Now THAT'S a constructive post!!:banana:
Is there anyone I can 'nudge' about this??

That would be Jelsoft. If I remember correctly, it was Wayne who started the proposal for a commercial directory. It could have been Steve, but I'm 90% sure it was Wayne.

[high]* peterska2 goes to look[/high]

Yes, it was Wayne.

There isn't a copy of it available to view, the only reason I have a copy is because I saved a copy of the thread in it's early days. It only existed for a month before they took the details and opinions of the users here to review and discuss.

Love Wayne! We bump into each other from time to time on boards...he's da man!!

I really hope this comes to pass! There's a lot of money to be had for smart, proficient, professional vbulletin coders.

I have great respect for coders so I won't compare them with designers; they go hand-in-hand, really. I can say from my experience that I've spent long hours, weeks and months working on designs. For just a hobby staring at the computer 16 hours straight and having a design completed only after 5 months by no means can be achieved without patience, tolerance and a bit of humor.

With all things relative I know coders who can't design and designers who can't code, let alone manipulate a code. At a hobby or professional level, there is an art to what we do. I agree that with the knowledge we have helping others is what makes this community successful. Support is never easy and in retrospect it can be an art as well.

I'm one of them - I know just about enough simple html to get by, and that's it, I could never design and build a style.

I might not have read all 12 pages of this thread, but from what I have read I can come up with a suggestion that may or may not have been suggested before. VB can assign a team of moderators or admins to look at unanswered posts and if these posts have been answered in another thread, direct the member to that thread. This would be that moderators sole purpose as a moderator.

I think that it was discussed several times before, including in this thread. While it's a good suggestion I'm wondering how well it will work out since the time spent here is by voluntary basis.

Now if vB were gonna pay me, I'd do that no problem at all. But voluntary? No chance, I've got enough stuff to do for free without having to fit anything else in.

I can't do either. Concept, marketing, and PR are my strengths.

I have no desire to learn coding or designing...once those two things are completed, that's when I get busy.

Too bad there's no PR section of this site. That's where I'd most be able to actually contribute something of true value.

eww mallow smells :p at least teh race course is fairly far outside the town!

No offense, but why are you here then? Wouldn't it make more sense to send the guy who does know how to upload files? There must be someone, since vBulletin got installed somehow.

to scope out potential new features? the code is just HOW we get the new features. code for code's sake would be pretty dilly. if he sees ebux or something and thinks, wow that be great for the forum, THEN the code guy comes in.

agreed!

Bless you...:)

my thoughts on this are pretty much the same as what alot of you have said.

i like to think of myself as a trainee coder. im no PHP expert and i do get stuck on things. but im learning by playing with code :)

i do occassionally ask questions, but i always use search before i ask anything, as i know how annoying it is to have hundreds of topics asking about stuff which could be answered by searching, but anyway. even when i have a genuine question, which i cant answer by searching it often gets ignored. this really annoys me and to be honest does put me off this community guys.

On the flipside the unanswered threads could also mean that whoever dropped by may not know the solution.

I don't know about every unanswered post, but for 0 Reply threads I use It's a quick search.

Unanswered threads are a turnoff to visitors. If you want people coming back, and RECOMMENDING your forum to others, at least SOME response, even to say "Sorry no one has replied, let's give it a day or two. I apologise in advance, but sometimes no one has an answer for your question. We do our best." I bump threads that get no response. Sometimes the thread is dead because no one does have an answer, but at least the person who asked (started the thread) doesn't feel 'abandoned', or worse, ignored.

Just my opinion.

I've installed codes where the coder was very helpful in answering my questions. Even when it was MY screwup in following his directions. And not just once but several times.

And then there is the flip side where I read the entire thread of a coder's install trying to find the answer, not once but 5 times, making sure I didn't miss it. Posted a question about why part of the code didn't work the way it was suppose to work and have yet to get an answer. My post is still being ignored over 3 months later. Yet, at the same time, that coder has answered over 10 more pages since.

Coders come in all flavors. The ones that help and the ones that don't...you eventually learn who is who and avoid the hacks of the ones who don't help. Liz

sometimes i think they answer the more serious questions first and then forget about the others because they get so invloved in the others. i have seen about 3 coders who go through and quote every single new question in a new post and answer...i thought that was very personal on their part. that way you weren't stuck in the middle. but even then i saw some people had gotten left out with their answers....i don't know but i don't take it personally. i figure if i had the problem and i posted about it then most likely someone else will eventually have the same problem or it will be fixed and i will wait.

Yes. I 'feel your pain'. I take it as a factor that most of everything here is essentially donated so there is not much incentive for a 'hack' developer to respond. Now and again I have even offered to pay. I have paid for several hacks to be updated by a 'third party' because I used them a lot and the person who posted the hack here had abandoned them.

If you don't get reply for 3 months, that should tell you not to depend upon that hack's originator. I'm not a coder, but usually a hack upgrade costs me about US$50 to US$100.

I make pretty good money on my forum so the two 'critical' hacks I need which were abandoned are important to me because my visitors are important to me.

Personally, I'm waiting for a good statistics hack. I would like it if VBStatExtended: advanced statistics for your board was debugged and current. I'd pay. If pcfreak would finish (or whatever) I'd pay US$1000 for vB Statistic version 3.0.0 (directors Cut *g*). But - both are, while not totally abandoned, 'static'.

But like I say, for many people who submit hacks, since it's essentially a donation to the community, I can understand why they 'abandon' them and/or do not respond. I can't complain when they're free.

Just a few thoughts.

It would be different if the coder in question was ignoring the thread but that coder IS answering other questions on the thread.

It's a hack that I really would like to have but I'll be the first to admit, I AM NOT a coder...that's why I come HERE. Like Paul mentioned earlier in the thread, he's codes but doesn't design, I design but don't code. Liz

You are correct - I ammend my post to reflect the instance of 1 post in a long thread. I do see that very often. I see it in my forum. In an active forum, I do not see any way, short of paying people to monitor every thread, to ensure every individual post is replied to. But again, most of this has to do with folks donating their 'hack'. I know on my forums I'm definitely not an expert in every subject / topic so I significantly depend upon moderators to answer questions/reply. My forum is relatively low volume. In a high volume forum this will be a significant problem short of paying people to 'police' threads to ensure every post is replied to. I hesitate to use the term 'impossible', which is why I say you'd have to pay someone (or more than 1 person) to 'police' every thread at last daily.

Many coders will not respond if they don't see that you have clicked the install button.

I recently downloaded a hack and installed it. I tested it and it didn't work. As I read back through the thread others had the same problem I di and no response from the coder. So - I uninstalled it. I didn't click the install button because it didn't work.

However, my point remains - These are Free Hacks. I have no real complaint if no one answers because I have no $ investment.

And what if you have? And are still ignored? Liz

That's fine if you have the code guy asking the questions, but that's not what people are complaining about. If you're the one asking for support for a hack, you should probably be the person who installed vBulletin or at least knows their way around administering it.

There seem to be two discussions here. Allow me to explain...

If I release a mod to the public (2 so far :classic: ) I'll support it the best that I can. I feel that I have an obligation to those who use it. It is not only my mod but my reputation on the line.

The threads in the question forums I'll sift through and answer the ones I think will work. I've only been a part of the vB community for two months and it would be quite irresponsible of me if I send someone on a wrong path just because I wanted to help but had nothing to back it up. Mistakes will happen of course but that's life. So if I reply to to a thread I'll go back with intent until the problem has been resolved or if I run out of suggestions.

There are many who'll search and try to find the answers on their own before asking their question(s). There are those who are not as resourceful and will ask immediately. My guess is that many contributers are turned off by the latter group.

I strongly believe in the "pay it forward" concept in that if you've received help then you help others. As huge as this community is with all of the personalities I think overall the people here practice that concept. They seem to enjoy what they do and are happy to help. Their time is on a voluntary basis and that says a lot. I think there's a good thing going on here and I'm glad to be a part of it. :)

To be fair, that will always happen if a thread is busy, it's easy to miss questions, esp if you have been away for a week, and no one is ever going to go back 10 pages to see if they missed a question three months ago. :)

I've probably mentioned this before but I think part of the reason some newbies find it hard to find the required answers is how long some threads become and especially because the same thread will cover different versions of the same hack - so an earlier bug may have been fixed in a later version but you have to read through all of the thread to work that out. (I've done this myself - read through a long thread, missed one particular post that addressed the problem I had and have to be pointed back to the original answer - that's not laziness it's just in an 18 page thread you do tend to miss things!)

I suggested it before but perhaps allow the hack poster to mark posts as "answered" or somehow otherwise collapse all the responses to previous versions.

Or perhaps have it so that each new version of a hack starts a new "sub thread"? That way people only need to read through the content that is relevant to the current release?

This is so true. Long story short and to sum it up, we all agree there needs to be a better system here. More admins and mods perhaps. There MUST be something done. I'm 1000% sure we all agree.

Where are you coming up with these silly rules?:cross-eyed:
(Rhetorical question...)

I honestly think a LOT of these problems will be resolved when/if Wayne gets that professional directory up and running.

Many of the people here creating hacks are quite young (and quite brilliant, apparently)...but young people have school, and other 'interests' that distract from 'supporting' a hack. I don't have any issues with that at all. (in fact, I'm always impressed when I see a coder is 16 or 17...very impressed.)

On the other hand, there are a lot of people who visit this site who are admins (not 'techie' admins, but admins, none-the-less) who are looking for certain board add-ons to enhance their member's site experience.

These types of admins don't care to follow the development of a mod, they don't want to crawl through code, they want to know that it works, and then find someone to install it. (These types of admins fall into two camps: Those who want things for free, and those who have a budget and are willing to pay for assistance.)

A professional directory community would be very helpful to the latter camp, and could prove to be quite lucrative to the experienced coder.

can i add that the install button is great but the idea flawed. IMO you should only click install once the code is up an running. You should not click the install button if you still get errors. I just don't see the sense in that. It's not installed if it has errors...I don't know just seems odd the way people use it.

I, and most of the guys/gals that I know in my position (admin) tend to download the mod/hack first, test it on our local testbeds then if all is hunky dory we will click install! Works for me. I see the 'Install' button system as an ideal way for a: us to keep informed, like when upgrades are available, and b: to aid the coder when supplying/keeping track of support.

Amen! Nothing drives me battier then to relesase a mod, have 12 people click install and say great job and then have somebody come along and point out an error in the install instructions that means nobody could possibly have it working.

Then, people come along and see 'great job' and several installs, assume it's working and try to install it before things are fixed.

I don't count how many 'installs' I have. It's a meaningless number. What I much prefer is to see a mod in action on a user's site. It's much more fun to see mods I create making a difference for somebody.

As far as support goes, I try to help when time permits, but I ignore duplicate questions and problematic users. I had somebody plagiarize a chunk of content off my site once and then have the nerve to get miffed when I wouldn't support her when she broke something. She's been grumping about lack of support ever since and all I can do is shake my head in wonder at some people's nerve.

I think gothicuser has a good point. I've always went about it that clicking the "Install" link meant that I was a satisfied user, regardless of any flaws that may have existed to the mod. I also know too that there are others who'll jump on a mod at first glance, just because it's the in-thing to do, click the Install link without first testing it thoroughly. That's the way it is.

I don't care if it is a rhetorical question. Why on Earth is it silly to expect that people asking technical questions will understand the technical answers? If you didn't install vBulletin, why would you install hacks for it?

This is as silly as asking someone 'why on earth' they would buy a car if they don't know how to perform their own tune ups...

The bottom line is, "I have several sites which run vBulletin, and I have certain needs for them." I'm sorry if you don't understand that. I have no plans to explain my reasons or needs to you.

Respond to me, if you wish, but as soon as I hit 'reply', I'll also be hitting IGNORE.

For the most part, its really easy to install vbulletin. They made it that way on purpose. Common sense.

On the hack side, I still stand behind what I said months ago. And to add to that - people who buy vb don't automatically come with a Bachelor's in PHP and vBscript.

I'm sure. If I 'needed' to learn, I would. :)

For real.;)

Anyway, I hope this thread can get off of the 'hijacked' topic of, "why on earth do you even have vBulletin if you can't write and/or install hacks", and back on constructive ideas for improving vb.org.

People need to get into the habit of asking questions as a last resort. The best way to get an understanding of what a hack does and how it affects the vBulletin script is to read through the thread from start to finish.

I personally do not install any hack until I have read about what it does/in what ways it can screw up your system.

Read read read