Under Consideration: Migrate the Forums to Discourse


 
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The Lounge What is on Your Mind? Under Consideration: Migrate the Forums to Discourse
# 1  
Old 03-07-2020
Under Consideration: Migrate the Forums to Discourse

Dear All,

After being active on the Node-RED forum for the last few weeks, I have been very impressed with Discourse, and my eyes have been opened.

Code:
https://www.discourse.org/

but not the paid /hosted offering, but using the open distribution:

Code:
https://github.com/discourse/discourse

Soon, I will build everything (in a test bed) and attempt to port our core database over to discourse (for testing only).

I am also considering paying around $1000 to $1500 to have a professional who has done this before do the migration; but I need to try it myself first to see if it is better for me to do it myself, or pay to have it done.

I think, seriously, it is time to 'retire' the legacy vBulletin code base and "move on"....

Anyone here ever use discourse forums?

Cheers.
# 2  
Old 03-08-2020
I've never heard
Here it is in my opinion
Keyboard Maestro Discourse - Discussion forum for Keyboard Maestro, the powerful macro program for macOS
Demo on the official website far from our topic

Last edited by nezabudka; 03-08-2020 at 04:44 AM..
# 3  
Old 03-08-2020
Hi,

In the past i participated sometimes at Monitoring Portal . They changed to discourse 1-2 years ago. The usability seems fine for me. Since discourse is based on ruby on rails(RoR), the resource requirements are higher than the php based vbulletin. I had never run discourse on my own so far. I just had a quick look when searching for a forum solution, and discarded it, because it would have required a newer stronger machine. (Statement of a former programmer-colleague on ruby on rails: "i do not care about memory - developer time is far more costly.").

I had a glance at nodebb, which was very quick in terms of response times. I liked that very much. Home | XCP-ng forum is based on NodeBB. NodeBB is based on Node.js.

phpBB has gotten another major rewrite with version 3.3. I used it as an internal communication board(version 3.2). The administration felt very awful back then. then Since it's fully OSS maybe they constantly improve over time?

All three packages are fully open source.

regards
# 4  
Old 03-08-2020
I like discourse, that is why I decided to go with it (testing, migration testing, etc). No verdict on production, since porting the DB over is fraught with dragons and goblins....

In addition, had a chat with the mods, and both Akshay and Ravinder are on board.

Ravinder loves the features as well how discourse runs on mobile (very important).

Akshay likes as well.

Currently, we are working on building test bed using Docker on a VPS.

Regarding performance, I have been on the Node-RED forum a lot lately (maybe good much), which is discourse, and is it blazing fast.

I think one of the main reasons I like the Node-RED forum, besides a robust Node-RED community, is the fact that discourse is so good and fun to use.

There has not been another forum which has brought be to this "retire old vBulletin" except discourse.

Of course, we can customize discourse as well.... which we will do for sure! That is a given... custom code.
This User Gave Thanks to Neo For This Post:
# 5  
Old 03-09-2020
Currently chugging along, importing users sans avatars and passwords.

Code:
root@localhost-app:/var/www/discourse# su discourse -c 'bundle exec ruby script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb'
discourse:@localhost wants vb5
Loading existing groups...
Loading existing users...
Loading existing categories...
Loading existing posts...
Loading existing topics...

importing groups...
       20 / 20 (100.0%)  [1918542 items/min]  
importing users
   106664 / 138120 ( 77.2%)  [9832 items/min]

Just upgraded the test bed slice from 2GB to 8GB and increase RAM and quadrupled the CPU power and disk space (was getting tight)..... Hopefully it will chug along every faster.

Code:
8 GB	4 Cores	160 GB SSD	5 TB	40 Gbps	5000 Mbps

This server is only for migration and test purposes.

Let's see how it progresses......

IF (and that is a BIG IF at this time) and the migration goes well, will consider the next steps, for example, where to host the docker image, etc. But I don't want to get ahead of the tips of my skis since we have no idea how the migration will go.

I may also consider porting over the legacy user avatars.... not sure about this yet.
These 3 Users Gave Thanks to Neo For This Post:
# 6  
Old 03-09-2020
Users imported... then another error:

Code:
importing users
   138120 / 138120 (100.0%)  [953 items/min]       
Creating groups membership...
	Unregistered_Not_Log
	Registered
	Users_Awaiting_Email
	_COPPA_Users_Awaitin
	Super_Moderators
	Administrators
	Read_Only
	Moderators1
	Banned_by_Moderators
	Advisors
	Supporter
	Bouncing_Email
	Elite_Member
	VIP_Member
	Signatures
	Recruiter
	Robots
	Novice_Users
	Event_Predictions_Ma
	Banned_User_IDs

importing top level categories...
        8 / 8 (100.0%)  [554 items/min]  in]  
importing children categories...
Traceback (most recent call last):
	5: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:942:in `<main>'
	4: from /var/www/discourse/script/import_scripts/base.rb:47:in `perform'
	3: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:84:in `execute'
	2: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:287:in `import_categories'
	1: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:287:in `each'
script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:289:in `block in import_categories': undefined method `[]' for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)

Try again:

Code:
root@localhost-app:/var/www/discourse# su discourse -c 'bundle exec ruby script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb'

# 7  
Old 03-09-2020
Work around for:

Code:
importing children categories...
Traceback (most recent call last):
	5: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:942:in `<main>'
	4: from /var/www/discourse/script/import_scripts/base.rb:47:in `perform'
	3: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:84:in `execute'
	2: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:287:in `import_categories'
	1: from script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:287:in `each'
script/import_scripts/vbulletin.rb:289:in `block in import_categories': undefined method `[]' for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)



Workaround (temporary?); Commented out this "buggy section" with :

Code:
if false

....
....

end

Now moving forward again:

Code:
importing children categories...

neo skipping...

importing topics...
      810 / 240477 (  0.3%)  [413 items/min]

Estimated Time to Completion (importing topics = threads only): 10 hours
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