Forum shop update

[sc2forums]

Hi everyone, I know a lot of you have been very patient in waiting for the forum shop to be re-installed. I am waiting for the author to release the gold version, which was supposed to happen a week ago. I am sure it will be out very soon. Until then, I cannot install it.

The current versions have security flaws and cannot be used. The Author for the shop mod has also stopped development of it. It was free back then, but the new one requires a yearly subscription. I've previewed the BETA version and it looks really good and I think worth the cost. It has a lot more features, which you will see for yourselves.

Please be patient a little bit longer. I will estimate within this week. I will check everyday and buy it for the forums when it comes out.

Thanks for your patience this far! We have a record of all your stuff from the old shop so they may take a bit of time to get restored for you. The Mods will see to everyone getting there items and minerals back.

:cool:

[Gasmaskguy]

A week, pfff. No problem dude. :D

[KuraiKozo]

Thanks SC2 =3
I know some people who will be very happy. And with minerals coming back that means more people will post =D (even though they shoudl post because this forum is awesome and not because of the minerals they get <.< )

[BirdofPrey]

I've been waiting for a while now. A week won't bug me since I've stopped missing it

[-LT-]

Thanks! You're the best!

[kuvasz]

Wow pay for an extension just because it's the best and you want us the best :> I'll ask Itza to give you a hug in my name.

[Yamato_Cannon]

Hmm... Can anyone tell me what it is we are going to buy at the shop, and what we'll be buying it with? (minerals?)

[kuvasz]

Well you will be getting ~100 units of forum currency (minerals). In addition, you will be getting a small but steady flow of minerals by posting. You can earn large amounts at once by helping the community and the site, by winning official competitions, solving riddles, and just generally being a good person. You can spend your minerals on numerous things, like account upgrades (frame, certain privileges, etc.), real life things (SC2, cash), and, by far the most popular, on items (collectibles pets). They're fun :)

ps sc2, have you considered giving minerals after character count instead of word? I think that'd be more accurate

[Yamato_Cannon]

You can get cash?!?!? Wow, that's awesome. I bet the conversion rate is something tiny though, like:
all of the minerals on the forum = $20.
Btw, character count could be spammed in order to maximize your gains, and there are also special format characters that aren't displayed which would also count toward the mineral count. Unless this was heavily moderated, it could get out of hand pretty easily.

It's a good idea though.

[kuvasz]

You can't spam characters because you'll get penalised. You don't earn minerals by posting in Space Junk. Problem solved :)

And the exchange rate was 170,000 to 20 I think.

[zeratul11]

i want my minerals back. =\

[KuraiKozo]

we'll get minerals back soon, just be patient, guys ^-^

[Ursawarrior]

no we wont.... just kidding..... i can wait..... forever, if you say, youll be there too.... lalala

[KuraiKozo]

xD *gives ursa a cookie* will that hold you over?

[MarineCorp]

Cool i can't wait for the shop to be updated!

[karlo]

yamato cannon,your new here,il explain.
each post is worth minerals[NOT REAL LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!}
you can use those minerals to buy stuff on shop[NOTE:NOT EVERYTHING IN SHOP IS REAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ONCE AGAIN]
topics worth more then posts

Yea sure sc2forums!
i can wait,though i wasent that excited of it coming back.
keep improving the site!

[CyberPitz]

Good to hear it's on the way!

[sc2forums]

The shop is currently being installed! Because of a problem with my paypal account, many thanks to Joneagle who actually purchased it with his own money. Please thank him if you can!

Shop should be up by today's end but please note, redistributing the old items may take some time. I will make another announcement when it is complete.

Thanks!

[EonMaster]

woot!

thx for putting your time into it, and thx Jon for actually spending your own money so us regular members could have some fun with it/ bragging rights.

[Meee]

Many thanks to both of you sc2forums and jon!

[Joneagle_X]

WTF! For the last time it's forum money! LOL

[BirdofPrey]

Great to hear

Are you increasing the number of items we can show?

[Fenix]

Damn you Jon, making the rest of us look bad.

[sc2forums]

hmm, it's really sad but it doesn't seem like the new shop has a trade center... :( or your own items page. Like there is no way to store your own items... don't ask me why!

[Hunter]

Oh my god.... I hope you will solve this somehow.. This way.. the shop would mean nothing:) and trading was also good.. We have plenty of time, and I know you will manage to make it work.

[Gasmaskguy]

Look harder sc2forums, look harder! This can't be the end of items!

[sc2forums]

I am trying but have spent the last 3 hours finding out that this shop works a lot differently than before. The new shop will let you pruchase items which you can display in your posts, but you don't have a specific page where all your items are. So you can still get pets and such, but can't trade with each other since you really don't have an inventory...

I can also code items like avatar frames, except you can't collect lots of different frames. As soon as you buy it, it will update your frame in your posts and the old one will just be overwritten.. at least so far, that's how it looks like it will work...

I wish I can port smfshop over to vbulletin.... =(

[EonMaster]

A shop that doesnt allow you to trade items?! What kind of programmer thought that would be a good idea,?

At least they show in your posts though, thats where it counts the most.

[Light]

Damn, it seems all vB does is be expensive and not deliver anything new.. Thanks a lot for being so determined, admin, I am sure it will be better.

[sc2forums]

Damn, it seems all vB does is be expensive and not deliver anything new..

No, it is more secure, much faster, easier to maintain and theme, patching and upgrading to latest versions take me 2 mins instead of a day, new profile features/social groups, arcade mod with tournaments (and the ability for me add new games with a 1 click), and lots of other things I can't recall at the top of my head.

Basically, it has saved me a lot of time (and time is what I need :) )

The only thing that the forums are missing really, is the shop right now which I am working on. It's just not looking good at the moment... I always thought the SMFshop was created according to the vbulletin one, but obviously not the case as SMF shop made a lot more sense...

[Light]

What will be the new shop feautures then?

[kuvasz]

D= This is a sad day for all of us...
But, there's never enough of thankyous, so thanks Jon!

[sc2forums]

Well, I'm working on it. We might sacrifice some of these features... I mean, you'll still be able to collect items and pets, I'll see if I can make enough pet slots to display 1 of every unit. If we make icons small enough, we might be able to do that.

The shop has other features though, like giving minerals to the thread starter depending on how many views a thread gets or how many replies to their threads. It also has things like when you create a thread, the creator can choose to 'charge' other users to view the thread, or charge to download an attachment. So things like selling wallpapers or maps, etc would be doable - users can choose to 'pay' to download an attachment, which automatically goes to the creator. Essentially, it's almost like a virtual marketplace for your digitally created things.


The shop also can sell items that can change colours, bold, underline, etc your own threads, which perhaps could be used in a 'marketplace' forum, where sellers could enhance their threads advertising their wares. I'm just throwing ideas around here but these sort of things are possible with the new shop.

I'm still looking into how we could use the shop - the old shop had a lot of custom stuff done by me to it. SMFshop didn't have the option of buying/displaying pets in your posts, or buying avatar frames - I coded those myself, if we had been using the barebones smfshop, you guys would be commenting on how crap it was.

The difference with vbulletin shop is that the way it works is fundamentally different - with no individual inventory, it will be impossible to code for things like a trade market. This is what I am worried about. But I think we'll be able to find new ways to use the shop and make it just as interesting as before.

[kuvasz]

Is there absolutely no chance of you coding the inventory?

The things you mentioned do sound nice, but I'm fairly sure everyone would gladly sacrfice these new features to retain the old system with the inventory, trade centre, and stuff like that.

[Gasmaskguy]

But is it possible to have a pet battle system? That would definitely compensate for a lot.

[sc2forums]

No Kuvasz, no chance. The way it runs at a fundamental level makes it impossible without basically re-writing the entire thing, and I don't know enough to do that. Unless someone here knows a lot of PHP and VB, it won't be possible.

A pet battle system would be a seperate mod and there is a good one for VB which I think is free here
http://dev.p3tz.com/index.php?page=vbpetz

the only thing would be the amount of time it would take to customize it so it is starcraft themed. It will take a while I think, as we'll need to create all custom graphics, items, etc.

[furrer]

How long time do you think it will take (for the shop to be up?)?
And I have a question that I cant find an answer on... The activity % is calculated out from the 10 most posting, but is that most posting today, the last moth, or overall?

[Ursawarrior]

im just glad that the shop will be back, although it may not feel the same anymore

anyways, thanks sc2, and thank you too Jon

*seriously? the forums earn money?!?!?*

[sc2forums]

I'm still in the process of creating the shop. Trying to figure out the best way to implement it.

furrer, it is calculated using data from the past 21 days.

Ursawarrior, in the past few months, I would estimate that the forums made about $100 in total (we don't have many ads as you can see, at the moment we have none because it wasn't really making anything).

Ofcourse, I didn't take away how much we spent on hosting and software, etc. Which is over the past few months would be close to $1,000. So we made negative $900 :)

[KuraiKozo]

D:
ohh, i would help pay if i had the money
but anyway thank you so much Sc2, and thank you, too, jon. you guys are awesome ^_^

[karlo]

LOL.what happened to my post here?
keep working on that shop admin!
you and jon are the best :)

[Ursawarrior]

wow, -900, profit....less....

anyways, ty again

[BloodHawk]

More people should click on the ads, all the time. Problem solved.

TY guys.

[sc2forums]

I made the suggestion for trading and inventory to the developer and looks like he is is adding an inventory and working on a trade system. The inventory has been done for the next version, hopefully a functional trade center too!

[Gasmaskguy]

Great news! Seems like you have some powerful connections. :P
Pets will work very much like before I guess. Sweet.

[kuvasz]

This is excellent news indeed... just when I was about to give up on the items. You're the best :D

[JBL]

finally.

[karlo]

OK WHATS ARE LATEST UPDATE SC2forums?
how long do you think before it is installed?

[BirdofPrey]

Say wasn't the point of moving to Vb because it's supposedly easier to program for than the old software?

Doesn't seem so to me.
Shop was up when I came here and worked perfectly
Chat took a week to impliment and didn't have login problems
and we never had any issues with permissions

[kuvasz]

We didn't have visitor messages or personal albums. We didn't have public usergroups. We didn't have such freedom in personalising our profiles. We didn't have arcade tournaments.

As long as we get the shop system back in exactly the same form as we had it in SMF, I will remain patient. But I would hate to see some placeholder shop where we don't have inventories or trade centres. Also it'd be nice to hear from sc2... that new shop should be coded by now. On that note, I think it degrades the site's popularity among both regulars and newcomers, so it is in everyone's best interest to get things going.

I think we should get Itza to hunt down sc2 in person.