Why 3.x forums have 5 times more visitors
 

Ok, in the early days of vB4, was normal the forums related to vB3 version to have more visitors than the forums vB4. But now is 26 months that vB4 exists, the support for vB3 has been almost stoped. But as you can see in the screenshot that I got a few minutes ago, the traffic to vB3 forums is many times more than vb4 forums.

Please vore and discuss what makes you stay back to vB3. Prisoner of a mod which does not exists, vB4 unstability, lover of the old good days of vB3, or what?

Chris

What screenshot?

My big problem:) Always to forget the attachments. Once I have to send an email 4 times, and only in the 4th I added it:rolleyes:

Well, I think part of the reason is because not everyone wanted to fork out the cash to upgrade to vb 4, especially a beta version. vb 3 was well established then and vb 4 was too new to have many mods for it. Plus we has to learn a new way of coding mods for vb 4 from vb 3 and not everyone was willing to jump on it at the time. Those of us that did have been on one hell of a ride for a while but things seem to be smoothing out now with vb 4. It's actually getting better. ;)

Sorry about that. You wanted vb 3 users' opinions and I am on vb 4. My bad.

Thank you for your time. I'm also in vB4 since the first release. I'm just wondering seeing so many visitors there, all times of the day.

Chris

Well, for the reasons stated above as well as the org is still on vb 3 so I'm sure that has something to do with it also. vB 4 got a bad rap out of the gate and it has taken them this long to finally start coming around to where they should have been long ago. Maybe as it progresses, there will be less vB 3 users out there and more vB 4 users. I think it will be interesting to start watching which way the trend goes from here on out, if vB 4 stays on the path it is currently on with the better updates.

I still use and recommend 3.8.x.

- Stable
- Less code, higher quality code-base, and simpler to build mods for
- Easier to skin (new stylevar system is a joke, IMO)
- Better interface (subjective, of course)
- I've already developed several years of mods for it that I use

It's obviously dated, but it doesn't take much work to make it look modern. We have a collection of plugins that we use to turn off several unused features, and make some areas simpler.

I won't upgrade for a long time. Perhaps 5.x, but I have no confidence in the team behind it.

I've seen the numbers reversed quite a few times, many in the vB4 forums but not so much the vB3... I'm on these forums as a friend once said "methodically" though and at any time of the day on any given day so don't be surprised.

You included a screenshot of the discussion forums, that could be related to searches being performed although so could the modification forum views but for example here is a screenshot of those currently viewing mods:

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/attachmen...hmentid=135740

Although it's a different area entirely it does show logic different than that you have come to use so it's truly dependent on a few factors including time of day and the area of the site.

I will say this though, it seems the larger sites are still on 3.x more so than 4.x but that's imo.

I don't think that the traffic in Mods are realble, because all those who are still using vB3 are old members, and they have already downloaded and installed any modification that they needed for their site. Even if I haven't checked it, I don't believe that there are new mods for vB3, and also I don't believe that the new users are going to vB3. I'm talking for the old users, who, as I said before, they have no reason to visit the modification area.

Chris

Well neither is the viewing count of the discussion forums then, can't be because who's logged in and who's just searching and from where, did they arrive here via Google, Yahoo or other? Also how may times do you imagine forum owners search for mods or have questions related to vB4 yet end up within a old thread related to vB3? We can't compare apples and oranges but we can enjoy the taste of each.

I dunno but if anything this is food for thought :cool:.

Your poll doesnt include all options.
For instance this site is not on vb4, but not for any of the reasons listed.

Your screenshot is somewhat meaningless, one random screenshot proves nothing really, but if you really want to examine it, more people are in the vb4 programming discussions and the vb4 design discussions than their vb3 counterparts.

Heres another one for you :)
My vb4 install count has now overtaken any of my vb3 versions. It continues to rise at a steady rate. So vb4 must be more popular than vb3 now .. right ?

I love my VB 3.8 but even when I do release a new mod for both versions, VB 3.x will get maybe a tenth of the installs and downloads as a VB 4.x version.

I know you say that VB3 users are already running established forums and not looking for new mods- but if that were true the same could be said that they are not looking for help or support so it doesn't explain the higher numbers on your screenshot...

Could have been spiders crawling the VB3 pages... by post count VB4 forums seem much more active.

I'm with BOP on this one. I coded my vB4 mods to vB3 by request and vB4 versions lead in downloads and installs by 10:1.

It's because of that, that I stopped updating the vB3 versions. I'll do bug fixes, but no new features will be added to them.

Besides, in my opinion vB3 will die a horrible death as coders move to newer versions of PHP. There are already some compatibility issues with PHP 5.3 and in most cases the only way to fix them is to roll back the PHP version. That may work for some people, but then if you run any other sites on the same server with a need for a newer version of PHP, your pretty much forced to change.

For sure there are many more options, I wrote what came first to my mind. Actually every single webmaster can has its own reason. At least I had to add an "Other" option.

Even if its some weeks now that I'm visiting the Forums section (usally I'm goind directly to Mods), and I noticed this traffic difference, I tool the screenshot just before my post.

Well.. and here my question for you:). Why you've your own forum running vB3? :rolleyes:

Taking myself as an example, I rarely bother with the 3.x programming forums since it hasn't changed and won't be changing anymore. Why would new people want to learn an old platform? I check up on 4.x once and a while out of curiosity.

Numbers are obviously going to favor 4.x but there are a huge number of *large* forums that aer on 3.x and won't move for a very long time. From my own client-base, experience and observations, I'd say there are more *users* using 3.x forums than 4.x forums.

To me, that's a much more interesting and meaningful metric. And not to poke the bear, the fact that IB isn't eating its own dog food the biggest of all.

Cheers

The traffic exists in General discussion and not in the programming where usally members are going for support.


The same applies for vB4 pages. Even those few 25 visits can be spiders.

None of your business, esp as you ask in an ignorant fashion.

We also recommend vB 3.8.x to our clients and/or most of them simply do not want to upgrade to vB4. Among our clients there are some of the biggest vBulletin forums, and most of them are running vBulletin 3; in some communities, the users decided they did not want to upgrade to vB4 as they did not like the interface; in other communities, the move to vB4 was followed to a drop in traffic (in some cases caused by early adoption of vB 4; the first releases of vB4 were so full of bugs that users actually left communities enraged by the change).

vB4 has also many design flaws that are irritating and expensive for a website owner, so some clients do not want to go with it. I am speaking about the lackluster sidebar implementation, the stylevar system (which caused style edits to be more time consuming than on vB3), the separation of the CMS from the forum area (which can be minimized if you use vBAdvanced instead than vBCMS). Especially business minded forum owners consider these things very carefully; hobbyists owners running their forum just for passion often are more willing to upgrade.

None of our clients (we have a portfolio of about 50 forums right now) moved to different systems like Xenforo, as they do not want to force their userbase to a traumatic change.

vb4 does not offer significant improvements over vb3. But it does have a lot of bugs and design flaws. In this respect its a bad trade off.
I do think vb4 is getting some more popular than vb3. But also because many do migrate from vb3 to IPB and XF.

Paul, cableforum looks heavily modified. Do you feel its currently worth the time and effort to upgrade it to vb4? You already have an article system, so the CMS may be superfluous.

We just recently upgraded our big Board site to vb4.

We do not have a typical vBulletin site. The site is heavily modified. We only utilize the forum part of the vBulletin suite.

We are still making some adjustments ... tweaking to make pages faster ... cleaning up code ... tweaking for browser compatibility ... etc

With the upgrade, I also made some changes to our navigation architecture (modified a few, moved a few, etc). The URL restructuring was needed to improve user experience and ROI. I do believe we will bounce back stronger than ever. The next 2-6 months will show this to be true. ;)

Note: We already surpassed same time last year traffic but we are aiming for bigger growth.

Why I decided to upgrade?

1. CSS Table-Less layout - this alone can increase speed of site (or at least the perception of speed) ... bandwidth and page loading improved by 60% vs previous Table layout
2. It was time. Every 2-3 years the site is due for a major upgrade. Most members now accept this as the norm. Negative feedback was good and for the most part it was due to real bugs.

Its planned to move to vb4 this year, its mainly dependant on me actually having the time.

We currently use textpattern for the news and that will get dumped in favour of the CMS. The biggest issue being copying over the existing items.

The odd part is that vB and DragonByte Tech and a few other places have been stating that "stats" show MORE people are using vB4 than vB3.

As for hits... I am not sure.

I can confirm that, our stats show 5 times more people actively using and improving their forums on v4 than on v3 based on our mods available for both.

The take up rate and sales figures for the mods show roughly 80% of sales are the vb4 versions - sample size of several hundred over all of the products.

Iain

I just cant seem to get mine 3.x to upgrade

^^^ This.

Plus, there is NO COMPELLING reason to "upgrade" to v4. It's not demonstrably better, it's not any better looking, it's not at all innovative, there's nothing to recommend it, IMO.

To answer the OP: Apples to oranges - there are I am sure, tens of thousands, at least, more v3 boards out there than there are v4 boards out there.

We love vB3 and have no plans to upgrade to vB4. In our users opinions, there was nothing our users wanted in vB4 that was not already well done in vB3.

In addition, we really don't like the "me too" look of vB4, and thought the original vB3 development line was more "pure" to our goals as forum.

Also, we have many custom plugins we like; and since there are no "great new features we want" from vB4, it is a waste of resource to upgrade our custom code.

Could go "on and on"; but we are happy with vB3 and even if IB stops supporting it completely, we will keep running it; as we have not seen anything out of the new development lines that are in our forum and users best interest. They don't want blogs and don't want to be on a copycat FB site, etc; our users want a solid forum and that is what we give them and continually try to improve upon.

We tried the new vB Mobile Suite and were very disappointed in the bugs and the very bad service from IB. We don't even use Mobile Suite although we paid for it (full price) and IB never even suggested a refund. Sad and bad customer support, really.

Call me old fashioned or nostalgic, but we liked the original Jelsoft vB development team, now long gone from vB. The "new kids" seem to want to "beat us up" on every issue, as if any customer issue becomes personal and their mode of operation is to attack the customer.

Naturally, customer service is important; and since we have very bad experiences with the "new kids"; we are perfectly happy to run and update our vB3 software which we paid for and works great for us. There is no reason for us to support a business which has turned a blind eye to our issues and has embarked on a development line which does not really improve the core forum concept; but instead tries to copy cat social media trends.

vB3 is great! Love live vB3!

Jelsoft, we miss you!

--------------- Added [DATE]1330581379[/DATE] at [TIME]1330581379[/TIME] ---------------

That is "more than likely" because new users without vB3 experience will certainly buy vB4 instead of vB3.

More experienced forum admins will "more than likely" write more custom code and plugins.

In other words, these types of statistics showing screenshots of "who is looking in vB4 vs. vB3 forums" are misleading and mostly useless.

We run vB3 because we like it and we don't hang out in the "plugin forums" on this site because we can easily write our own mods that we need.

.. just trying to keep it real.... sorry to be so direct in my reply on this topic.

vB3 is great. Hands down. :D

I dont know how anyone could use vB 4.

Just go back through, and count the "Bug fixes" released in each version...and tell me how its "stable".

Example:
4.1.11 166 bug fixes
4.1.10 300+ bug fixes (apparently to many to count past 300)
etc etc etc

There's bug fixes in 3.8.x versions as well. In fact, 3.8.7 still has unresolved bugs that will most likely not be addressed as the company has decided to dedicate its time and development to the 4.x series.

It's pretty unfair to compare bugs in a .8 vs. a .1 version. Of course the .8 will have less bugs and be more reliable! But if anyone remembers 3.1 you would know that 4.1 is doing far better than it did.

Personally, the vB 4 upgrade was easy- but then again I have a lot of technical experience with vBulletin. For non-technical forum admins I could definitely see how the upgrade would be a pass in the ass, as I don't think it is quite user friendly enough. Why? I think it should back-up the database and restore the database should the upgrade go wrong, and it should require the vB4 upgrade to be in a completely new directory so that if all goes wrong the user can simply revert back to vB3 and try again. But that's just asking for perfection, and, tbh, if your forum doesn't have a tech admin able to upgrade without assistance you need to find one if you plan on growing your forum at all.

How do I feel about vB4 now? I like it. I like the new layout, it's more profession and modern. Sure it took some time to get use to, but even Google and Facebook get negative feedback when they update their looks. People seem to be inherently against change, but overtime they get use to it and, for the most part, agree that the new look is better than the old.

Some features new in vB4 that I enjoy:

• CSS & Divs replace Tables and inline styles - It's 2012, it's time to use semantic mark up.
• New Editor - It's just way better. Better cross-browser compatibility, cleaner, etc.
• Updated template syntax - Simply love it. Else if, each, namespaced, etc.
• Stylevars - Allows for better modification custimization and it's more friendly than digging through the templates. It still needs work though, how are we suppose to know what each stylevar defines unless we dig through the templates?
• More AJAX functionality - There's still needs to be more though. I can't wait until they AJAX pagination (for threads at least).

Those just stick out to me atm. But there's little things scattered around that I like, such as quoting in the quick reply instead of a new reply and buttons using HTML and CSS instead of images.

I"m still on 3.7.3 and was going to start upgrading this year, but I've lost so many members to Facebook that I'm holding back to see what will happen. I'm going to hold on for another year but by 2014 and my membership percentage is under 10%, I'll shut down. It's simply not worth the cost to sustain a dead board...I've even had to shut down new registrations because the fast-adapting spam bots are damn near out of control...

DANG YOU FACEBOOK!! DANG YOU!!

But if I had to be truthful about it, message boards only have so long of a shelf life...boards that are 10 years and older are almost rare and hard to find. I knew that going into it and I've been up for 6 years and I'm surprised that I had that long of a run...

What's your forum about?

I'm holding off as long as possible. I've got things setup perfectly right now, any big change and I fear it will hurt the site. The only thing that will force me to upgrade will be serious PHP and MySQL incompatibility.

I am holding on to 3.8 as long as I can. My site is heavily modified and it's been pretty much as close to what it is now for some time. No need to confuse the members with a new version with no upside.

I will never use vb4.

I simply don't like green eggs and ham

I can relate. Fortunately, my site is heavily modified with code I personally created so it took me no more than a few months of light work to have the code converted and ready for vB4.