A major new version of the forum software has been released. I'm planning to run the upgrade sometime between now and a couple weeks or so. No solid plans at this time, but just wanted to let you know. If you see some weirdness happening, I'm probably upgrading at that moment or cleaning up after the upgrade, or something like that. I'm hoping to run it on a weekend evening so it's not so busy.
If you are thinking, "Oh noes, here we go again..." -- lemme just say you have nothing to worry about. We aren't converting to a social network or anything like that. In fact, the updated forum software still looks and works the same as it does now. They've just modernized the code, added new features (mostly for me, not for you -- neener neener), but they didn't change the way the forum works or how it looks. I'm looking forward to it though because there's a lot of new moderation tools that should help make my job here a lot easier. That's really good news because income from this website isn't a whole lot to brag about. haha
The big upgrade was released last week and they've been since releasing small updates to squash bugs. So another week or two or three should give it some time to settle down a bit and stabilize.
Well, anyway, that's all I have for now. Just wanted to give you a head's up. Have a good one and happy traversing!
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Update complete.
Please let me know if you run into any issues.
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Does tripping over a giant stack of old newspapers qualify as running into issues?
@wendell I thought I felt something
Notable new features:
- What's New page, showing a timeline of recent activity. Can be found in the main menu at the top (hamburger menu on mobile) or in the forum-specific menu.
- Language translations. You'll now see a "Translate" dropdown atop the content of each topic or reply. It will automagically translate the content of that post into the language you select. A "show original" link will replace the Translate dropdown.
- AI Assistant. You'll see the AI Assistant button just below the traditional search icon (magnifying glass) in the forums menu. It will help you search the forum content or answer general questions. Note: It is currently indexing the site, which will likely take several days, and then it will continue to index new content moving forward -- this means that it may not produce great results until indexing of the entire forum has been completed. I'd say, give it a good solid week before expecting great results.
AI updates for me:
- AI moderation. However, I don't fully trust it. I think the real solution here is a combination of human and AI. I'm hoping that AI moderation will be a lot smarter than the old auto-moderation features though, which would often ban non-malicious, good users. I was regularly unbanning folks after they emailed me about the problem. The advantage of the old system was that some would get pissed off and show me their true colors before they ever got an approved post, so I wouldn't unban them. LOL -- but we'll see how this goes.
- AI content generation. No, I'm not going to allow it to create phoney posts just to stuff the forum. That's not my style. I am thinking about having it grab surveying-related news articles and posting links in its own forum. This could be good for those who are still publishing news for surveyors, as we can hopefully provide them some increased traffic while also helping us all stay informed here.
- AI post tagging. AI can now review each post and add appropriate tags. Most people don't seem to bother with this feature, so AI can help us out. This should help with better search engine indexing, thus helping us gain more traffic. More traffic means (hopefully) more advertising dollars to help us stay afloat.
A note about AI stuff: There's some great features now available in the forum software, and I plan to take advantage of it, albeit cautiously. I use some AI in my web development business and it has helped me a lot. But it doesn't replace me. It makes me more effective and allows me to do more in less time. My hope is that will translate similarly here in the forums -- the AI features have a cost associated with them but I'm hopeful that will be offset, at least partially, by making me more efficient.
If you have any questions or comments, please reply here. 🙂
Have a good one and keep on traversin'.
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Another notable feature is the new AI Assistant. At the top of every forum page, attached to the bottom of the forum navigation bar, is an AI Assistant button. Click that and you can search, or you can switch to the Chat tab and have a conversation with @theo (the AI). Theo uses the forum's content to chat with you.
Note: the forum content is still being indexed. It's actually useful now, but it will improve over the next few weeks. Then it will continue to improve as new topics and discussions are created.
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you can switch to the Chat tab and have a conversation with @theo (the AI). Theo uses the forum's content to chat with you.
I like trying to break Theo (but it is actually pretty good!)