I want to share some exciting news with you about the site. It's been long overdue, but we will be rolling out a brand
new forum, chat room, and private messaging system, tentatively scheduled for December 1st. I think you'll be amazed at
all the added functionality we will gain compared to the current platform.
I realize that not everyone eagerly embraces change, so I'd like to take the time to explain why we need it. Our current
security was developed back in 2000, making it over 7 years old (ancient by technology standards). As the years go by,
every time my hosting provider upgrades us to new servers, our old platform gets broken, and I have to work with them to
troubleshoot those issues. There will eventually come a day when our current platform is so outdated that no one will be
able to support it anymore. In other words, our forum is living on borrowed time. In order to continue to provide a stable
posting environment, we need to move to a new platform.
Another reason for the change is to maintain and grow our userbase. If all the other cat sites keep offering more
to their users, then eventually Persian-Cats.com doesn't look so attractive by comparison. We want to retain our membership
by offering our users a robust online community with all the bells and whistles. We need to get with the times!
Allow me to summarize some of the functionality you will gain in the new platform. Here's my top ten list:
Forum
1) You can search the forum. Either search by keywords or search for all posts by a certain user.
2) Users will be able to see who is currently online. (In addition, users may elect to hide their online status.)
3) You can see how many times a message thread has been viewed.
4) Users can assign an avatar to their profile (this is an image that is unique or personal to each user, which they can upload
themselves).
5) Users can create polls.
6) You will have the ability to edit your postings. For example, have you ever re-read one of your postings and noticed you
had a typo? Well, now you'll be able to fix it.
Private Messaging
7) A more robust private messaging system, including real emoticons (smileys) and a rich text area so you can style the font.
8) An inbox, sentbox, and savebox
Chat Room
9) You can see who is currently online! And you know what that means... no more lurkers. You can rest assured that you are
only talking to the people whom you see listed there, and there's no one silently watching.
10) Lots more emoticons.
Perhaps you're thinking, "Sounds great, what are we waiting for?" Well, I need to first prepare you for a couple of downsides
to the new platform. Please be advised:
1) When the big day comes, all users will be asked to re-register since this will be a whole new site security.
2) Naturally, the current password-protected features will go away, and a couple of those will not be feasible in the new
environment. One is the Start Page, and the other is the Make Your Cat's Web Page. I doubt anyone would miss the Cat Pages
because they've been only half-functional for the past 2 years. But some folks would probably miss their Start Page. I know
this is a big negative to some, but my hope is that the new forum index page will make a great start page.
Please be aware that the contents of your old forum posts and private messages will be permanently inaccessible
to you after we make the switch. Therefore, if there is any data you need to save from those areas, you must do so by December 1st!
I would like to put together a beta group to do some testing of the new platform in advance. Please PM me (username: Lindsay)
if you would be willing to participate. I will need around 10 people to register in the new forum and start posting messages a couple
of weeks prior to our rollout. This will give us the opportunity to catch any bugs and fix them before rolling it out to everyone.
I do hope you're as excited about this change as I am. We have 35,000 registered user accounts on our current platform, which
has certainly served us well over the years. However, I think it will be nice to have a fresh start!
Please stay tuned for further updates!
