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Ladies and gentlemen, we're back with some additions and refinements to the forum you know and love. There are many administration related updates but I'm only including those that relate to your experience in the interest of time and space. We've got a lot to cover so let's not waste any time and dive right in:

• Admin Alerts - Ability to push alerts to groups of members and/or staff right from the admin panel. These will show up in your alerts. For example, this can be useful if we'd like to highlight a forum update thread by giving it more visibility via the alert system. This way you'll always be on top of all the exciting changes at the exact moment that they're unleashed.

• Admin Floating Notices - We can now push floating notices to the bottom of the board right from the admin panel. This can be a useful way to inform you of some important information in a non-intrusive manner. Messages can be shown for a predetermined amount of time and then simply disappear.

• Admin Group Messaging - Ability to message groups of members and/or staff right from the admin panel. This can be useful when we want to make sure that everyone is informed of one thing or other and the content is larger than what would neatly fit in a floating notice.

• Chat Buttons For Images And Media - I had to fight for this one because as happens sometimes, SAiNT and I had differing opinions. SAiNT wanted chat to be strictly developed for text and I took a more media-centric approach for sharing and collaboration. The divide grew when we encountered some media issues and the feature was completely removed for a while. Luckily for all of us, I wasn't willing to give up and he finally gave in, so now you guys get the features that I know you'll really appreciate. Please don't post too many large images or videos back to back because it will cause visitors to have to preload these and it could affect those on slower connections. However, I think we can all agree that it was the right thing to integrate these buttons and features into the chat which extends our interaction and collaboration features. Plus there's the extra added bonus of saving yourself the carpal tunnel syndrome futzing with bbcodes.

• Edit Post/Profile Post Notifications - Now when we edit your post or profile post we can send you a message to indicate why. Could save us the time responding to your messages when you angrily write us about how we could have dared to remove the warez link that you posted in violation of our rules. Half-joking there but it has happened.

• E-mail and Password Change Notifications - Feel more secure about your account because any changes to either and you get notified immediately. Make sure to whitelist us if we're getting blocked by your spam filter.

• New Posts - We have a feature available that can list X amount of the most recent posts, just like we had on the old AudioSex. This way you can easily see what the freshest items posted were, rather than having to navigate to New Posts. SAiNT and I have been split on whether to include this feature. I voted that we leave it in because it lists the aforementioned right at the bottom of the board as opposed to having to open New Posts. SAiNT left it up for about a day and ended up removing it, seeing it as duplicate functionality and therefore extraneous. I see his point since, a majority of the time, a member will navigate to New Posts anyway since it's more comprehensive and will list more than just the last few recent items but I also think that it could be useful for those people making a pit stop where this feature could be useful in providing a quick overview. Let us know what you think.

• Password Reset Changes - The process is more user friendly and will allow you to set a new password directly after clicking the e-mailed link.

• Profile Post Soft-Deletion - Now profile posts can be soft-deleted by staff. This can be useful in the case that someone posts a link to your profile page and we suspect that it may be nefarious but aren't sure. Soft deletion allows us to remove it temporarily from view while we get to the bottom of the issue.

• Responsive Admin Control Panel - No matter what device we're using, the admin panel is now more responsive which translates to a better experience for the community. This enables us to be more attentive to any issues, even while on the go, and not have to deal with constant pinching and zooming anymore. This was the last part of our platform to get this treatment but it's something that didn't even exist in the old AudioSex which made administration tasks a massive pain if not altogether impossible on mobile devices. So whether SAiNT and I are on site or not, we're still there making sure that things run as smooth as ever.

• Server RAM Upgrade - We purchased some more RAM for the server so that your experience is even more responsive than ever before. This also helps with some issues we were having as we bumped up against the limits of our previous configuration. Though AudioSex is free, we spare no expense in providing you with the very best experience.

• Tags - Now you can add tags to your thread to make it easier to locate at a later time. This is a feature that I've been wanting to implement since the original site and I suggested it for the relaunch. Now I'm happy to inform you that it's finally here so please make use of it. For example, if I'm posting news about Sonic Charge's new Echobode plug-in then I could possibly use the tags: Echobode, Frequency Shifter and Sonic Charge as tags. I believe we support up to 20 tags but there usually is no reason to use more than a few. You can of course add tags to previously created threads using the Add Tag link under the thread title area or edit previously added tags utilizing the Edit link next to the previous tags and under the same aforementioned area.

• Two-Step Verification - This is one in the interest of security but it hasn't been completely set up yet. The idea behind it is that you can validate with more than your basic password every so often to ensure the integrity of your account. You can receive a verification code via code generation applications such as Authy and Google Authenticator or e-mail with the latter being less desirable. I'd really like, at the very least, for the staff to start utilizing this feature when it's fully implemented.

• Welcome Message - We can generate an automated welcome message for new members without having to manually do it like I've been doing for the last few years. My method has that human touch but it's nice to be able to automate it at times because there are a lot of sign-ups these days and I'm not always going to have the time but I'd still like the opportunity to greet our new members, at least in some way. While we're on the subject, I'd like to extend a welcome to anyone that's just recently joined our community.

Well that about wraps things up for now. Soon I'll be making some more selections for all your smiley needs, as promised. Also I really wanted to thank @recycle for the exquisite and stylish 3D AudioSex logos that I've been using for my forum related posts. We've given you the platform and we've maintained it all these years but the question now is what are you going to do with it? Do something extraordinary.

Sincerely,
Management

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Kick ass!

 

Awesome. Keep your good work up
About the "New Post" Question. I actually don't mind clicking on the "New Posts" button and it's probably better arranged than some info box. (Would nevertheless be interesting to see how the feature would look like)

 

Thanks man, we'll do our best like always. The Recent Posts feature that I'm referring to would be in addition to the New Posts page and not in place of it. So everything would be the same except on the bottom of the board list page under the Members Online Now portion, there would be a similar box (only vertically larger) that would list the 5 most recent posts. That's why SAiNT was against the idea, since it's a duplicate feature, but it's convenient if you're just passing through and want to quickly see what's new. My position is that If the performance impact would be negligible, then I think we should include it.

 

Thank you and Saint for your dedication and all the hard work behind the scenes. Ya'll constantly strive to improve the members experience within this community and your efforts are very much appreciated!

 

you guys are killin' it with this site...

 

This place is the only thing better than snakes on a plane

 

fukn hell man once again you all do such a brilliant job for this community, always improving and making things happen. These are the qualities of a well managed and solid community. May this place have more longevity than alot of other forums that have died really quickly in the past, especially with audio forums which dont really last so long.

Also a +1000 for the RAM upgrade, also shows that you guys are maintaining and improving things not just from the software side, but also on the hardware side as well.

BIG UP TO MAH BOYZ CAT AND SAiNT!

 

Yes but do I still actually have to do the clicking around myself?

Most of these I was aware of as they came in - very cool stuff and so far beyond most/all other forum. I guess for a lot of websites the forum is kind of an afterthought, while here it's the whole focus of a team of geniuses.

Thanks Cat, SAiNT, mod team, and anyone else I'm forgetting. Spectacular work. Every time I open up my browser this is the first place I go.

 

Cool Cool keep on good stuff

 

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Ohh boy

 

I hope I'm not the party pooper but: what about spam protection?

 

Well done, management!

 

We actually have significantly greater spam protection than on the older site. The difference is massive and believe me I would know. I've made recommendations to prevent the remaining few from getting through and, in the interim, I've pushed for the implementation of approvals of the first 5 posts for new members which will keep spam from making its way to any public areas. In addition to that, just last week, I manually deleted upwards of 600 spammers from the database (one by one) that made it past the registration process on the old site but were never identified.

 

holy crap, I feel for you brother.
gj!

 

hello, staff members, also all audiosex site lover fellows,

after saving that beautifully executed hammered spammer animation here, one might not be able add loads more of things, besides the laughs. :replace_me:

deleting six hundred absolutely misplaced skin care, liposuction, erection medicine, snake oil, etc. spam sender accounts manually? ooooouch...

jumped merely in to wish all the best for all of us on this site, plus pray do include utterly enormous loads more for all the persons on staff...

 

That is a wise move!
For sure there are some wicked "informers" around, connected to developers etc.
One thing needs improvements: The Chat Box, it's not good that it's visible to everybody.

 

That's the way it was when I signed up, but doesn't that just make a lot more work for the mods? I mean, more work than simply deleting posts and banning spammers?

Easy solution for non-mods: when you see a spammer, report them. That way the eyesore is minimal and the mods aren't needlessly burdened with approving new posts or left all on their own to deal with spammers. I know when I'm in chat and I see a 'newest member' alert with a first and last name that is obviously Indian I check the profile for a Garcinia Cambrogia/dick pills link and report them. Most of the time the mods clean it up in minutes.

Btw Cat, I'm gonna send you a PM in a minute here with a very small issue/request. Please don't feel like you have to rush to take care of it, I just wanna make you aware.

 

Last edited: Sep 3, 2015