We have officially hit the donation target that shall enable us to upgrade our existing scripts with minimal data loss. Testing is in progress at the moment and we are working to make the new site as functional as possible. This is a long process as we have limited time and resources but I am happy to say will be well worth it in the long run!
Plans:
- (Completed) Trial an import of all data from the forum, downloads area and gallery to XenForo 2, XenForo Gallery 2 and XenForo Resource Manager 2.
- (In progress) Determine and trial applicable modifications to the new software. Target: Mid-February 2018
- Modify the templates and recreate areas such as the current front page with existing functionality. Target: March 2018
- Close AnimeOTK. Take full backups. Perform a full upgrade and purge on old files. Target: Mid-April 2018. The upgrade process takes around 72 hours to run all the required scripts.
- Test the upgrade, verify all user permission levels (as these are lost during the upgrade) and ensure functionality of the site.
- Reopen AnimeOTK.
Upgrade Steps:
- Close AnimeOTK.com
- Password protect the whole AnimeOTK.com domain to prevent issues
- Full MySQL backup ~3.5 hours
- Full File Backup ~2 hours
- Upgrade the forum to Vbulletin V4 ~1 hour
- Upgrade the DownloadII plugin ~30 mins
- Sanatise and remove all remaining forum files ~ 1 hour
- Install a clean copy of Xenforo 1.5 ~15 mins
- Import the forum data to Xenforo 1.5 ~12 hours to run all the scripts
- Install Xenforo Galery 1.1.15 ~15 mins
- Import the gallery data to XenForo Gallery ~36 hours to run all the scripts (longer if errors occur while Ai sleeps and the process needs to be manually resumed)
- Install a plugin to import DownloadsII to Xenforo ~5 mins
- Install Xenforo Resource Manager 1.2.4 ~15 mins
- Import DownloadsII to The Resource Manager ~45 minutes
- Upgrade Xenforo to V2 ~2 hours
- Upgrade Xenforo Galery to V2 ~15 minutes
- Upgrade Xenforo Resources to V2 ~15 minutes
- Disable previously installed plugins ~5 minuntes
- Install all new plugins and forum skin ~2 hours
- Perform necessary manual modifications to templates etc ~6 hours
- Set up all plugin and Xenforo options ~3 hours
- Set up and review all permission options ~2 hours
- Test functionality of site ~2 hours
- Reopen the site to the public.
There are around 72 hours worth of steps to perform. Some steps such as the imports are mostly automated but time consuming. They do become even more time consuming if any errors are encountered and the process halts itself. I preduct that between work, sleep and the required time spent on upgrades we will be looking at 4-8 days of full downtime for the site.
Future goals and tasks:
- Hit the donation target again and do this to DiaperedAnime.com
- Review the fesability of upgrading and retaining YaoiAi.com
- Purge FurryAi.com data from the servers and backups, retaining a single offline copy. Make an archive of the FurryAi.com gallery images available via torrent or similar.
- Design a new logo for AnimeOTK and DiaperedAnime (YaoiAi too if it is to be retained)
- Integrate an HTML5 Oekaki Paint script into Xenforo Gallery
- Move video downloads to the gallery where thumbnails will be automatically generated.
- Move all stories to pdf or a different system that includes a rich text editor as the Resources script isn't designed for our current use case.
- Review current staff activity levels, allow existing staff members to retire and recruit new staff members via open applications.
Current spends:
- Xenforo scripts: $372 (Xenforo forum, gallery, resources and enhanced search)
- Xenforo plugins: $275
- Server fees: $96.67
Want to get involved now? All donators of $100 or more will help us decide on the future of AnimeOTK including the plugins, custom modifications and features of the new site. Contact me now if you're intersted in becoming involved with this!
Moving forward to AnimeOTK V2
