AbanteCart forum migration proposal!

[Basara]

Suggestion to migrate AbanteCart forum to the Google+ Community see AbanteCart forum Beta.
There is a lot of benefits and we need your opinions.

Decision should be made in one or two weeks.

[eCommerce Core]

Sounds good to me. I see many benefits.

1. Easier for users to join
2. Easier to post.
3. No worries for hosting and uptime.
4. Less spam
5. Better look

I am up for this migration. I assume, ee will keep old posts here and lock forum?

[abantecart]

Good idea. We need to keep existing posts, notify users and lock forum from registration.

[abantecart]

Let's do some more testing.

[llegrand]

Hi guys,  here's my two cents -  an improved forum could be of benefit.

This is Google's + forum (hopefully that know how it is run ) but reading about some of the issues seems testing should indeed be done.   And as I understand it,  community members have to have a Google+ account - wonder if that may be an issue for some?

https://plus.google.com/communities/115758385206378551362

Seems some of the communities are plagued with spam mails (settings available to handle that,  but members need to know that)  and how to handle those pesky ad posters that we see on the forum now.  And some testing of search would really be good,  as that is helpful when needed to research something one remembers seeing on the board.

Lee

[abantecart]

This is Google's + forum (hopefully that know how it is run ) but reading about some of the issues seems testing should indeed be done.   And as I understand it,  community members have to have a Google+ account - wonder if that may be an issue for some?

Seems some of the communities are plagued with spam mails (settings available to handle that,  but members need to know that)  and how to handle those pesky ad posters that we see on the forum now.  And some testing of search would really be good,  as that is helpful when needed to research something one remembers seeing on the board.

Lee

We will definitely test.

I do not see  issues with users getting Google+, if they do not have one yet. It is way easier than our forum registration. Many users, tries to use our Facebook as a forum, that make me think that people are lazy to go through registration.

I only see one concern. We will not own content in Google+ and knowledge base will no longer be ours.

[Gordon Taylor]

Well, here is my two cents. I disagree with the idea. As Pavel said, you don't own anything, albeit the format is nice etc. There is so-o-o much knowledge stored here it would be a huge loss. Searched properly, that knowledge database can be a big help to newbies and save a lot of duplicate postings for easy to find solutions.

[digitalt]

Well, here is my two cents. I disagree with the idea. As Pavel said, you don't own anything, albeit the format is nice etc. There is so-o-o much knowledge stored here it would be a huge loss. Searched properly, that knowledge database can be a big help to newbies and save a lot of duplicate postings for easy to find solutions.

I'm with you on this Gordon. If you look at the Stats on the bottom of the home page, you will see a lot of guests here consistently throughout the day, which means people are using the KB established here to find answers.  If you want Google+ simply to get people to sign up and experience a socialesque platform, I think that's misguided. This is business, serious business.   Do you really want to loose all the great info already archived here?  Moving to Google+ would be starting over with 0 info.  Referencing info here would have people jumping through hoops to get answers and they will go elsewhere. It's human nature.

If it's ease of signing up using social media logins, take a look at Social Login http://custom.simplemachines.org/mods/index.php?mod=3580   As far as I can tell it's compatible with this version of SMF and covers most of the common social media platforms.

As for what is here now, for problems such as Spam, SMF forums has lots of addons to address the issue(22 right now) AND a lot more.  I use Stop Forum Spam and Bot Buster and both work relatively well. Run across a bad IP? Ban it from cPanel or use on of the many .htaccess files available that bounces the most common bots. 

Want a Like button ala Facebook, got it.  Want a section with a format like Facebook? Got it.  If you can think of it, there is probably an addon for it at the SMF forum site http://custom.simplemachines.org/

Also, you may find that the opposite could be true, that people will shy away from Google+ since it represents Big Brother. And possibly get a bad reputation for Abantecart. Is it worth the risk?

Running your own forum independent of "big business" embodies the Open Source philosophy and MHO is to keep what we have and make it better. I have run an SMF forum since 2004 so my experiences are yours.

Edit--->  Parting thought, what would be returned for a search for Abantecart Forum for a new user?  Would it even show in Bing or Yahoo?

Also, it's 3:40 AM EDT and there are 121 Guests on the forum. I think people are using the KB here.  Admin can see exactly where they are too, to get an idea of what the overall interest, problem, whatever is of the guests.

[Gordon Taylor]

I'm with you all the way. It's 10:44 ET here in NY and there are 109 guests looking at threads ...

Forum Stats:

20277 Posts in 4311 Topics by 3117 Members ... you can't buy that for any amount of money.

Please, let's just keep it here!

[Basara]

Hi.

Thank you for your opinions on this matter

[abantecart]

Let me add something.

People find irritating to register on the forum and they go straight for social media with questions. They post questions on Facebook, YouTube, twitter. We can not and will not reply to same questions on multiple places.

We tried to add social media login to the forum, but there were some issues.

Maintaining forum software is also a challenge especially, when we will get to larger audience and traffic. Installing plugins, updates, security, bots, etc. All pain for small team. This takes us away from focusing on a software. 

[Gordon Taylor]

Pavel,

I will support what ever move you decide to make, you know my fondness for AC. Before social media, forums WERE the social media and now it's so easy to register for the new ones, people get lazy when it comes to filling out the registration here.

Again, what ever the decision is, we'll support you all the way.

[abantecart]

Pavel,

I will support what ever move you decide to make, you know my fondness for AC. Before social media, forums WERE the social media and now it's so easy to register for the new ones, people get lazy when it comes to filling out the registration here.

Again, what ever the decision is, we'll support you all the way.

Thank you Gordon,

There is no final decision yet. Let's explore a little more

[digitalt]

If you decide to go to Google+, I'll be there with you. I think a look at the Social Icon addon for SMF forums might sway your final decision. It actually supports about 30 or so different social platform logins thru  Oneall. It would solve the registration problem for those that don't want to fill in the form and possibly give wider coverage for those that would not want to sign up for Google+.

Whatever your decision, I'm with ya.

[llegrand]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Google_products#Discontinued_products_and_services

Here's one of my biggest concerns with Google -  take a look at all of the things they have started and discontinued over the last 10 years.  And as of 2015  Google + was struggling some what -  lots of accounts (as all email accounts got one)  but they struggle to be popular it seems  .http://www.businessinsider.com/big-changes-coming-to-google--2015-5

So in addition to not owning the content,  we are subject to the whims of Google and what they want to promote next.

Just my 3 cents worth (inflation,  not a typo)

Lee