12 replies to this topic

[devilhunter]

The Forum is online again.

I think most of you will see the changes we implemented right away.
The Forge moved into the Gaming section which is now called the 'Porting Section'.

Inside there are now 5 different main categories:
- Game and Application Ports: All Wrapper /Games /Dos Ports /Applications can be found here now, just select this subsections of this section and you'll find the usual categories.
The Wrapper / Game Ports /Dosbox sections cluttered the main Page a lot, and it was pretty confusing for a lot of people.
Now everything's more tightly organized and logically structured.

- Work in Progress Ports:
All the 'Work in Progress' Ports can be found here. Everything that's not fully playable and get's a different Rank than 'Green' should be posted here /gets moved here.

- Porting Requests:
The Porting Requests Section got two new Categories, the Application Requests Section from the Forge and the  Port Graveyard / Re-Port Requests section, with which the Dead Ports from the Port Graveyaerd and the re-Port requests got merged. (why didn't anybody think of this sooner?)

- Ask for help!:
The Ask for help section is now splitted into Applications and Game related posts, but in addition there's the new 'Help Me I'm New' section.
This should be a blessing for all the new Users who got Information Overload and posted things like 'What to do now' or 'Help a noob' and so on.

- Emulation Corner
This got moved from the Forge, no big change.


The 'Your Language' section got moved to Discussions.


A few notes why we did this change:
The overall quality of the ports dropped quite a bit over the last few months, since many new users wouldn't stick to the Tutorials and forget to customize the Wrappers correctly or don't install the required libraries or applications to make them work better, or simply post Status Orange or Status Red Ports in the Game sections.
Now there is the 'Work in Progress' section where you can post the not so functional Games /Wrappers, (where others can help improve them) while keeping only fully playable stuff (Status Green) in the Games and Application Section.
This helps to raise the standard and the quality of the ports, while also making a new place for the experimental / barely playable stuff.
More info here and here.

How to Rate a Port as Green / Yellow / Orange or Red ?
Simply look at this Global Announce
(viewable at the top in every Section)


The other change we did was to introduce two new Porter Ranks, the Rookie Porter Rank and the Advanced Porter Rank.
Previously everyone was awarded a 'Porter' Rank once he or she posted a port in one of the Ported Games sections, but with this Rank you were not able to distinguish between beginners, inexperienced porters and porters who had already learned a lot and got more experience.
Everyone has been set to Rookie Porter for now, but in the coming days we'll make a new Topic where you can request an upgrade to Advanced Porter.
The requirement for a Rookie Porter is one posted Port, and for the Advanced Porter it's 7 Green (fully playable /usable) Ports.

[DankoB]

I like how the amount of games in "Our Latest Ports" was extended from 10 to 29 per page!

[BoomBox]

The WIP section is a GREAT idea.

Its a good place for collaboration, Much like an open-source project, just alot smaller.

Community love! :friends:

[SPQR]

Thanks for the info devilhunter!

[doh123]

Tika said:

hi
why all the forums are closed?

if you require a certain number of posts for access, it says so.... I deleted your spam posts... don't spam.

[d10sfan]

Forum looks even nicer now. Easy to navigate.

[Firsou]

I'm little bit new but from what I heard of the old forums.
It looks like there's been a lot of changes so, I guess I'd say thanks to the Team ^^

[eluminx]

i have to agree with ^^^^ i have never heard of this place before, but i am glad i found it.  Hopefully i can start to help out in anyway possible.

[vandalian]

Like what you've done with the place.

[RazorPro]

@Devilhunter, the forum looks great.  Were you the originally founder of this forum?

[devilhunter]

No, a friend of mine named loco started this Forum.
Later he had little time to keep up with it and there were some downtimes, but Korich, doc and me managed to put the site up again.