2018-07-06, 05:20 AM
Feel free to move this to the correct area if required.
I am not trying to start a flame war etc just bring to attention some things I have noticed and touched on.
With the recent released a few bugs have slipped though.
Youtube Videos,
Moderation Logs,
The latest bots spider comma
These have been simple things which with easily overlooked
or easily have been over sighted in QA.
A simple solution is to release in stages to main testers and developers as a inner circle then the general community same way Microsoft does releases like there insider and feature updates.
Or have a beta period like other software does (Xenforo does this for example) where a release is labeled in the end as .bta or something so 1.8.16.bta that people can publicly test to catch these bugs before a wider release is pushed.
This will stop all these smaller breaking bugs and allow faster development and input from the community on changes and potential issues.
I would even run a dedicated beta forum to help find and report these bugs for the wider released versions as well as many of us here would surely like to do.
As well with the recent change to the login template which needs a change on every custom theme to get that working again,
I feel this wasn't highlighted enough and was missing from the release notes.
Also if It could have been held until 1.9 that would have been better than pushing out a theme breaking change when the whole theme system is being redone.
I made a thread detailing the code change for the login which seems to be the official link to and public notice on this forum for any question about the issue.
MyBB 1.8.16 Released — Security & Maintenance Release
This didn't mention it it only mentioned,
If you use the login_attempt_check() function, its signature has changed
This refers to max login attempts.
In the 61 issues resolved there was nothing listed about a breaking or critical change to the login template in the titles.
In the Release Notes as per the blog the only message was about the max login attempt change as quoted below.
Note: CSS appears typod and should be changed to 'Template and theme files' as CSS is the styling sheets when the changes were in the template code instead.
A confusion point for many.
The above should also have read as a extra:
The login system has changed slightly to prevent a security breach so your member_login xx and xx templates need changing with this updated code <code here>
The 6 Security vulnerabilities addressed doesn't list the change,
In the file and template changes the templates section the login code there were 47 changed templates alongside the 97 changed files and 3 removed files.
Also there is no way to click on the files in the changed files list to see just the changes to each file and template before updating.
The main login template was listed member_login which is what change that was there were other places I believe the new code was used one the portal wasn't changed and was still bugged.
Below the changed template is just the MyBB footer.
So nowhere was a public notice that a critical theme code breaking change on login was made.
Yet the official response given on the forum was look at the change log and compare difs, well as shown above the change log didn't list the change and there were a total of 164 changed files and templates and 3 removals in MyBB 1.8.16.
I did read all this before I updated looking for anything labeled as needing to be changed in the templates that would be forum breaking like that login issue but didn't see any major breaking changes like that listed.
Also telling people to compare diffs is quite hard before they update to changes that can break there site as the only diff compare method is once a site has been updated if you have a second copy of the default theme to cleanly compare diffs to as custom themes are all modified in 50+ files to the official ones as is, which isn't good to be seen as telling people to update to see whats changed and could break their sites.
Not everyone runs a secondly test forum, just like not everyone runs a second computer or a VM to test windows and other software updates.
I however have a secondary and as many domain test sites as I want.
This is something that should be addressed with documentation for the next version and before 2.0 that all theme and plugin changing critical bugs get notified in the release notes so users aren't caught out like they have been with the login.
You managed to mention max login attempt which was a rarer bug but not the login change which is something common to nearly every custom theme.
With 1.9 which will start becoming huge code changes to 2.0 a complete rewrite I hope MyBB can put in new procedures on QA and documentation of release to avoid simple mistakes as well as issues like this one with the login.
I am not trying to start a flame war or annoy anyone and I know as developers you may feel you owe no-one even any user or forum owner on here anything and that MyBB is already going out of its way to just provide updates and a release page as it is (this has been the vibe I have gotten on these forums from developers both main and plugins)
As a non profit forum company the goals of MyBB are to enable people to run there own forum as well as enable communication on the internet.
Taken from the front page.
As enabling the community, so too should be releases and documentation be community focused as we are the ones impacted by changes here and need information in order to run our communities efficiently without issues from minor bugs and code changes that change how we run things.
I personally don't mind for major changes as long as we are informed what those changes are and how to deal with them.
With MyBB deciding to become new complete rewrite software as 2.0 so too should the ways and methodology be improved to enable more information and QA for users as a better stronger and more reliable system.
For info: I have run a few communities in the past on different board softwares.
I ran a Minecraft server with over 40, 3rd party plugins for two years as well as a forum and learned about the importance of changes with documentation and when even though we had the info right in their face people would constantly scream they weren't told what changed 'also as a means to troll me'.
I have a certificate 1 and 2 in business and worked as a Public Servant for a year with the Police department here.
I have a certificate 3 in I.T as well as 2-3 years working with disabled and underprivileged as a repair technician and kinda consultant liaison of info and procedures and improvement for the non profit Microsoft MAR refurbisher program places I was with.
So I know the importance of QA, documentation, also training, to the disabled and people that don't know a clue about using a PC the 'general moms and dads' as we called them that want to just browse the web, check email, play solitaire etc.
I am not trying to start a flame war etc just bring to attention some things I have noticed and touched on.
With the recent released a few bugs have slipped though.
Youtube Videos,
Moderation Logs,
The latest bots spider comma
These have been simple things which with easily overlooked
or easily have been over sighted in QA.
A simple solution is to release in stages to main testers and developers as a inner circle then the general community same way Microsoft does releases like there insider and feature updates.
Or have a beta period like other software does (Xenforo does this for example) where a release is labeled in the end as .bta or something so 1.8.16.bta that people can publicly test to catch these bugs before a wider release is pushed.
This will stop all these smaller breaking bugs and allow faster development and input from the community on changes and potential issues.
I would even run a dedicated beta forum to help find and report these bugs for the wider released versions as well as many of us here would surely like to do.
As well with the recent change to the login template which needs a change on every custom theme to get that working again,
I feel this wasn't highlighted enough and was missing from the release notes.
Also if It could have been held until 1.9 that would have been better than pushing out a theme breaking change when the whole theme system is being redone.
I made a thread detailing the code change for the login which seems to be the official link to and public notice on this forum for any question about the issue.
MyBB 1.8.16 Released — Security & Maintenance Release
This didn't mention it it only mentioned,
If you use the login_attempt_check() function, its signature has changed
This refers to max login attempts.
In the 61 issues resolved there was nothing listed about a breaking or critical change to the login template in the titles.
In the Release Notes as per the blog the only message was about the max login attempt change as quoted below.
Note: CSS appears typod and should be changed to 'Template and theme files' as CSS is the styling sheets when the changes were in the template code instead.
A confusion point for many.
Quote:This update includes compatibility fixes for database engines and recent PHP versions as well as performance and global security improvements. Note that the theme’s CSS files may need to be updated. If you use the login_attempt_check() function, note that its signature has changed.
The above should also have read as a extra:
The login system has changed slightly to prevent a security breach so your member_login xx and xx templates need changing with this updated code <code here>
The 6 Security vulnerabilities addressed doesn't list the change,
In the file and template changes the templates section the login code there were 47 changed templates alongside the 97 changed files and 3 removed files.
Also there is no way to click on the files in the changed files list to see just the changes to each file and template before updating.
The main login template was listed member_login which is what change that was there were other places I believe the new code was used one the portal wasn't changed and was still bugged.
Below the changed template is just the MyBB footer.
So nowhere was a public notice that a critical theme code breaking change on login was made.
Yet the official response given on the forum was look at the change log and compare difs, well as shown above the change log didn't list the change and there were a total of 164 changed files and templates and 3 removals in MyBB 1.8.16.
I did read all this before I updated looking for anything labeled as needing to be changed in the templates that would be forum breaking like that login issue but didn't see any major breaking changes like that listed.
Also telling people to compare diffs is quite hard before they update to changes that can break there site as the only diff compare method is once a site has been updated if you have a second copy of the default theme to cleanly compare diffs to as custom themes are all modified in 50+ files to the official ones as is, which isn't good to be seen as telling people to update to see whats changed and could break their sites.
Not everyone runs a secondly test forum, just like not everyone runs a second computer or a VM to test windows and other software updates.
I however have a secondary and as many domain test sites as I want.
This is something that should be addressed with documentation for the next version and before 2.0 that all theme and plugin changing critical bugs get notified in the release notes so users aren't caught out like they have been with the login.
You managed to mention max login attempt which was a rarer bug but not the login change which is something common to nearly every custom theme.
With 1.9 which will start becoming huge code changes to 2.0 a complete rewrite I hope MyBB can put in new procedures on QA and documentation of release to avoid simple mistakes as well as issues like this one with the login.
I am not trying to start a flame war or annoy anyone and I know as developers you may feel you owe no-one even any user or forum owner on here anything and that MyBB is already going out of its way to just provide updates and a release page as it is (this has been the vibe I have gotten on these forums from developers both main and plugins)
As a non profit forum company the goals of MyBB are to enable people to run there own forum as well as enable communication on the internet.
Taken from the front page.
Quote:Forum software everyone can love.
MyBB powers hundreds of thousands of engaging, powerful, and unique communities across the internet.
As enabling the community, so too should be releases and documentation be community focused as we are the ones impacted by changes here and need information in order to run our communities efficiently without issues from minor bugs and code changes that change how we run things.
I personally don't mind for major changes as long as we are informed what those changes are and how to deal with them.
With MyBB deciding to become new complete rewrite software as 2.0 so too should the ways and methodology be improved to enable more information and QA for users as a better stronger and more reliable system.
For info: I have run a few communities in the past on different board softwares.
I ran a Minecraft server with over 40, 3rd party plugins for two years as well as a forum and learned about the importance of changes with documentation and when even though we had the info right in their face people would constantly scream they weren't told what changed 'also as a means to troll me'.
I have a certificate 1 and 2 in business and worked as a Public Servant for a year with the Police department here.
I have a certificate 3 in I.T as well as 2-3 years working with disabled and underprivileged as a repair technician and kinda consultant liaison of info and procedures and improvement for the non profit Microsoft MAR refurbisher program places I was with.
So I know the importance of QA, documentation, also training, to the disabled and people that don't know a clue about using a PC the 'general moms and dads' as we called them that want to just browse the web, check email, play solitaire etc.