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ANNOUNCEMENT: Migration to vBulletin Cloud
I have informed the Administrators, the Moderation Team and our Site Supporters and now want to update the wider UKMIX community.
Over the last two weeks, I've been in discussion with vBulletin about migrating UKMIX over to vBulletin Cloud.
What is vBulletin Cloud?
According to vBulletin:
"With vBulletin Cloud we host your community for you. You get a fully functioning and customizable vBulletin site with all the key admin controls, while we handle the back-end infrastructure for you."
In simple terms, I don't have to worry about the technical server management anymore - vBulletin will do that for me - but the site continues in its current form, hopefully without the technical issues that we've seen recently. Migrating is something I've thought about before; prior to upgrading UKMIX to dedicated servers a couple of years ago, I thought about it, but didn't go through with the change. The main reason I've put it off is that I lose control over the server side of things, which I hated the idea of but truthfully, I'm not really doing much with the technical side anyway so giving up control to vBulletin (who will expertly manage it) isn't really a problem.
There will be no change in ownership, I will still own UKMIX but as part of the fee I pay to vBulletin, they'll essentially run the backend for me while we (the Administrators and Moderators) get to focus on day to day site management. Your experience should also not be affected (on the contrary, it should be enhanced). As part of the migration, we will be moving to the newest version of vBulletin (vBulletin 6.0).
Why now?
The reality now is that my personal situation is different to what it was five years ago, my personal priorities are different, which means I have less time than before and frankly, I don't want to spend the spare time I do have optimising the database, fixing broken tables and analysing error logs to diagnose reasons why something isn't working! So when technical issues arise - such as those occurring recently - I struggle to find the time to fix them properly, or long-term.
Please be reassured I am as committed as ever to keeping this brilliant community going, UKMIX will be around for at least another 20 years, and I would reiterate my earlier point that there shouldn't be any impact to what our community sees/feels when they post. I've tried not to make this sound like a big deal, as it isn't - I'm actually delighted to be doing this, subject to no issues arising with the vBulletin team - but appreciate you might have questions, so if you do, please just post them in here.
What are the downsides?
vBulletin doesn't allow add-ons - which we don't use - and we have less control over the technical side (we can make no changes that affect/impact the server management) and the ability to make changes to vBulletin templates.
What next?
I'm in the process of taking the relevant steps to commence with the migration - I'm not exactly certain when the migration will be (I'm relatively confident it will start within the next week or so) or how long it will take but please note something very important: UKMIX will not be accessible during the migration, and for a short period thereafter (while we test the site). I think it'll be up to a week of downtime but will confirm all of this once I have more information.
In the meantime, any comments or questions, please do let me know in this topic.
Over the last two weeks, I've been in discussion with vBulletin about migrating UKMIX over to vBulletin Cloud.
What is vBulletin Cloud?
According to vBulletin:
"With vBulletin Cloud we host your community for you. You get a fully functioning and customizable vBulletin site with all the key admin controls, while we handle the back-end infrastructure for you."
In simple terms, I don't have to worry about the technical server management anymore - vBulletin will do that for me - but the site continues in its current form, hopefully without the technical issues that we've seen recently. Migrating is something I've thought about before; prior to upgrading UKMIX to dedicated servers a couple of years ago, I thought about it, but didn't go through with the change. The main reason I've put it off is that I lose control over the server side of things, which I hated the idea of but truthfully, I'm not really doing much with the technical side anyway so giving up control to vBulletin (who will expertly manage it) isn't really a problem.
There will be no change in ownership, I will still own UKMIX but as part of the fee I pay to vBulletin, they'll essentially run the backend for me while we (the Administrators and Moderators) get to focus on day to day site management. Your experience should also not be affected (on the contrary, it should be enhanced). As part of the migration, we will be moving to the newest version of vBulletin (vBulletin 6.0).
Why now?
The reality now is that my personal situation is different to what it was five years ago, my personal priorities are different, which means I have less time than before and frankly, I don't want to spend the spare time I do have optimising the database, fixing broken tables and analysing error logs to diagnose reasons why something isn't working! So when technical issues arise - such as those occurring recently - I struggle to find the time to fix them properly, or long-term.
Please be reassured I am as committed as ever to keeping this brilliant community going, UKMIX will be around for at least another 20 years, and I would reiterate my earlier point that there shouldn't be any impact to what our community sees/feels when they post. I've tried not to make this sound like a big deal, as it isn't - I'm actually delighted to be doing this, subject to no issues arising with the vBulletin team - but appreciate you might have questions, so if you do, please just post them in here.
What are the downsides?
vBulletin doesn't allow add-ons - which we don't use - and we have less control over the technical side (we can make no changes that affect/impact the server management) and the ability to make changes to vBulletin templates.
What next?
I'm in the process of taking the relevant steps to commence with the migration - I'm not exactly certain when the migration will be (I'm relatively confident it will start within the next week or so) or how long it will take but please note something very important: UKMIX will not be accessible during the migration, and for a short period thereafter (while we test the site). I think it'll be up to a week of downtime but will confirm all of this once I have more information.
In the meantime, any comments or questions, please do let me know in this topic.
, but looks like TBC atm on the date.
hope everything ends up well!!!
They have affected me quite regularly too, so I’m looking forward to a smoother, more stable ukmix access.
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