Recent Site Changes
Posted: Mon Dec 30, 2019 2:27 pm
Hey all,
On Thursday (Dec 26), I upgraded our PHP version to the latest version which caused a trickle down waterfall of other unexpected issues.
After hearing about Myth Weavers' recent problems (DDoS, offline), I checked and realized that I hadn't updated our forums in way too long. So I thought I'd update our PHP version as a easy first step. However, after updating that, the software version of phpBB forums that we use was found to be not compatible, so that forced me to upgrade to the newest version of phpBB.
After finishing the upgrade to the latest phpBB software, nearly all of our custom themes and extensions (addons/plugins) were broke, because they weren't compatible with the newest forums software version. So I had to debug, recode, and update/find/install the new themes and extensions again. Additionally, a lot of the custom BBcode (like ooc, gm, roll, init) were broken and needed to be recoded as well.
Since all of these addons are open source, that means a bunch of developers that made these addons several years ago (like the @ mentions etc) just disappeared without a new version. So there's a few less addons and extensions.
Notably the following items are either broke, need to be recoded, or need to find a replacement:
As a long term plan, as soon as these changes and updates settle, I'd like to also switch over to Cloudflare to protect us from DDoS attacks. I don't think a major hacking group took down MythWeavers, more likely a former, angry player/script-kiddie took it offline. Several years ago I originally set up this site with Cloudflare but it didn't work well with forums software. Now, there's a special plugin that is suppose to make everything work, so I need to do a lot of research to make sure it actually works. Cloudflare basically changes our DNS so when users access the site via the domain name (or ip) it goes to Cloudflare and does all the filtering/security checks, and then passes the request to our server. They are basically a middleman software that can detect and block some web threats, especially DDoS attacks - and its free for a single site (or used to be) for the basics.
If you notice anything else, please post it here so we can investigate.
Thanks,
Shurijo
On Thursday (Dec 26), I upgraded our PHP version to the latest version which caused a trickle down waterfall of other unexpected issues.
After hearing about Myth Weavers' recent problems (DDoS, offline), I checked and realized that I hadn't updated our forums in way too long. So I thought I'd update our PHP version as a easy first step. However, after updating that, the software version of phpBB forums that we use was found to be not compatible, so that forced me to upgrade to the newest version of phpBB.
After finishing the upgrade to the latest phpBB software, nearly all of our custom themes and extensions (addons/plugins) were broke, because they weren't compatible with the newest forums software version. So I had to debug, recode, and update/find/install the new themes and extensions again. Additionally, a lot of the custom BBcode (like ooc, gm, roll, init) were broken and needed to be recoded as well.
Since all of these addons are open source, that means a bunch of developers that made these addons several years ago (like the @ mentions etc) just disappeared without a new version. So there's a few less addons and extensions.
Notably the following items are either broke, need to be recoded, or need to find a replacement:
- Dice Roller - I made this, and it needs to be recoded because the new themes/forum has different code/styles
- Games List - I made this, and to be honest, I'm not sure what's broken here, but it's broken, most likely I'm using a function or feature that was heavily changed or deprecated. Most likely, I need to recode this as well.
- @ Mentions - I found another addon that does this to replace our old version, but I'd like to wait a week or so to make sure everything else is working fine first
- PM Search - (ability to search your PMs)
- PM Status bar - (Showed you a percentage bar of how full your inbox was, most of us were at 100% anyways
) - Topic Preview - allowed you to hover over a topic to see a preview. I think a new version of this exists (or a replacement) that we can use. Also waiting to make sure everything else works first.
As a long term plan, as soon as these changes and updates settle, I'd like to also switch over to Cloudflare to protect us from DDoS attacks. I don't think a major hacking group took down MythWeavers, more likely a former, angry player/script-kiddie took it offline. Several years ago I originally set up this site with Cloudflare but it didn't work well with forums software. Now, there's a special plugin that is suppose to make everything work, so I need to do a lot of research to make sure it actually works. Cloudflare basically changes our DNS so when users access the site via the domain name (or ip) it goes to Cloudflare and does all the filtering/security checks, and then passes the request to our server. They are basically a middleman software that can detect and block some web threats, especially DDoS attacks - and its free for a single site (or used to be) for the basics.
If you notice anything else, please post it here so we can investigate.
Thanks,
Shurijo