Why are all vb4 Mods are so out of date ?

[Mark.B]

Brandon unfortunately uses vB 5.0.0 as his baseline for not recommending it, the product is light years away from that today. However, vB5 lacks the modification system of the scale that vB3 and vB4 had, which is the main reason you don't see many modifications for vB5. Though some people produce them: www.vbmods.rocks.

There has also been a huge move away from people writing major modifications for free. There are people who will write custom code for you but they will charge, and rightly so.

Part of the reasoning behind this is that there was a phase when a huge number of "entitled" people started demanding instant support for free mods and posting the most awful abuse and insults when they didn't get it. It drove a lot of people away. You see this on other platforms now, a lot of stuff is paid only because of the culture of entitlement that has developed on the internet.

The other big thing I would add - the days of being able to get people to join a forum because of all your fantastic modifications are over, if they ever existed. Nobody cares if you have a classified adverts section, or can upload your own videos, or can run auctions, or play arcade games - the world has moved on, these facilities are better provided elsewhere. The remaining successful forums are about content, content, content, and also content. Nothing else.

[Brandon Sheley]

Wrong Mark, I don't suggest any version of vbulletin 5.

I've had to work on it at various points since it was released and I'm not surprised at all that the community developers have moved on.

The options in the forum world are still out there and many for free, just not with vb5.

[Mark.B]

Originally Posted by Brandon Sheley

Wrong Mark, I don't suggest any version of vbulletin 5.

I've had to work on it at various points since it was released and I'm not surprised at all that the community developers have moved on.

The options in the forum world are still out there and many for free, just not with vb5.

vB5 is not a good choice if you want modifications.

What I am pointing out though is that many of those who say "don't touch vB5, it is rubbish" only looked at 5.0.0 five years ago, and yet they give that same advice as if the product was still the same. If it were, I'd never suggest vB5 as an option for anyone, but the facts are it's a very different product these days.

But as always, when people say they want to upgrade or migrate, involving any software, I always question them as to why. If you have a successful, functioning forum, what are the compelling reasons to upgrade or change? Whatever platform it's on, if it works, the default position should be "leave it alone".

Hosts do not help with this, constantly telling people to "upgrade your software" as a "fix" for all manner of server issues.

[IggyP]

vb5 still lacks basic function issues, in particular for any image content based forums its purely useless.....or if you want a forum that respects permissions instead of telling you it has them but them not working etc etc.....if you do get into it there is still a long list i think most users would agree unless they have a casual text forum like vb.com.

many issues are not addressed and ive been with it since release....if you even watch the jiras its pretty shocking to see regular severe regressions and basic functionality issues that are only half casually worked into fixes....

i do agree about vb5 its nice to "not need" so much external modification...i can see a future potential that i keep waiting as patient as i can for... but for most practical sense as it is atm it cant be taken seriously if we are talking honestly....unless you want it for a casual forum in which case their are better options as vbulletin has historically excelled at having a better editor and being best suited for more professional and technical content....

[cellarius]

Originally Posted by Mark.B

vB5 is not a good choice

Some might say that sentence should end there.

Telling people that coders left because people got demanding really is misleading. There have always been people that were demanding. Most people left for other reasons. Poor quality (and having a finally rather usable version after five years is not something to be proud of), and company policy (which did not change, see recent events here).

But as always, when people say they want to upgrade or migrate, involving any software, I always question them as to why. If you have a successful, functioning forum, what are the compelling reasons to upgrade or change? Whatever platform it's on, if it works, the default position should be "leave it alone".

And you really think it's not telling that vB 5, after five years on the market, should not offer good reasons for most, if not every user to upgrade? However you try to rationalize it?

[IggyP]

not meaning to beat on a dead horse but there really are some valid points here which IB seems to not get or else ignore for some reason...

to compound things, this whole vb5 problems episode comes at the worse possible time... when forums themselves are struggling in the first place....i can understand a pressure to make it more modern, like adding the social media buttons of last upgrade...but seriously things that are built into it RIGHT NOW....NEED TO WORK....

stop pushing forward adding new features before basic things work, that has to be a solid logic by now right? you can angle for those "lifetime buys" of people who will pretty surely end up hating the product once they actually try to use it...and/or be unable to revert back....but should that really be the main target market and strategy??? how long can that last?

what i notice most these days is the instagraming facebookers of the world have very low patience so things need to make sense easily.....be intuitive, and most importantly WORK.

if you have to explain how to create content with a long article explaining half working buggy functions and doubled up functions that create problems if not done properly etc....you already lost them, they just closed the window called your site a joke and went back to facebook....

[In Omnibus]

I was under the impression this is a vbulletin 4 general discussions thread. It would be nice if not every thread devolved into a vbulletin5 bashing contest.

[TheLastSuperman]

Originally Posted by In Omnibus

I was under the impression this is a vbulletin 4 general discussions thread. It would be nice if not every thread devolved into a vbulletin5 bashing contest.

Most assume that should be the case however how can someone accurately comment on the original posters inquiry without it evolving into something along those lines? vB5 lead to the downfall of modification development at vBulletin.org imho. If vB5 would have allowed customization with a in-depth plugin system (lol or at least something similar to vB4) FROM THE BEGINNING many of the coders from that era would have stayed, would have continued development, and would be much more pleased with the product AND would have more than likely continued developing matching vB4/vB5 mods like we used to see simultaneous vB3/vB4 modification releases. No one realizes that (this is my opinion) back then vB4 was being hacked left and right, so they took out the plugin system in vB5 I remember Paul told me he was tasked with removing it - ACK! Also they didn't allow it at all on the cloud based on that in a sense too but more so overall security reasons. Basically they wanted to save face imo, if you just had over 30k of your customers vBulletin powered sites hacked in a 6 month span and it was all over the then "interwebz" and the tech sites well...

Normally I would have agreed with you about it being derailed but every so often a thread is not that bad OR its borderline with both subjects correlating and like I mentioned above the vB4 current state of things was affected by the release of vB5 and the continued lack-there-of plugin system until here recently.

If you're on vB4 you can still find great mods that still work fine, you can also hire a developer in the paid requests section or via third-party sites to design and code a modification if you truly want it.

[In Omnibus]

Everything above may be perfectly accurate, however the question was why vB4 mods are so out of date, which can be answered without any mention whatsoever of vB5. vB4 is no longer being developed. There is no money in free modifications. Forums are no longer winning the popularity contest. They have been replaced by social media. The removal of the hooks in vB5 has nothing whatsoever to do with any of those things.

I purchased vB5 the day it was released so I am fully aware of its history. At some point either the product serves a person's needs or it doesn't and that person should seek an alternative. Complaining about history that can't be rewritten is pointless.

For the record, I am running an instance of vB5 right now and its works perfectly well for our purposes. Perhaps that's because I am not actively seeking things about which to complain. If we're going to allow people to derail conversations with complaints allow me to derail this one with compliments to the handful of people who have worked tirelessly to correct the vB5 product. The developers have spent countless hours fixing countless issues on a product I am sure they would never have released had it been their decision. Let's not pretend the decision was theirs. Wayne and the customer support team have dealt with a rash of angry customers the entire time, including but certainly not limited to myself once or twice.

Some of the people who made this product worth owning for the last 17 years have moved on. Those who are still around deserve more than to be the corporate whipping boys for decisions that weren't theirs to make. Customers deserve better than to have to sift through walls of the same complaints every time they attempt to use this site. Ergo, if the need to bring vB5 into the conversation is something one cannot avoid perhaps it could at least be done only in the interest of asking the question asked and not as a prelude to endless tangential nonsense that has nothing to do with the question.

If people ask why vB5 sucks (it doesn't but I digress) there are plenty of threads on that without creating more of them.

[cellarius]

Originally Posted by In Omnibus

Everything above may be perfectly accurate, however the question was why vB4 mods are so out of date, which can be answered without any mention whatsoever of vB5.

No, it can't. Bacause many coders of said addons left the vB ecosystem precisely because of vB5 and company policy, and if a company representative decides to conveniently forget that. What you expect is something like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfl6Lu3xQW0