Smashers,
The upcoming year will bring many changes to Smashboards. Some of these changes require quite a bit of prep work and may take months to unfold, while others can occur more quickly. One change that we can implement right away is a revamp of how our forums are structured. Currently, there is clutter, unnecessary forums, forums with little or no traffic that distract from others and split attention, and one sub-community of Smashers who deserve and have been clamoring patiently for more, and much deserved, space.
I am talking, of course, about the creative community of Smashers behind Project M - which on December 28th released demo v2.5. If you haven't explored or are unfamilier with Project M, more information can be found here and can be discussed on our forums by going here! As part of the many changes coming to Smashboards, Project M, and other projects like it, will be receiving more exposure and their own frontpage forum space instead of remaining nested within other areas of the site.
Other changes will be made by merging some (sub)forums together (for example: Atlantic North and Beast Coast Tea Room will be joined). During this process, no information or threads should be lost - just simply relocated. There is a chance of some awkwardness if you are browsing one of the forums as it is being moved.
As for other updates, the January 3rd test-migration appears to be holding. Additionally, assuming the test is successful, we are tentatively targeting a live-migration to the new servers on January 7th, 2013. This is obviously the week prior to Apex 2013, which can be discussed here. We will do whatever we can to make sure the migration is successful prior to Apex 2013, and if there are potential issues (likely revealed in testing) we may postpone the migration until after the Apex weekend. More information on this will be revealed after the test migration is completed.
Reminder: Registration for the largest Smash tournament of the year closes on December 30th, so make sure to go here and register if you are interested in attending. And as another gentle reminder, Premium Memberships that go to support the site can still be purchased here!
Finally, I'd love to hear feedback and suggestions from the community about changes they would like to see with Smashboards. Please use the discussion thread for this update as an opportunity to let us know what Smashboards can do better!
Happy Smashing!
AlphaZealot
Follow on Twitter
Smashboards Transition Log
The upcoming year will bring many changes to Smashboards. Some of these changes require quite a bit of prep work and may take months to unfold, while others can occur more quickly. One change that we can implement right away is a revamp of how our forums are structured. Currently, there is clutter, unnecessary forums, forums with little or no traffic that distract from others and split attention, and one sub-community of Smashers who deserve and have been clamoring patiently for more, and much deserved, space.
I am talking, of course, about the creative community of Smashers behind Project M - which on December 28th released demo v2.5. If you haven't explored or are unfamilier with Project M, more information can be found here and can be discussed on our forums by going here! As part of the many changes coming to Smashboards, Project M, and other projects like it, will be receiving more exposure and their own frontpage forum space instead of remaining nested within other areas of the site.
Other changes will be made by merging some (sub)forums together (for example: Atlantic North and Beast Coast Tea Room will be joined). During this process, no information or threads should be lost - just simply relocated. There is a chance of some awkwardness if you are browsing one of the forums as it is being moved.
As for other updates, the January 3rd test-migration appears to be holding. Additionally, assuming the test is successful, we are tentatively targeting a live-migration to the new servers on January 7th, 2013. This is obviously the week prior to Apex 2013, which can be discussed here. We will do whatever we can to make sure the migration is successful prior to Apex 2013, and if there are potential issues (likely revealed in testing) we may postpone the migration until after the Apex weekend. More information on this will be revealed after the test migration is completed.
Reminder: Registration for the largest Smash tournament of the year closes on December 30th, so make sure to go here and register if you are interested in attending. And as another gentle reminder, Premium Memberships that go to support the site can still be purchased here!
Finally, I'd love to hear feedback and suggestions from the community about changes they would like to see with Smashboards. Please use the discussion thread for this update as an opportunity to let us know what Smashboards can do better!
Happy Smashing!
AlphaZealot
Follow on Twitter
Smashboards Transition Log