your email address as the identifier.

Things you should do in preparation for the migration, and if you care about these things you should do them soon:

1. If you need access to album photos in the near future, you really should download the photos in albums and keep a copy.

2. If you have multiple aliases with the same email address, these will be merged if the email addresses are still the same when the export is done. You should login to each alias account and change the email address to something unique. The merge process will always keep the oldest account, all aliases will be merged into the oldest account. You can change the username once we're live on Microcosm (and you can change the username whenever you like, there are no limitations on that).

3. If you care deeply about your reputation comments, you will want to save them somehow. Unfortunately vBulletin doesn't provide a mechanism for these, so this is basically a take screenshots of your rep comments thing.

4. If you care about anything within a social group you will want to save that somehow. Again, this probably means taking screenshots of social group pages.

5. If you care about comments left on your profile you will want to save those. Again, take screenshots of your profile comments.

6. If you know you have private messaged someone via BCC and you really do not want the other recipients to know you included them... delete the private message (the sent copy if you were the sender, the received copy if you were the BCC recipient).

The big message again: Make sure your email address is correct, that you have access to the email account related to your profile, and if you have aliases these will all be merged into the oldest account that shares the email address... if you don't want your aliases merged you should make sure each one has a unique email address.

Repeating it again, if you don't want an alias merged, you should ensure the alias has a unique email address.

It's all about the email addresses.

What we are migrating over:

1. Users
   
2. Forums
   
3. Usergroups (forum permissions and memberships)
   
4. Threads
   
5. Posts
   
6. Attachments
   
7. Private messages
   
8. Follows (thread/forum subscriptions as well as "Adam is friends with Bill")
   
9. Ignores (user ignores, as well as thread/forum ignores)
   
   

All of that stuff will work as you expect.

The size of the export? Currently 52GB of data:

• 50 forums
  
• 40k users
  
• 120k threads
  
• 4.2m posts
  
• 70k attachments
  
• 1.5m private messages
  

1.5m pms is staggering!

1/3 of the forum is effectively private.

Cheers, Velocio. I'd like to keep my social group going, so I'll save all that info.

What is to be done with screen shots of rep, for example?

52GB? You could keep the forum in your pocket...

Cheers, Velocio. I'd like to keep my social group going, so I'll save all that info.

What one is it? I'll consider what it means to export it if it's really valuable to you.

What is to be done with screen shots of rep, for example?

I don't know... keep them? If you don't want a copy, don't take screenshots.

The data isn't coming over to Microcosm, so it will be lost. Take screenshots if you care for a copy of those things.

What one is it? I'll consider what it means to export it if it's really valuable to you.

It's this one

Epping Forest Honey Badgers

Although, if you're going to loop back and export picture albums, It might be simpler for me to take those and create a new forum.

It's mainly the members list, photos and route maps that I'm concerned about keeping :-)

Can you remind me of the aliases I have that are associated with my main account?

Can you remind me of the aliases I have that are associated with my main account?

I've no idea, don't you have emails left in your Gmail for each new account you created?

my email address for microcosm and lfgss are not the same (although usernames are I think - I have one reserved as an investor) - is it best to change my email in my profile to the one I use for microcosm?

Yes.

For investors, the reserved username is against the email address you used when you told us about it ages ago. If you don't have the same email address, well the username belongs to someone else ;)

Aahh, I won't have time to make the first page of most prolific losersposters. I was about 20 posts off then pisti was unbanned and I got bumped down a spot, my life will never be complete.

^^ does that mean someone might have reserved dicki in microcosm ?

Euph?

Yes.

For investors, the reserved username is against the email address you used when you told us about it ages ago. If you don't have the same email address, well the username belongs to someone else ;)

I'm not sure I ever did this. Is there a way of checking?

Microcosm is coming...

I'll be stocking up on bottled water and tinned goods this morning then later today I'll be barricading myself in the basement with my dear friend, Mr Axe...

Take care out there, kidz...

Aha an extreme prepper.

You learned how to skin and gut rats yet?

I'm gettin' there...

Merging? No merging? Out. It's been fun.

I'm gettin' there...

it's as if i have been crossed with Russel Brand

good luck.

What is the rollback plan?

Move fast, break things

What about member numbers- do they get lost too?

I'm not sure I ever did this. Is there a way of checking?

Kinda.

I'm going to run a report after we've done a few test imports and see which investors were affected and then email you asking which email you want to use (if not the investor one I'll update it for you, if the investor one you can change your email on here pre-migration).

good luck.

What is the rollback plan?

There isn't one. It's test, test, test some more... then fly scary and blind for a month or so whilst we all get freaked out that it's different.

What about member numbers- do they get lost too?

They change. Not sure lost is that right word. They will remain ordered in the same way, but as an example I'm userId = 1 on LFGSS, but on Microcosm if the total number of users on the platform (including other sites) is 2,000, then I'm going to be userId = 2,001. And skydancer will be 2,002 and so on.

Where there are gaps in the LFGSS numbering, those will now be filled in. But effectively the base number is offset by the number of profiles on the platform at the time of import.