Hi again! I just thought I'd share a couple things I came across while testing the import process on my test domain.
First, when I import files from DownloadsII I find that all files that are just links to outside sources end up as failure errors, even though they appear to appear correctly and list the links in the mirror correctly.
Second, and far more important, when you import your database from DownloadsII it creates a new file slot and upload for EVERY REVISION THAT FILE HAS EVER HAD. (Sorry for the digital shouting). Even if each entry links to the same file (and so far I have been unable to find a case where the entries link to different files) this created hundreds of duplicate mod entries in my vbDownloads database. It would probably be worth putting some kind of filter into your import script to only pull the latest version of a mod for import.
Next up, while the search function is very fast an effective, it has one glaring flaw in that it only seems to put results in a pop-up inside the window, and if you click on the link it will disappear. I'd rather see a nice search button that pulls up a page with all the results which you can then scroll through and click as many as you want. I'm actually rather surprised you don't have this. I suppose this goes under feature request though.
Next up is a feature request as well: I just want to be able to rename the Downloads Tab in a person's profile to something else, because right now it is identical to the Downloads Tab for DownloadsII. It's probably odd, but I'm going to be running both at the same time, and if the tabs are labelled the same it will get confusing.
Last thing for now that I've come across is that the Add Comment button is just a tiny link off to the side and is really not obvious at all. There should definitely be a nice big button when you open the Comments tab for a file that lets you add a comment right there. It would also be very useful to have nesting comments, so that when people do support requests or something they can be easily found and followed. Actually, I'd much rather see the comment system just straight-out integrated with the forum system, so people can subscribe to threads and search them. If you have to keep them separate, it would be nice to be able to changed the format of the automatically generated thread title.
Oh, and as a side question, does Adding a File as a Favorite mean you become subscribed whenever there is an update to that file?
For some background, I'm going to be launching this as my second file database in December, to coincide with the next game release for the game series my site follows (we host game mods). My DownloadsII database is too old to change without a huge hassle for changing all the links without some kind of automatic redirect system, and the current import system is just not effective enough to make it viable to make a full switch anyways. Thus, I'll be running both pieces of software at once, but I ran the import process on my test domain so I could have a full database of files to do tests with. I feel like this software is a great step in the right direction compared to DownloadsII (which gets almost no help and no updates period), but it's not quite to the point yet where you could honestly point to it and tell someone that it is better in every way from DownloadsII and completely worth the money for anyone who has the extra cash.
Thanks in advance for listening to all that. I listed it as a bug because I started with bug and then my list of things just grew from there.
First, when I import files from DownloadsII I find that all files that are just links to outside sources end up as failure errors, even though they appear to appear correctly and list the links in the mirror correctly.
Second, and far more important, when you import your database from DownloadsII it creates a new file slot and upload for EVERY REVISION THAT FILE HAS EVER HAD. (Sorry for the digital shouting). Even if each entry links to the same file (and so far I have been unable to find a case where the entries link to different files) this created hundreds of duplicate mod entries in my vbDownloads database. It would probably be worth putting some kind of filter into your import script to only pull the latest version of a mod for import.
Next up, while the search function is very fast an effective, it has one glaring flaw in that it only seems to put results in a pop-up inside the window, and if you click on the link it will disappear. I'd rather see a nice search button that pulls up a page with all the results which you can then scroll through and click as many as you want. I'm actually rather surprised you don't have this. I suppose this goes under feature request though.
Next up is a feature request as well: I just want to be able to rename the Downloads Tab in a person's profile to something else, because right now it is identical to the Downloads Tab for DownloadsII. It's probably odd, but I'm going to be running both at the same time, and if the tabs are labelled the same it will get confusing.
Last thing for now that I've come across is that the Add Comment button is just a tiny link off to the side and is really not obvious at all. There should definitely be a nice big button when you open the Comments tab for a file that lets you add a comment right there. It would also be very useful to have nesting comments, so that when people do support requests or something they can be easily found and followed. Actually, I'd much rather see the comment system just straight-out integrated with the forum system, so people can subscribe to threads and search them. If you have to keep them separate, it would be nice to be able to changed the format of the automatically generated thread title.
Oh, and as a side question, does Adding a File as a Favorite mean you become subscribed whenever there is an update to that file?
For some background, I'm going to be launching this as my second file database in December, to coincide with the next game release for the game series my site follows (we host game mods). My DownloadsII database is too old to change without a huge hassle for changing all the links without some kind of automatic redirect system, and the current import system is just not effective enough to make it viable to make a full switch anyways. Thus, I'll be running both pieces of software at once, but I ran the import process on my test domain so I could have a full database of files to do tests with. I feel like this software is a great step in the right direction compared to DownloadsII (which gets almost no help and no updates period), but it's not quite to the point yet where you could honestly point to it and tell someone that it is better in every way from DownloadsII and completely worth the money for anyone who has the extra cash.
Thanks in advance for listening to all that. I listed it as a bug because I started with bug and then my list of things just grew from there.
