I understand what you're trying to say here, but I get the feeling that you are under the impression that the forum is the only improvement we are planning on making. I'll repost what zultar posted in the original thread.

"Here is a partial list of what we would want to improve (what gets done depends on costs and feasibility):

New forum or modernize the front page
Mobile app for the site
Integrate Ghostrating or TruSkill-ish rating into the site
Integrate tournament scores into the site
Sandbox mode (one player can control all seven countries for the classic map; this would have been perfect for the Worldcup but we couldn't get it to work)
Dual-player system (where two players can access and control the same country for the classic map; this would create new possibilities of gaming tournaments and teaching/training)
Map overhaul (Scalable (SVG); More practical (readable, colour-blind friendly, etc); Beautiful; Original as to prevent copyright issues)
Rethink the way we input orders (such as the addition of point and click)
Create notifications for game progress"

Note the word "partial." There is a long list of ideas that we have come up with. Rather than creating an entirely new thread to protest one aspect of this plan, it would be helpful and probably better received if you posted your commentary in the original thread where you can air your concerns within the context of the actual operation. As ghug said there, we're asking you all for your money and you get to choose how you spend it, so input from everyone is actually critically important to this project, believe it or not.

Jamiet, a forum that breaks the entire site when it gets to a certain data threshold is intrinsically not "fine". Regardless of how we make a new forum look stylistically, the forum needs to be redone. The new forum could look the same or completely different I have no idea, but pretending that the entire list of developmental problems I laid out in the donation thread don't exist is just trolling.

On the off-chance Jamiet isn't trolling, I'd just light to highlight this part of jmo's post:
"The new forum could look the same or completely"

This really isn't about the look of the Forum (although that may very well change). This is about the underlying code that is preventing us from making other improvements.

Why can't you just put threads over a certain age into an archive stored separately from the main site data?

That's not the exact same you HYPOCRIGE

1. Jamiet99uk
2. leon1122

Do what you want to fix memory problems, but keep the format.

Think of it like building an extension on a house that has a crumbling foundation. Adding new features to a database that needs work just leads to a really high chance of needing rework. There's various changes that need to be made to the database structure for new features. It is way easier to make all these changes at once then piece-mail. So we want to fix the problems, and having a site that can't handle more members is a big problem. If we doubled our forum usage (and we might if we add a lot more neat features) we want a system in place to let us handle that traffic. And at the same time those changes get made other changes will be made to accommodate other new features.

The goal of any work that you have someone do via programming is to ensure that it's easy to maintain going forward. If we have to keep moving data into tables every time we get close to some threshold then you have a hard to maintain site. Which is exactly what we should be trying to ensure doesn't happen.

If you did move that data into archive tables you'd need a new archive table every time there was X amount of data, then for that to be accessible you have to rewrite the code each time to include that new table. Which then leads to way slower load times for the site because it's reading from multiple tables instead of just 1.

I promise you that a LOT of thought has gone into the options here. What the final product will be is not set in stone. Zultar is going to figure that out taking members views into account. But something does have to be done to make sure this site is sustainable long term.

Ok, look, I think I've been misunderstood. I would like the forum to *look* the same as it does now, and I would like to *interact* with it in the same way that I do now.

I don't know anything about code.

I was concerned we were going to end up with something like this and it would be awful:

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/forumdisplay.php?f=12

I agree I'd love to see the new Forum look similar to this one, but it does need to be updated under the hood.

Jamiet, you made a thread saying you want the forum to stay exactly the same and that it works fine. Not that you want it to "look" exactly the same.

And yes, that example is awful and I hope we don't go with anything like that.

Don't see why not. When I want to experience good UI as designed by people who work with it every day, I definitely go to a hardware performance forum. Mhm.

Speaking of forum anyone else want hyperlinks??

When you say exactly as it is now, i presume you mean with Krellie-poo banned...

Krellin is banned from the whole site, not just the forum. That would be a silence, not a ban.

@jmo: I'm sorry, I don't know much about coding, you see. If the only proposal vis-à-vis the Forum is some behind-the-scenes coding efficiency, then I'm all in favour of that.

Jamie, database coding is hard and when you change one thing it has all sorts of effects that can be hard to predict. I do tech support for a database company and every time they make improvements other things change. Especially when they're dealing with limited resources, they are going to have to do things in a straightforward way, and that means that it would be unlikely they could improve the forums functionality without also making changes to the UI.

@Pastoralan: It is my understanding that they are not trying to improve the functionality - just to stop the forum from overloading the server.

That would be improving functionality. I'm trying to say that when you change invisible things, visible things get moved around too.

And I am trying to say that I would like the visible things not to be moved around.

While I would like a similar forum, the long-term functionality of the site far outweighs it. I trust the Owner/Admin/Mod team to make the right decisions to move the site forward.

I would love to see the old threads restored and accessible on-line.

But the old Replies and Threads subpages in people's profile pages is what I really miss. :-(

To me, the Forum revamp should focus on revamping the code to restore those functionalities. I actually really like the look and feel of the forum as it is, but proper archiving is more important to me than preserving the current layout.