NYSkiBlog, HTTP vs HTTPS and the Future

TL;DR:

• If you get messages saying "the page you are using isn't secure" don't worry too much about it.

• We are trying to move to a new forum in the future, you may have to re-register.

• 8 years of forum content won't be integrated into the new forum, but we will provide links to it.

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Last summer we did a big update to NYSB moving the website to a responsive format, so that it works much better on mobile devices.  That was half the job.  The forum remains on an old, outdated and largely unsupported platform.

My goal was to find a way to migrate the forum database from the existing Nabble database to WordPress to preserve the existing content in a seamless way. This is not a simple task, which is why it has take so long.  I really want(ed) to do this.

I learned last night that this is far more complicated than originally thought.  The estimate I have now is 15-20k with no guarantee that the result will be success. Clearly that is not happening.

The only solution will be to go the new forum software without a migration, essentially starting over.  It's likely that we will provide links to the old content, but you will not be able to post there. Not ideal but it is what it is.

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The other issue is the move to HTTPS.

In the "old days" URLs all looked like this:

http://example.com/

When people started to buy things online a "secure" protocol was developed, URLs that were secure looked like this:

https://example.com/

The "s" stands for secure. On https pages, data is encrypted before it is transmitted. This makes it much harder for someone to steal your credit card info.  It was normal to build most of a site on HTTP, but credit card submit pages on HTTPS.

In the last few years, Google decided that EVERY page on every website should be encrypted/HTTPS. Google has a simple way of enforcing their will. They say that if you don't do what they want, they won't show your website in search results.  That gets people to act.

More recently the BROWSERS (Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer) are getting on board. Now when you move from an try to move from an HTTPS page to an HTTP page you might get a message like "you are moving to a page that isn't secure."

You have been using HTTP pages for years so I wouldn't be too concerned about this. For example Alpine Zone is still on HTTP. (Never enter your credit card on an HTTP page).

We are going to move the website to HTTPS in the next few days.  (We tried last night and failed, you might have noticed the site was down.) There are some problems with this.  Some of our very best weather maps aren't HTTPS so we may lose them. But there really is no choice.

NABBLE (the forum) is on HTTP and they seem to have no interest in moving it to HTTPS.  It seems that now is the time to bite the bullet.

Our plan is to start a new forum on WordPress and provide links to the old content. It is likely that when you access that old content you will get the "security warning."

It is my hope to get this done in the next 4 weeks. Not sure, but it may require those who want to continue to be members to sign up again. That remains to be determined.

Thanks for the info Harv it helps .

I tried several times last evening to access the forum and was put onto the Word Press site which frankly was baffling , not knowing what was going on .

This feedback from you explains the situation . Thanks and good luck with the conversion and hey as far as transferability of old threads , comments etc .........hey it is what it is and could be a GOOD thing hahahaha

warp  

Thanks for the info --- never knew what/why I would get that message from time to time once again proving how educational nyskiblog truly is

MC will go crazy not being able to show us his search skillZ

I'm changing my name to Sense Member

Given what you mentioned about the upcoming end for the Nabble interface and that the existing forum will be put on ice, I'd like to save the formatted TRs I've posted over the years so that they don't disappear into the ether -- what do you recommend?

Or will you be saving forum content to an archive that will keep them in their current format -- but you won't be able to post anything to them in the future? (that would work for me)

Ha! I thought I assumed I was the only one who cared about his TRs.  There is actually a way to save them. It's a bit manual, and not perfect, but I am going to make the effort.  Maybe you will too.

If you copy and paste your entire TR into a new thread in the new forum they should display, WITH PICS as long as Nabble lives.  There will be no (EASY) way to save all the comments.

Your images would disappear if/when Nabble goes to forum heaven in the sky.

My awesome developer tells me that there is a "pluggin" that allows us to move images over to WordPress (the new forum) without having to reupload each image.  Apparently it can be done with one click. Well, it would be one click per TR I think.

As admin, I would probably have to do it for you.  I'm going to do it for my TRs, probably NEXT summer.

In the meantime there will be a link to the old TR forum (actually all forums). There is a bit of a risk of not doing it right away because if Nabble disappears before you use the image pluggin, you will loose your images or have to re-upload them.

FYI Nabble is SAYING that there is a path forward: Nabble will be migrated to a new experimental platform called BLASMA. I want to be out of Nabble's grip as they are just a couple of guys and if they were to get hit by a bus tomorrow, Nabble would be gone.  WordPress is the largest website platform in the world now and it's unlikely to go anywhere.

In other news, Earl Barker, the guy who provides the awesome snowfall maps, responding quickly to my request and is now provide secure URLs (HTTPS) for all his maps:

https://gribco.verio.com/gfs/WINTER_GFS0P5_SFC_ACCUM-SNOW_144HR.gif

https://gribco.verio.com/gfs/CONUS_GFS0P5_SFC_ACCUM-SNOW_144HR.gif

https://gribco.verio.com/wrf/N-EAST_WRF_SFC_ACCUM-SNOWFALL_48HR.gif

https://gribco.verio.com/gfs/EUROPE_GFS0P5_SFC_ACCUM-SNOWFALL_120HR.gif

These will now live on. Very cool!

Yesterday's downtime was an attempt by Nabble to take the forum to HTTPS. It was a fail, but I am encouraged that they are trying. During the summer is a bonus.

Nabble pushed HTTPS last night and it's working, sorta. Finding several bugs, button that don't exactly work.

When you hit reply to a post it seems like nothing is happening because it doesn't return you to the completed post. Also TOPICS View seems to be broken.

Sorry for the inconvenience, working with them to try to fix it.  Seems like they only work in the wee hours though.

Harvey wrote

Nabble pushed HTTPS last night and it's working, sorta. Finding several bugs, button that don't exactly work.

When you hit reply to a post it seems like nothing is happening because it doesn't return you to the completed post. Also TOPICS View seems to be broken.

Sorry for the inconvenience, working with them to try to fix it.  Seems like they only work in the wee hours though.

Do you mean clicking on a Topics icon to see the list of threads with the most recent posts?  Working okay for me right now.  Tried it before and after adding a couple posts.

EDIT: adding this post worked fine.  Didn't work for the other two posts.  Meaning I didn't see the new post right after clicking on Post Message.

They reverted back to http until they can figure it out. At this moment if you are having issues try clearing cache.

Yeah the Topics button still not working actually no response when hit it

Hoser wrote

Yeah the Topics button still not working actually no response when hit it

It is reported to Nabble and they are indicating they are on it.  Should be working now, at least until we try again.

Fixed on IE on Desktop.  Not fixed on iPhone.

Not sure how to clear cache on an iPhone...

Harvey wrote

Not sure how to clear cache on an iPhone...

“Settings-“
“Safari-“
“Clear history & data-“
If you want to check to make sure it took, scroll to the bottom of the same menu to “Advanced” and “website data”. If you cleared it, it should just show zero history. If it didn’t clear there’ll be a list of web addresses.

We are trying to go to HTTPS again today.  If you see issues please report them here.

I found one already, the "last post" links weren't working.  It has been addressed with a temporary hack.

Harvey wrote

We are trying to go to HTTPS again today.  If you see issues please report them here.

I found one already, the "last post" links weren't working.  It has been addressed with a temporary hack.

I usually click on the time stamp that is the link to the last post in a thread from the Topics listing.  Doesn't work. Is that what you were referring to?

marznc wrote

Harvey wrote

We are trying to go to HTTPS again today.  If you see issues please report them here.

I found one already, the "last post" links weren't working.  It has been addressed with a temporary hack.

I usually click on the time stamp that is the link to the last post in a thread from the Topics listing.  Doesn't work. Is that what you were referring to?

Yeah. It wasn't working, we made a change and now it is working for me. Maybe clear cache?

Are you using Safari? Working for me in Chrome and Firefox but not Safari.

I’m in safari and the last post isn’t working from the forum main page. If I hold down I get the “open in a new window?” And it works that way. Switching between threads within a sub forum seems to work how it’s supposed to.

Harvey wrote

marznc wrote

Harvey wrote

We are trying to go to HTTPS again today.  If you see issues please report them here.

I found one already, the "last post" links weren't working.  It has been addressed with a temporary hack.

I usually click on the time stamp that is the link to the last post in a thread from the Topics listing.  Doesn't work. Is that what you were referring to?

Yeah. It wasn't working, we made a change and now it is working for me. Maybe clear cache?

Are you using Safari? Working for me in Chrome and Firefox but not Safari.

Yes, Safari 11.1.2.  Can use the timestamp link to open in New Tab using Command-click.