I am in this group for a long time and use dbman for some years. I am not a programmer and most of my questions has been answered immediately by wonderful people like JP, Eliot and others.

One thing which really bother me is that I cannot find a mod using the search function of this discussion board. Also some mods a spread to different topics which makes it even harder to find the right one.
JP has opened a database with some mods inside but there are more.

In my opinion we should make it as a rule to post every mod / or helpful changes to JP's database as soon as it works and also to gather all modifications of this discussion board and put it inside the database. This would really help a lot and would avoid unnecessary questions inside the discussion group.

Your opinion ...

 
Great suggestion.


Good observation. However, keep in mind that the Discussion Forum is for discussing code hacks for DBMAN...and I use it as a "test bed" for people to test Mods before posting them in the Resource Center, which I religously do when bugs have been worked out of Mods. Although, I have stopped writing Mods because it is hard enough trouble shooting with the number of Mods I've written (with the help of Carol) for both DBMAN and LINKS.

Regards,



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Eliot Lee....
Former Handle: Eliot
* Check Resource Center
* Search Forums
* Thinking out of the box (codes) is not only fun, but effective.

Realize that I only put up that Mods database a few days ago. I first added the mods that were already on my site. I haven't gotten around to putting other ones in as yet. I will as I have time.

I suppose I could allow other people to sign up for accounts online and they could modify their own mods as needed. It would mean changing the database I have now and I would have to validate new entries before they were available to be viewed. (I know that the folks here are trustworthy, but one never knows about someone else who might happen on to my site.)

What do you think?


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JPD

I have been observing this forum for only about half a year, but it seems to me the the number of postings every day is increasing. Wasn´t the total number of postings something like 8000 last October?

As Nieman states searching for help is becoming more and more difficult, especially as only 50 hits are displayed. Moreover, many "newbie" questions are asked over and over again and should be regarded as FAQs, but if you click "faq" in the forum header you only get information on the forum as such.

So I think that when pondering on how all mods should be assembled and presented, also the question of the FAQs (i.e. DBman FAQs) should be considered. It is a tremendous task, no doubt about that, but maybe now is the right time (for whom ? , if if the number of postings keep growing exponentially.

I´m sorry I can´t come up with a solution, just add more confusion?

JPDeni, I simpy don´t understand how you can spend so much time and patience on the forum. As for opening your mod database for others, a rough idea: maybe you can distribute accounts to people whom you feel are trustworthy if they are willing to do the validation.

My 50 fils.

There is a DBMan FAQ in the Resource Center, but it needs to be maintained better (probably my fault) and it needs to be advertised better.

I've been toying with a "Trouble-shooting" section for my database, but I still haven't come up with the best format for it.

After I posted here, I thought about giving out userids to those I know. I think that might be a good idea. But it does mean reworking the database, because I don't have a field for userid right now.


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JPD

HI HO,

I think gathering all mods cannot be done by one person. So if there are some people helping me to extract the mods and add-ons from this forum it will help to set-up JP's database.
Most important is to start with the above now since this forum is growing so fast.

I have a list of topics that Lois made up and gave me, which has mods and all sorts of stuff in it. I need to go through the and get the mods in my database. Some of the things will just need to have a link to the forum page. Others will need a lot of cleaning up first. I'll get it done as I can, but I don't know if it's even possible for anyone to help me right now.

If others post to the mods database, I would like only the one who wrote the mod to be the one posting it. I'm pretty conscious of people being recognized for their work.

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JPD

I am working on developing more FAQs (not Mods) for both LINKS and DBMAN...I will submit them to the Resource Center when I complete them.

Regards,

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Eliot Lee....
Former Handle: Eliot
* Check Resource Center
* Search Forums
* Thinking out of the box (codes) is not only fun, but effective.

There's a fine line in DBMan between a FAQ and a mod. For example, is the procedure for eliminating bold tags in a url a FAQ or a mod? I'm not sure.


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JPD

 
This is my interpretation of three concepts:

1) FAQ: These address commonly asked questions, like Required Libraries questions. This would address what to look for and how to fix it.

2) Mods: These are typically stand-alone scripts that feed into and out of the database files. These are also considered to be additions or deletions of complete sub-routines in the DBMAN scripts (like your friendly html.pl file).

3) Code Hacks: These are more similar to FAQs than Mods. These are simple edits or additions to the scripts (like the removing bold from the URL or removing line breaks in fields).

Regards,

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Eliot Lee....
Former Handle: Eliot
* Check Resource Center
* Search Forums
* Thinking out of the box (codes) is not only fun, but effective.

Let me throw out a couple suggestions re: finding mods/add-ons and this forum.

1) swap out the BBS software... for a non-threaded discussion forum, not being able to sort by number of replies, last reply, author, topic, etc is a severe limitation.

2) spend a little time updating the existing BBS software... I believe that UBB has the ability to display icons next to topics, which in itself is pretty annoying (who needs a smiley face or question mark next to a question), *but* it could be used to visually distinguish mods posted from questions.

Also, while a vocal critic of UBB, I recognize that one of its benefits is that-- like G-T-- it has a very active user community and there are dozens and dozens of add-ons which might make life easier. Here are some interesting ones for my wish list...
http://ubbcodehacking.com/...um7/HTML/000070.html
http://www.scriptkeeper.com/...m14/HTML/001511.html


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The Immuatable Order of Modding
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
1. Read the FAQ, 2. Search the board, 2a. Search the board again, 3. ask the question, 4. back-up, 5. experiment, 6. rephrase question (or better yet, post solution to original question)

oldmoney, I appreciate, understand and agree with what you said. Unfortunately, the only one who can make those decisions is Alex and he doesn't read all of the messages in the forums. The only way to be sure to get the information to him would be to send him email.

I am in the process of getting things together a little better. I'll leave my database up for a little while until I get everything in the Resource Center, but after that, the Resource Center will be the place to go for all mods, FAQs and code hacks.


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JPD

Sorry, moved here...
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/...m12/HTML/002645.html

[This message has been edited by oldmoney (edited April 13, 2000).]