No matter how we proceed with a new RSC, the old/current forum IS going away forever in one month.

I'd like to see the possibility of the old forum available in a locked down location that only an assigned few can access.
I mean really locked down where only (for example) 4 people who can convert forum threads to PDFs can log into.

The tech section is relatively easy to move, the threads where we've all hammered out mods & procedures over the years are not.
If the old forum is locked up but a few people have access to, those people could take their time browsing through the threads, finding things that aren't in the tech section & turning them into how-tos & tech articles.

For example, where else could you find Dchopper's Raider 210 rear wheel conversion with all the details he posted?
Not in the tech section ... at least yet. How many others are there?

Maybe a time period established at new launch to request old threads be converted to non-editable PDFs for download.
Once we've hit a deadline for that or it looks like most of the usable info has been mined out for conversion, the locked forum could go down permanently.

Steve has already said he'd keep the data in his possession so if for some big reason it had to be referenced, it could be.

For all that matters, there's nothing stopping someone from starting to copy threads of intertest right now.
Anyone want to give this one a shot?
http://roadstarclinic.com/component/option,com_fireboard/Itemid,187/func,view/id,625860/catid,60/

BubbaK, Have you checked out Archive.org and their Wayback Machine? It's pretty awesome and a free service. I was playing with it last night but need to look into it more for archiving the entire site... That way everyone still has access to the old site as if it never went away. They just can't post or modify it.

Best of all, they use a web crawler to do it so it's fully automated and *they* host the files for posterity sake.

It's even cool just too take a trip back in time and see what the RSC used to be like in it's earliest days. I was surprised to see what the site was like back in June of 2004, when it first came on line; you get a feel for the vision Gram had originally created and how it's evolved over the years. There's a lot of content that I bet most of us never even knew existed.

Definitely worth checking out, even just for fun:

https://web.archive.org/web/20161127042231/http://roadstarclinic.com:80/

I also came across another service called PageFreezer, which even allows for the archived site to come up in standard Google searches, and after all, Google is how most of us ended up here. I believe there may be costs involved with that one so I'd need to look into it more as well... https://www.pagefreezer.com

That's pretty cool, I'd forgotten about those.

I think the best & easiest way to access old threads will be here:
https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://roadstarclinic.com/

I just went there and put in the clinic address & went all the way back to 2004.
Using their archived pages you can still follow links to other threads.
Off-site links are often dead but that would be the same no matter where those links are from.

It would be easy enough to have an archive link right on the front page or in the header of the new site.


Thanks Doc_V for bringing that one up!

Not all the threads are archived.

Doc

Yah, BK, if you notice, that's essentially the same thing I posted, just a different view using the calendar; however if you click on the links, they are not in the archive and have to be added. Unfortunately, it would take for ever to go through the entire site and add each page manually, so we need to figure out how to do in an automated fasion.

I'm not sure if the entire thing really needs to be archived.
How many "which oil ..." threads do we really need?

I agree, archiving everything isn't a realistic option.
I could see just linking to the webarchive site for referece.
If someone has already gone there and not found what they're searching for, they could request for someone else on the board to find the info by knowing about when in the timeline the info was posted.
Still a little clumsy but most of the threads anyone would ask for are buried in there somewhere.
It could also be done by any member who wants to help, not just a few admins.

I emailed both services today and will let you know what I hear back.

I like oil, oil is good,,, the archive.org route seems pretty nice but I would be concerned that it would go the way of photobucket........the only way to secure the DB is to own it IMHO...

Flashback wrote:
I like oil, oil is good,,, the archive.org route seems pretty nice but I would be concerned that it would go the way of photobucket........the only way to secure the DB is to own it IMHO...

If you check out Archive.org's whole reason for existence, it's to preserve a historical record of the internet for posterity sake. It's pretty *massive*. They are not in the business of making money, so I'm not too concerned about the Photobucket issue; i.e. some bigger company comes along and drives them out of business.