News Item - November 11, 1998 12:44 PM I'm accepting questions for the up-coming Twinturbo.NET quiz to see just how astute members really are. The quiz will be 50 questions long. I'm looking for questions in 5 possible multiple choice questions or true/false/yes/no variety with the answer marked somehow. Only questions revolving around the Z32 iteself. Not lifestyle questions or other opinion/vagueness. I need 'proof' of the answers in the form of links in the Search section so I can verify the answers myself. All material will come from the archives so everyone has a fair chance at 'passing'. Yes, there are rewards at the end for those that pass. :-) I've gotten some really good ones submitted so far. If you would like to contribute, send questions and answers to quiz@twinturbo.net. Thanks! Greg fixed a couple bugs. There were a couple problems in the Search function with the follow-ups not matching the post. All fixed now for full ability to traverse the follow-up tree. Also slated are two 'surprizes'. One is waiting for approval, the other is on the drawing board waiting to see if it can be pulled off. Stay tuned! Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - November 02, 1998 12:30 PM There are some issues that need to be addressed concerning www.twinturbo.net: Security: There have been some questions raised about 'security' here. We have provided as much, if not more security than most programs you run on your computer. The security actually falls on the user. Just like ANY other program you run requiring passwords (like e-mail), if you leave it open & aren't in front of the computer, someone else can access the site as you. There is 1 exception, the 30 day login can allow your ID to be used by someone else visiting the site on a computer you've used with this option. This is why it's NOT checked during regular login. It's YOUR decision who/how access is gained. The site passes a 'cookie' containing a personalized ID code number to your computer. If you have 30 day enabled, this cookie lasts for 30 days on that computer. If you don't select that, the login expires when you close the browser window (just like e-mail). Now can the number be hacked? Sure, it's possible, anything is possible on a computer. Is it probable? No, not really. If you want to sit around all day & make fake logins... Remember the infinite number of monkeys? Vote to Delete (VTD): The VTD feature has become popular lately. We've raised the number of votes required to delete a post for a 'mob' check. To make sure there's not the same collection of people voting all the time. As Greg noted on the Main Forum, the VTD on For Sale was significantly lower total to delete. I based it on a percentage of usage. For Sale doesn't get as much traffic as the Main Forum, so a lower number was utilized. This number has been raised for a 'mob' check. There has also been some frustration over what gets deleted and what doesn't. We can look at the deleted messages afterwards to see what/why they were deleted. The messages fall into three basic categories: Flames, Chats & Non-Relateds. Flames: Malicious messages added to the forum for the purpose of generally pissing the members off. I.E. 'My <insert name of car here> can STOMP your <insert derogatory statement here> Z!'. This is what VTD was originally intended to remove. Even though there are multiple moderators watching the board, sometimes there isn't enough coverage. I know I take vacations every now & then (like this passed weekend & come back to see what's going on) & can't look at the board at all for a few days. :-( With VTD, the members could remove messages without the need for a moderator to remove the offensive post. Chats: Messages posted to gather people into the chat room I.E. 'Come to Chat'. These get deleted primarily because they are 'annoying'. The members I've heard from would rather the original poster delete their own message when they leave chat. It's time relative, not content realtive. Members are using the VTD to 'keep the board clean'. Non-Relateds: These are the messages that have nothing to do with 90+ Zs. If you want to know about Banjo playing in the Everglades, got to www.yahoo.com and do a search there. Please do not bother the rest of the list with this. If a conversation is going to veer off the Z topic (motorcycles & Zs seem to fit closely in a lifestyle sense), take it to e-mail. I realize there is a wealth of information to be gained from the other members on non-related topics, but please refrain from using this forum as a means to access that information. Personally, I made it for Z related discussion, & opt to keep it soley for Z related information, although I can't recall ever using the admin powers to delete a non-related message, I just VTD like the others have to. Once again it's members using VTD to 'keep the board clean'. Also someone mentioned the fact 'you don't even have to read the message to VTD it, just click on the Xs. Once the first X is up, it's a snowball effect.' Yes, we made it that way to counteract Flame posts in the quickest way possible. I'd much rather delete something that I can tell is BS from the subject line then having to wait to open the message & then vote inside. Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - October 27, 1998 01:44 PM WOW! Twinturbo.NET has cleared 200,000 hits on the site, 100,000 messages in the archives & averaging 11,000+ 'accesses' a day. Incredible! Thanks GuyZ & GalZ! Noticed a bug in the [ View Personal Posts ] you weren't able to view the follow-ups directly from the list. That's fixed now. We've got a couple new ideas on the burner right now, but time is tight for Greg & I, so production has gotten slow temporarily (hey, we have real jobs too :). Hang on tight, these next couple 'upgrades' will be pretty awesome! Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - October 20, 1998 07:48 PM Greg added a re-login window under Member Services for the multi-user computers... just go to it, enter your info & the cookie gets reset with the new (your) member info. Hope that helps Tim! :-) Also added a new navigation feature the [ View Personal Posts ] on the main forum. It lists all of your current posts & the responses to them. I always find myself just looking at my own posts for responses & then backing up to read the rest of the forum in an effort to save time. I think a lot of other people are having to do the same thing, so I added the new navigation tool. Greg is working on an advanced Member Directory search tool. It's pretty awesome! Search is back up and running... what a headache that was. Thanks for roughing it out with us. Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - October 08, 1998 08:02 PM Switched over to DNS from IP for cookies to work properly. Everything seems OK for the moment. Except for the forum deciding to cut it self off at some undesired length every now & again. :-( At least we have the backup working for us while we track down the problem, so all is not lost when it happens like before. Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - October 02, 1998 04:33 PM Transition to the new server was a little bumpy, but overall we feel very successful. The speed increase is very noticeable. The member profiles didn't transfer well & we had to fall back to roughly a month ago. We are also in the process of getting search set up. There's a LOT of messages that need to be indexed (over 91,000), so it might take some time. We also found a couple bugs in the first few days with the delete features wiping out the board. I apologize for any inconveniences. Not bad considering we totally swapped servers/harddrive formats (XFS to NTFS)/OSs. The DNS www.twinturbo.net has been switched, so all previous bookmarks are good again. Rides section submission is flowing along nicely, thank you to those that sent in everything as requested, it has made getting the pics post a LOT easier. For those that would like to submit, go here & read the directions. Also taking Link submissions at this time too, directions are with the Rides directions above. The Events forum is picking up speed. I'll make some revisions people have already taken into account... namely LOCATION (oops, forgot that one!). Along with the date window, I'll put a location blank in there, so we know if events are geographically accessable to us or not. :-) The Z32 FAQ is up, keep voting for the good stuff to be included! Don't forget about www.twinturbo.net stickers (address & info for those is below) & the printable flier. Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - September 28, 1998 10:03 PM Well, we're on the new server... here's a partial list of changes:   Vote to Delete / Vote to FAQ work properly now. A tag is left on the forum when a message is removed by the members. Rides Editor integrated w/ profile editor. No duplicates allowed... should prevent multiples of the same post, i.e. if you bang on the SUBMIT button it will only submit once. User directory has changed.  Profiles display rides page as well, if available. Directory only displays requested letter at a time. Should be much faster. Clicking a username inside a message now goes to the user profile instead of email.  Email can be accessed from within the profile. Events page is working and shows events in closest to furthest away order. Profile now accepts information for "Other Vehicle" if you are not currently a Z owner. Profile has entries for Home Page, Vanity Plates, Convertible. Stage and Year are now selection boxes instead of free-form to make things more consistent. Profile stages now have SGP checkbox and Plus checkbox to state a III+ stage for instance and if you are using SGP or standard stages. Viewing a User Profile also tacks their RIDES information at the bottom if they have a RIDES page. MODS are no longer limited to 1000 characters if you have a RIDES page. AND Last but not Least.... FULL Followup Trees are BACK! Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - September 03, 1998 07:07 PM We're concentrating our efforts on the new server, which is now up & doing 'forum' things (had 1 programming obstical we finally conquered, now it's off to the races). We are working on cleaning up (redesigning) some of the coding to make it more efficient, coupled with a dual 300 PII w/ 128M SDRAM. So far it rocks! Greg's also tweaking some of the member data stuff to make it a little more friendly. I've been working on several background scripts to make admin chores easier (an automatic RIDES updater) and some other SEARCH type navigation tools. So, nothing really to report on this server, other than we're getting ready to move, so hang loose! Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - August 14, 1998 05:47 PM With the new back-up script running every 2 hours, in a nice 24 hour loop, we're not worried about loosing the discussion threads currently happening. :) Also put the forum chopping script in there. I've been letting the forum grow out to a little bit in hopes of getting a couple days of messages displayed... We get so much traffic (not that we're complaining, we're glad you're getting use out of the forum) that the current set length wouldn't hold more than 24 hours & I've noticed a lot of reposts because the threads got chopped off too quickly. Twinturbo.NET stickers are still available in all colors except Carbon Fiber. Ordering details are below. I want to thank DavidS again for the sticker contribution to Twinturbo.NET! :-) Don't forget the Twinturbo.NET printable flier! Just load it on the screen & press print if you have a laser printer! We've had a couple folks passing them out already. Thanks MikeB (Houston) for putting it together! Written by Dallas DamonZ News Item - August 10, 1998 02:47 PM Appendix Z is up! :-) Thanks to everyone for contributing! If you have any additional info/changes, post them on the forum for further discussion. I've also finished a script that backs up all the important data on the forum every so many hours. Hopefully, this will avoid future situations like last Friday afternoon, where the forum got corrupted. So we won't have to re-populate the forum w/ messages & loose the current discussion. Don't forget your Twinturbo.NET window stickers!!! Silver is the most popular color so far. Ordering info is down below! :-) Written by Dallas DamonZ