Notice of downtime this weekend

[Ian-Highlander]

Just to let everyone know that I will be taking the site offline at some point over the weekend (I'll try and be more specific shortly) in order to do some updates and make some changes to the server configuration ready for the new addition to the Vectra-c family that is currently in the planning stages.

I will try and keep this downtime to a minimum, but it's essential before we can move forward with upgrades to this site and the birth of the new sister site.

Thanks for you patience.

[neverlandandy]

Thanks for letting us know in advance Ian

[Ian-Highlander]

"Short time" may be being ambitious, this upgrade is going to take a while I suspect, as I will be needing to upgrade all the back end systems for the sites in order to run the newer versions of software we've just bought. Think we're creating a monster here

I will probably do most of it during the day tomorrow (Saturday) although will start backing everything up tonight and see what happens, if I get ambitious I may start it tonight.

[Woody]

Just be careful not to "break" anything Ian

[Ian-Highlander]

Just be careful not to "break" anything Ian

no guarantees of that with a big upgrade like this, but I'll be taking full backups of everything tonight before I start anything (site might be a little slow this evening while I do that).

[fatfred]

I'm driving down to the caravan during the day tomorrow to empty it so we can get the new one delivered so I'm not worried!!!

Can you make sure its back up by 5 pm please as I'll be back by then.

[dougie89]

Make it Sunday please as I'll be busy don't want to have to resort to talking to the wife/entertaining the child

[Ian-Highlander]

Nothing's ever quite as simple as it should be is it?

So, long story short (ish)...

The club has now purchased the latest versions of VBulletin for both Vectra-c.com and the new sister site Insignia-Owners.com.

The new software requires upgrades to all the backend (PHP, MySQL etc) which is what I'd planned to do tonight/tomorrow.

However, to throw a spanner in the works, the current Vectra-c.com software will not run on these required upgrades.

So, we now have to do an additional "halfway house" upgrade on Vectra-c before we can do the backend server updates, this will undoubtedly mean more downtime than we'd anticipated.

Pete is talking with VB at the moment to check specifics and we're waiting for our new licences to be issued.

The end result is some of this may or may not happen this weekend now and if it does happen, it's likely to be with very little or almost no notice, if you come to the site and it's offline, don't panic, we'll be working madly to bring it back online.

[Ian-Highlander]

And we're back (sort of).

Apologies for this taking much longer than expected.

There's good news and bad news.

Good news is @Big-Pete has managed to do the first level of upgrade on Vec-c's forum software. However he had a lot of problems in the process and as a result we're way behind schedule and there's still a few kinks to iron out.

Bad news is that there is quite a bit more work to do, we have to do the backend upgrades and the next Vec-C upgrade together otherwise the backend upgrades will break the site massively and that's just to get us up to the level where we will be in a position to be able to install the newest software for both sites. We need to iron out the kinks in this first upgrade before we do that though.

Watch this space for updates we will let you guys know as and when things are going to happen as much as we possibly can and please report any issues you see with the site currently if you have any.

[Woody]

A couple of things to point out in case they haven't been noticed yet

1 - clicking on a "liked" notification to pick up the thread/post referred to results in database error
2 - Clicking on Page 2 of another thread & also the initial post, also brings up database error - thread headed "CD70 Testmode" started yesterday 13:15 by OLD DOG NEW TRICKS.

Just for info
@Ian-Highlander @Big-Pete