Time for a new/old Website?

[Alatar]

Shark pointed me to this piece of speculation on the future of Google Groups.  Even if it doesn't disappear, I think its safe to say this wasn't the most succesful move ever.  Some people never came over, and others are posting less and less frequently.  Now maybe thats just the nature of our lives and leisure, or it may just be that this wasn't the best fit for our group.  So, should we go back to a PHPBB board?  Any thoughts?

As Latitude falls, 3 more services Google may kill for the sake of Google+

Google+ killed Reader and Latitude. What service will be next?

by Casey Johnston - July 10 2013, 6:25pm GMTST

137

The latest killing in the name of Google+: Google Latitude.

Google announced plans today to retire the location reporting and tracking service Latitude—and the company will instead encourage customers to direct their geolocation-reporting energies to Google+. Judging by Google's recent activity, this "Attack of the Google+ Blob" is far from over.

To the Internet's shock and dismay, Google also killed off Reader on July 1. Google's initial reasoning was that the service has been little-used. Google later explained that it thinks Reader is actually no longer a fit for the times we live in, where people can simply be Google+ users instead and get their news from their social media feeds, subscribe to brand pages, and forget their RSS salad days.

Google announced back in June 2011 that it had a cryptic but benign-sounding plan to put "more wood behind fewer arrows." This meant less effort on kooky Google Labs inventions, better user experiences, and more iterations on products people actually use. Well, make that "products Google wants people to use"—notably, Google+.

Now that Latitude is on the chopping block, Google is no doubt setting its sights on even more products that it would like to eliminate in favor of unifying more users under the Google+ banner. Here are a few likely candidates.

Groups

Google Groups was reduced to little more than an archive of e-mail conversations years ago, when it removed the ability to have welcome messages, pages, or files maintained on a group page. Now, the service is used exclusively for sending updates among friends and co-workers either in real time or as periodic digests. The interface is about as bare-bones as it gets, effectively just a stand-in for an e-mail address accessible by a group of people.

It wouldn't be too hard for Google to roll this into Gmail instead, but the obvious Google+ analog is "circles." Users could designate a circle as addressable by its members and store all messages in a threaded forum-like interface, possibly with an attached Hangout for members to live chat with one another.

Circles could be public or private, more like actual forums or private e-mail chains. The format would certainly make it easier to share media among groups, though the potential anonymity of Groups would be harder to maintain in circles.

Enlarge

Voice

It's strange and dismaying how Google has left Voice. The company acquired GrandCentral back in 2007 and relaunched its service as Google Voice in 2009, allowing users to register a new phone number and receive calls and messages through a Web interface. This also produced hilarious and wholly inaccurate transcriptions of voicemails.

But no one uses voicemail anymore, and while a second phone number is nifty, it’s still a cumbersome route to circumventing traditional text and phone call charges. Apple has trounced Google when it comes to integrating its own ubiquitous message service with the same SMS interface and making it available on multiple platforms. While Google has Talk-turned-Hangouts, its Voice service isn't seamless enough to compete on iMessages' level when it comes to messaging.

Google also announced this morning that it was adding voice calling to Hangouts, and that Hangouts is "the future of Google Voice"—i.e., say your goodbyes. Google could take this a step further and thread messages to phone numbers (including Google-provided numbers) together into one interface, using a person and their profile as the target rather than an e-mail address or number. The same could be done with voice-only hangouts.

While Google’s voice recognition technology has certainly developed (as shown by Google Now), Google Voice has yet to get a piece. Google could abandon the voicemail transcription aspect, but the company also appears equipped to revamp it if it sees fit.

Enlarge / Imagine all your Web results here.

Search

In these browser-based search times we live in, when no one ever closes their browser and homepages hardly matter, it’s hard to see much point in the Google search homepage. Even looking at it now, the Google homepage and search results page looks and feels like old-Google compared to the style Google is affecting on Google+.

Done the wrong way, this could easily be killing Google’s golden goose, so it’s the biggest “if” in this list of Google+ absorptions. Google no doubt makes plenty of money from ads and sponsored placement in its search results, and those things would be hard to integrate seamlessly into the way we see Google+ now.

But ads can become classy-looking “sponsored” spaces, similar to what Facebook is doing in its News Feed. That’s a potential way forward for Google, a way forward we probably never want to see come to fruition, ever, but a way forward nonetheless.

This is not to say that Google’s good search results on, for instance, “Game of Thrones” would be shunted to the bottom of a page in favor of your friends’ status posts (“GoT finale was so good OMG”). Google could still favor Web results inside a Google+ interface. But a more Facebook-like "Graph Search," maybe with inverted priorities, could be the result of a Search-Google+ union.

Google search is only two simple elements: a field and the results. To simply plop that field into Google+, imbue it with all the power the field on the homepage has right now, and make search results appear below your profile picture and alerts… that’s not so hard to imagine. In fact, the Google results page already has exactly those elements, just in smaller format than Google+. Likewise, a browser search-field query that takes you to plus.google.com and throws some social-media type results into the mix… not so hard to imagine either.

Google Latitude is set to get the axe on August 9. Any guesses on what other services might be next? Your speculation is as good as ours.

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Myself and Dollar have been talking about moving all our services under our own control for some time. Owncloud, RSS, proxies, my own nntp indexing service. We have even talked about moving away from gmail. 

Anyway I'm more than happy to move away from Groups and would be more than happy to host a board on my AWS instance.  

--
Neil O'Loughlin
Tel # : 0044 (0)7894088352

[Falin]

If you want my 2 cents, I've always thought the group should be opened up to 'outsiders'.

 

The more people you have in a group, the higher the chance you will get a response when you post about something you are interested in.

 

Since I have been in the group (2007) only 3 or 4 people have regularly posted.

 

I know we lost a couple of people going to google groups (mainly Deagol?) but I think it's lack of fresh blood rather than the site itself.

[Alatar]

But thats kinda the point of this group Matt.  Its for us and our mates.  If you want to invite a mate in, he's more than welcome, but I don't want a bunch of people none of us know in here.  There's a whole internet for that. 

[Sharkwald]

I'm with Martin on that - this place's entire raison d'etre is as a place for friends to shoot the shit, it's not meant to be a serious gaming forum.

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Also want to back that. While I don't post as much as I did (3 kids and new job have not helped)...the forum in what ever form it takes has always been a place for healthy & more informative discussion because its not anonymous rubbish you often find else where. 

Not that I would not others to join in..but also would not want to lose what makes posting I. the forum interesting. 

Once I'm back home next week I can throw up a new forum to test...no rush since Groups is not going anywhere just yet. 

[Neil O'Loughlin]

One feature I like with Google Groups is the full post reciveved by email and the ability to reply or post by email. 

Are there any other nice to have features a new board should have?

[Alatar]

I think the Categories were helpful.  Eoin could ignore the Console stuff. Carl could participate in the Rugby only threads etc.  Groups is a bit less discriminating.

Shark was looking at something called Discourse?

http://www.discourse.org/

[Neil O'Loughlin]

My only issue with discourse is it needs IE10+ so it won't work for me in work, which is where I post most if I'm honest. 

[Alatar]

You don't have Firefox in work?

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Nope. Nor Chrome. 

[Alatar]

Well, anything that limits our access is a bad thing to be honest.  Why not just go back to PHPBB3?  It had topic subscription and email notification, but not reply, although it did provide an easy link to bring you straight to the reply page.

[Neil O'Loughlin]

I was looking at mybb and it seemed to have a mod that added "reply to email". 

Need to test it out though.. 

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Discourse has reply by email which my well be enough in work. I know a new hardware refresh and move to win7 is coming and some thing a bit more like discourse would be nice. 

I guess try a few out and see what suits everyone best before we jump ship. Ill get a few boards up and running before we rule anything out. 

[Alatar]

If possible I'd still like to host it on my Web Hosting.  That way even if there's a major crash we'll get it back in a matter of hours.  But we can certainly use yours to try out the various options.

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Your call but is that not why we move the last time since you could not recover it?

Mine runs on Amazon Wed Services so it's not likly to disappear/crash etc...

[Sharkwald]

And you can always tell when AWS goes down because half the internet goes with it!

[Falin]

I preferred the previous board like Viigand, but as I now work in a busy office - a white/black format would look less conspicuous for me.

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Ill second that Falin, selectable themes is nice to have. 

[Armand]

So put up a MyBB forum for testing

http://kieranoloughlin.com/mybb/

user: testing

pass: testing

I've not done much setting it up since theres no point depending on what we decide to do. I have put some catefories but thats about it..not tested my mail settings either..

 

[Alatar]

Looks like the mail setting aren't working, tried to Register but never got the authentication mail.

[Neil O'Loughlin]

Yeah did not have time to test them...like I said until we decide what way to jump I don't want to spend too much time setting it up...

I've activated your account and set you up as admin...

[Armand]

phpbb we already know works and I dont think there is much difference between mybb and phpbb for us other than maybe the "reply by email". So I was gonna try Simple Machines since it also has a mod for Post from email or  Vanilla Forums next since it looks a little different.

Had a look at installing Discourse but its very system resource heavy for what we need.

 

Outside of commerial options there aint much else out there I can find...

[Armand]

Gonna stick the other forums on DO rather than AWS to test....aws is not playing nice due to the security lock down I have and I have my own stuff running on it that I dont want to feck up.

This will give me a chance to check out DO before I commit to move. 

[diarmaidol]

And I'll just tag in here all Geeky and say we could set up a private NNTP server on a droplet.

Just saying !!

D.

[Sharkwald]

Wouldn't we all need some kind of client then? It's been well over a decade since I used NNTP for text!

[diarmaidol]

I kinda assumed that there would be a few web based front ends out there but it seems not.

I have a romantic association to NNTP... SQL backed conversation doesn't do it for me ;-P

D.

[Sharkwald]

Hmm. I wonder if anyone's built a forum app running off Mongo or some other NoSQL DB then....

Just for shits'n'giggles, I set up shannonlan.azurewebsites.net on my Azure account, entire free & running PHPBB, so that's definitely an option.

[Armand]

Gave a shot at installing Vanilla forums and SMF with not much success (I will admit I did not try too hard). So unless anyone has an real drive to give them a shot or find another alternative, I would say it’s down to MyBB or PhpBB.

 

My preference is slightly towards MyBB only because it may be able to do “Reply\Post from Email”. They are pretty much indistinguishable really.

 

I think in the past we have Tapatalk installed which is great for mobile viewing but thats available not matter what.

 

 

 

[Viigand]

Tapatalk compatibility would be great, I do most of my fora browsing using it.

[Armand]

On Monday, 29 July 2013 14:35:52 UTC+1, Viigand wrote:

Tapatalk compatibility would be great, I do most of my fora browsing using it.

 

what version are you using? I have v1 but I see there has been a release v2...worth the upgrade? I'm not a major user it has to be said...

[Alatar]

Yeah, I think we should just pick one and go with it.  Do we want to host on my web hosting, Arms or Sharks?

[Sharkwald]

I have piss all knowledge of installing PHPBB extensions like TapaTalk, so probably best to use someone else's!

[Armand]

Preference is MyBB. No preference on hosting. Likely to have all my personal hosting done on DO (where the Unreal server is running) rather than AWS as I stated before, if I was going to host.

[Viigand]

Stayed with v1, it is free and does what I want it to do.

[Armand]

Tapa talk has upgrade v1 to v2 (thiugh thue are still charging for the official v2) so worth picking up if/when we do create a new site.

[Armand]

I'm starting to move my stuff over to AWS...want me to kick up the shannonlan site???

[Armand]

So after having a  short chat with Alatar\Viigand\Deagol about this over the weekend, I think we should plan (since I think we all agree?) our move away from Groups to  a new(old) board.

 

The pros:

·         Google Groups while not under treat right now has to be in the firing line. This takes it back under our control before that happens.

·         It give access to those that don’t want to log in (or logged  in) to Google services.

·         Categories if we so wish

·         Themes

 

The Cons

·         We lose easy access to Google Groups history

·         Email receipt of full new posts

·         Email new articles\ replies no longer available

·         PHP boards tend to have a greater risk of an attack

 

 

Some solutions for the cons:

·         Since Google Groups is not going away yet, we can copy headings and link if you want. It’s often less the of the content rather the general

·         Tapatalk seems like a good replacement for some of the features

 

No solution for emailing a new articles but that’s about the only thing I can find no work around for and it might well be only me that uses it much anyway.

 

Alatar is offering to host. Deagol put his hand up for running and UT server needs

[Sharkwald]

Sounds grand to me!

[Alatar]

So are we thinking PHPBB?  Ideally I want something with auto-updates over the web, and preferably ridiculously secure registration.  Reason being, we don't have to care about our registration process putting off newbies, cause there aren't any.  I don't want to spend my time pruning spambots!

[Armand]

PHPBB or MyBB are really the two contenders. So since your setting it up it's personal preference. They look much the same on the front end.

Both support TapaTalk so no issue there.

[Alatar]

Ok guys, I've set up a new site over here:

http://shannonlan.freeforums.net/

Check to see if you can all register and log in.  Looks to do most of what we need, and we can convert to a pro account with our own domain and no ads for about $15 a year?  Also appears to support Tapatalk!

[Armand]

Just had a look. Does not support Tapatalk. They have their own app (written by the same guys that do Tapatalk) but its not free nor does it look at fully functional as Tapa talk.

[Alatar]

On Tuesday, October 15, 2013 8:36:29 PM UTC+1, Armand wrote:

Just had a look. Does not support Tapatalk. They have their own app (written by the same guys that do Tapatalk) but its not free nor does it look at fully functional as Tapa talk.

Hmm, thats weird.  They're on Tapatalks page as a partner?  Maybe it needs to be enabled, or is part of the pro offering?

[Neil]

Was thinking that. But no. They only offer their own app which is created by Tapatalk (they offer a reselling custom version)..hence them being on the partners page I think.

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Neil
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[Armand]

I have reg request still pending...would still like a look at it...

[Sharkwald]

Looks OK to me,  but then I don't use Tapatalk etc.

[Alatar]

Hmm.  Looks like Tapatalk wrote their mobile app.  Thats why it shows as a partner.

[Alatar]

Ok, I bit the bullet.  Registered Shannonlan.net again and reinstalled PHPBB.  Go sign up and have a look:

www.shannonlan.net

[Alatar]

Anyone having trouble accessing it?  Its only a basic set up so far.  I'll add Tapatalk and update to latest version when I get a chance

[Armand]

On Thursday, 17 October 2013 09:13:17 UTC+1, Alatar wrote:

Ok, I bit the bullet.  Registered Shannonlan.net again and reinstalled PHPBB.  Go sign up and have a look:

www.shannonlan.net

It's like home from home!! ;-)

 

 

 

[diarmaidol]

Woohooo , Google also killed off the rss feeds for google news ;-(

Reg request sent.

[Armand]

When do we officially move?

[Alatar]

Might as well move immediately.  I think all the regular contributors are members already

[Falin]

Domain not working for me...

[Armand]

On Friday, 18 October 2013 13:30:05 UTC+1, Falin wrote:

Domain not working for me...

thats strange.... you try and your phone as well?

 

[Alatar]

Funnily enough its not working for me in work either.  Must not have fully propogated yet