Simple Machines Community Forum

Simple Machines => News and Updates => Topic started by: Norv on April 02, 2012, 07:52:31 PM

Title: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Norv on April 02, 2012, 07:52:31 PM
In order to help focus development with the next generation of technologies and the best way to help evolve forum software, the SMF team would like to announce that we will be ending all support for our SMF 1.0 series software as of December 31, 2012. SMF 1.0 was released to the world in December 2004 and has been supported for more than eight years.

Anyone still using a 1.0 release should investigate migrating to SMF 1.1 or SMF 2.0, which will continue to receive support for the forseeable future. We highly recommend a migration to our 2.0 series as updates for the 1.1 series is limited to security updates only.

These days, the SMF 1.0.x line is very outdated, even though it still receives security patches. Hardly any sites still use it, and we rarely if ever receive support requests for it. Since it is almost completely irrelevant to SMF users these days, we have decided to recognize that it has reached the end of its working life, and put our effort towards other things that are more useful to our users.

Please note:
We will continue to support the SMF 1.1.x and SMF 2.0.x lines for as long as there is a significant need for them in the community.


For more information, please see:

Regards,

Simple Machines Forum Project
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Looking on April 02, 2012, 07:56:40 PM
Time to upgrade! I've been upgrading client sites and haven't done my own, looks like this is the message to get started!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: 青山 素子 on April 02, 2012, 08:20:03 PM
Quote from: Looking on April 02, 2012, 07:56:40 PM
Time to upgrade! I've been upgrading client sites and haven't done my own, looks like this is the message to get started!

Wow, someone is still running 1.0 in production?
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: CountryLady on April 02, 2012, 09:29:23 PM
Wise plan, N. N. Onward and Upward into the future of SMF and it's heirs.

Thanks to all who worked with SMF 1.0 and in so doing led us to SMS 1.1 and SMF 2.0.

Good Work, Team!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: agridoc on April 02, 2012, 11:08:28 PM
I started SMF with 1.01 about 7 years ago after testing several forum software.

SMF was releasing security fix patches for 1.0 until recently. This shows the respect for users and their choices.

BTW how about a Timeline page showing the history of SMF versions?
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: SleePy on April 02, 2012, 11:21:28 PM
aaah... You where supposed to end it on the 21st of december!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: ApplianceJunk on April 02, 2012, 11:27:39 PM
Quote from: SleePy on April 02, 2012, 11:21:28 PM
aaah... You where supposed to end it on the 21st of december!

Yes, all will be coming to a end then. ;)
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Matthew K. on April 03, 2012, 12:29:22 AM
Quote from: SleePy on April 02, 2012, 11:21:28 PM
aaah... You where supposed to end it on the 21st of december!
Yeah seriously, I thought that was the plan :P
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Deaks on April 03, 2012, 01:22:47 AM
shame we didnt post on Sunday :P
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Aleksi "Lex" Kilpinen on April 03, 2012, 01:33:10 AM
Quote from: Labradoodle-360 on April 03, 2012, 12:29:22 AM
Quote from: SleePy on April 02, 2012, 11:21:28 PM
aaah... You where supposed to end it on the 21st of december!
Yeah seriously, I thought that was the plan :P
Thought so too...
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Crip on April 03, 2012, 05:54:11 AM
I received an Email..?

SM 1.0 is very popular even to this day , some refuse to Update 2.0 .. just my 2¢..
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Aleksi "Lex" Kilpinen on April 03, 2012, 06:05:36 AM
Quote from: Crip on April 03, 2012, 05:54:11 AM
I received an Email..?

SM 1.0 is very popular even to this day , some refuse to Update 2.0 .. just my 2¢..
You are now confusing 1.0 and 1.1.

We are continuing to support 1.1.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Norv on April 03, 2012, 09:39:36 AM
Quote from: ApplianceJunk on April 02, 2012, 11:27:39 PM
Quote from: SleePy on April 02, 2012, 11:21:28 PM
aaah... You where supposed to end it on the 21st of december!

Yes, all will be coming to a end then. ;)

Yes, I'm no fun, isn't it? ;D

But hey, look at it the other way around: after 21st it won't matter anyway!

Quote from: agridoc on April 02, 2012, 11:08:28 PM
I started SMF with 1.01 about 7 years ago after testing several forum software.

SMF was releasing security fix patches for 1.0 until recently. This shows the respect for users and their choices.

BTW how about a Timeline page showing the history of SMF versions?

You mean, including patches? Theoretically all information that such pages would contain exists publicly already... but they're not systematized this way. We could do that, if it's useful - and it probably is. Our archives are quite messy otherwise. It's good you can filter them, for the rest, there's nothing clear about the SMF releases in there, when and what type of release that was.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: agridoc on April 03, 2012, 02:18:07 PM
Quote from: N. N. on April 03, 2012, 09:39:36 AMTheoretically all information that such pages would contain exists publicly already... but they're not systematized this way. We could do that, if it's useful - and it probably is. Our archives are quite messy otherwise. It's good you can filter them, for the rest, there's nothing clear about the SMF releases in there, when and what type of release that was.

Maybe a SMF versions Timeline is something for the Docs Team. I don't believe is something that is needed but something that would be good to have. It needs quite some search to be made, after that maintaining would be easy.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Fustrate on April 03, 2012, 10:15:00 PM
We've tried to get our history together in the past, but I don't recall it ever going anywhere. Every once in a while, a team member steps up to do it, then gets caught up in other things :P
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: gisfreak on April 04, 2012, 12:38:33 AM
Quote from: SleePy on April 02, 2012, 11:21:28 PM
aaah... You where supposed to end it on the 21st of december!

same thought ,  ;D
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: sharks on April 04, 2012, 12:10:37 PM
I'm still using SMF 1.1.x across more than a dozen live forums and it's working very well, and with all the custom paid modifications that i have invested into it, which are unfortunately not compatible with SMF 2.0, i don't see myself upgrading to 2.0 any time soon. So, thanks a lot to SMF for keeping up the updates for 1.1.x. Actually, on my daily cyber trekking, i've seen more 1.1.x forums than 2.0.x but maybe it's just me.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Suki on April 04, 2012, 01:06:47 PM
Just to clarify, the end of life is for SMF 1.0, not 1.1.x.

1.1.x will still receive support.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Matthew K. on April 04, 2012, 01:15:11 PM
@Suki - Sharks understood that, which is why he said thanks for keeping it supported :)
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Suki on April 04, 2012, 01:18:35 PM
I know, it wasn't directed to him, just a general reminder, that's all.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: GravuTrad on April 06, 2012, 09:26:30 AM
It was time. Thank for this information Norv. ;)
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Apllicmz on April 06, 2012, 06:50:43 PM
Thank for this information
Done
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: weekend camper on April 07, 2012, 01:18:46 AM
Wow, hard to believe its been that long already since 1.0x.

Kudos to the past and present team members for supporting it this long.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Owdy on April 07, 2012, 05:48:12 AM
Good.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0.x
Post by: MrPhil on April 07, 2012, 09:39:10 AM
You know what's going to happen now... word is going to spread that SMF 1 is end of life, confusing and panicking everyone running on 1.1. I would suggest that in any announcement or posting regarding this that you always say 1.0.x, rather than 1.0, to make it absolutely clear that it's not all of SMF 1 that's going away. If you don't, stupid/careless people will drop the ".0" part of it (after all, we learned in math class that 1 == 1.0, right?).
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Norv on April 07, 2012, 10:42:44 AM
MrPhil, I actually expect that some confusions may happen no matter how well we explain it. Which is why the wording and even formatting of the announcement, the wiki pages, and other details. If they're not enough, I think that, sure, we can continue to refer to it as 1.0.x, as additional care (although I think I've seen references meant to 1.1.x written as 1.0.x, too, I'm afraid). I have actually intently postponed this announcement, the start of the 1.0.x end of life timeline, to long after 2.0 release, for the same reason. There were proposals to start making this step then or around that time, but IMHO that would have likely been much more confusing: back then people were understandably wondering anyway what changes for older versions, and there were also some problems (i.e. there was an issue on the mod site accepting submissions) that we have fixed meanwhile. I think the probability of confusions between the old 1.0.x and 1.1.x would have been much higher, than today.
In addition, meanwhile we have also released patches to the SMF community for all 3 versions in current development support. (1.0.22, 1.1.16, 2.0.2)

IMHO, part of the cause of confusion is that people may have forgotten 1.0.x even exists, if they knew it at all, for years. That's a fact which makes quite unavoidable a number of confusions. Strangely enough, it means that the precise fact that it's not popularized at all for a long time, is not helping. :)  (it's not even mentioned on the downloads page for years, although we're always continued to patch it too, and it is present on the patches page (http://custom.simplemachines.org/upgrades/).)
Perhaps it would actually help if all versions, 1.0.x, 1.1.x, and 2.0.x, are mentioned on the main downloads page, at least until December 2012, the actual EOL of 1.0.x.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 11:59:28 AM
I mentioned a TimeLine for SMF after I had explained in another place that 1.0 is different than 1.1, my answer in better format



Dec. 2004: SMF 1.0 Final
Dec. 2006: SMF 1.1 Final, 2 years after 1.0 Final.
June 2011: SMF 2.0 Final, four and a half years after 1.1 Final and just nine monts ago.

As there is no yet any public Beta version of next SMF version, support for SMF 1.1x will continue for quite some years.


It's true that there was confusion in persons with experience.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: MrPhil on April 07, 2012, 01:47:59 PM
I appreciate that people who have been around for a while know the difference between 1.0.x and 1.1.x, and that the former is EOL. However, unless you're very careful in how you designate it, (e.g., "1.1x" in just the previous post), there will be untold confusion between the two. Considering that most people just say "1.x" or "1.1x" and are very sloppy about whether they mean 1.0.x or 1.1.x, I think it behooves official SMF pronouncements to make it very clear that it's the 1.0.x branch that's EOL.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: 青山 素子 on April 07, 2012, 02:21:26 PM
Quote from: MrPhil on April 07, 2012, 01:47:59 PM
I think it behooves official SMF pronouncements to make it very clear that it's the 1.0.x branch that's EOL.

I thought the original post made it quite clear. You're never going to get around the fact that some people just won't read or are stupid.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Fustrate on April 07, 2012, 02:38:48 PM
Quote from: 青山 素子 on April 07, 2012, 02:21:26 PM
Quote from: MrPhil on April 07, 2012, 01:47:59 PM
I think it behooves official SMF pronouncements to make it very clear that it's the 1.0.x branch that's EOL.

I thought the original post made it quite clear. You're never going to get around the fact that some people just won't read or are stupid.

On top of that, you'll never avoid the reality that people just won't read or are stupid.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 10:12:44 PM
Quote from: 青山 素子 on April 07, 2012, 02:21:26 PMI thought the original post made it quite clear. You're never going to get around the fact that some people just won't read or are stupid.

That's rather too much. I have seen clever people be confused. I believe a main reason for this confusion is that it took four and a half years to go from 1.1 Final to 2.0 Final. Even more than a year before Dec. 2006 many SMF installations started with some 1.1 RC or Beta version. So, many didn't even know of 1.0x existence or that 1.0 and 1.1 were different versions.

A polite, informational approach is better IMO.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: 青山 素子 on April 07, 2012, 10:58:42 PM
Quote from: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 10:12:44 PM
I have seen clever people be confused. I believe a main reason for this confusion is that it took four and a half years to go from 1.1 Final to 2.0 Final.

The length of time 2.0 was in development shouldn't have any effect on the ability of people to read. The original post specifically recommended upgrading to the 1.1 or 2.0 series. If people read that and still somehow confuse 1.0 and 1.1 then they would have to try and figure out why there is a recommendation to upgrade to a discontinued version.

Heck, even if 2.0 was released 1 year after 1.1 and the latest SMF was 5.0 or something significantly high, the same people would still be confused. Frankly, I think even if a huge announcement that 1.1 was still being supported was included at twice the size of the other text, you'd still get the same confused people.

Quote from: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 10:12:44 PM
Even more than a year before Dec. 2006 many SMF installations started with some 1.1 RC or Beta version. So, many didn't even know of 1.0x existence or that 1.0 and 1.1 were different versions.

And some people will have used vBulletin 3.x and started at that version and not really know (or care) that there was a 1.x and 2.x before that.


Quote from: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 10:12:44 PM
A polite, informational approach is better IMO.

Given the original post specifically stated that 1.0.x will be discontinued and that 1.1 and 2.0 are suggested upgrade paths I feel that was more than polite and informative. The first post has now been updated to include bolded areas and a bolded line about 1.1 still being around, but I'm sure there will still be the same people who either don't understand or don't read that will get all confused.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 11:26:47 PM
You are absolutely right about reading, "too much" was for "stupid".

It's a fact that most will see the title and might give only a glimpse at the introductory message. It's the same for headings in newspapers and banners or marquee text in TV news. They can be occasionally or intensionally misleading. This fact must be considered.

A title rename from "End of life of SMF 1.0" to something like "End of life of SMF 1.0 - SMF 1.1 support continues" might prevent quite some confusion. Not all but most. A pleonasm maybe but might be useful.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: 青山 素子 on April 07, 2012, 11:39:50 PM
Quote from: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 11:26:47 PM
A title rename from "End of life of SMF 1.0" to something like "End of life of SMF 1.0 - SMF 1.1 support continues" might prevent quite some confusion. Not all but most. A pleonasm maybe but might be useful.

At that point, you're going to be writing paragraph-long topic titles and people won't read those either.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Norv on April 07, 2012, 11:45:47 PM
I think both points are right, if I may interject. :)

motoko,
Indeed, I admit I would be a little wary to change the official announcement too much, to the limit of informality. Perhaps there are other ways to address, even better, the expected amount of confusion. (I really think a certain confusion is understandable considering the context).

agridoc,
Where do you think a simplified timeline like the one you suggested would be better placed? We could do it in the wiki, not sure if it will have enough visibility though. If you'd like, please feel free to make your suggested timeline as a page in the wiki, and let me know where it might be, in addition, welcome as content of a page on the site.
Some location very easy to find, I'd think, to be able to be both found by people and pointed out by us when needed.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: agridoc on April 08, 2012, 12:33:36 AM
Quote from: agridoc on April 03, 2012, 02:18:07 PMMaybe a SMF versions Timeline is something for the Docs Team. I don't believe is something that is needed but something that would be good to have.

As I have written TimeLine is something for the Docs Team. As I see it, in About SMF (http://www.simplemachines.org/about/smf/) a comment and a link for the TimeLine page.

The TimeLine page, again as I see it, might be added either as a Navigation option in About SMF or in SMF Wiki in Miscellaneous.

About making it, to be honest, I rather prefer to give my two cents with something like How to convert to UTF-8 (http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=472777.0). However, if accepted and a discussion is started by the Docs Team I will try to be useful, if I can.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Robert. on April 08, 2012, 04:42:48 AM
I think this is very good news. Great news, team! :)
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Angelina Belle on April 09, 2012, 05:03:53 PM
Thanks for this announcement, N.N.

It is always difficult to know the BEST way to explain something like this without confusing people.
I hope we will be able to help people understand that "1 point zero" versions are being declared obsolete, while "1 point 1" versions will continue to be supported.

This is a nice indicator that our development team is turning its attention to future versions. I am really looking forward to it!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: karlbenson on April 14, 2012, 02:59:42 PM
SMF1.0 may have been ahead of its time.  But sadly now it needs to follow IE6 into the long grass.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: MrPhil on April 14, 2012, 08:38:53 PM
Quote from: agridoc on April 07, 2012, 11:26:47 PM
A title rename from "End of life of SMF 1.0" to something like "End of life of SMF 1.0 - SMF 1.1 support continues" might prevent quite some confusion.
On the contrary, the first time I read that, it sounded like "End of life for SMF 1.0 through SMF 1.1"! Be very careful with your wording. Thus my earlier suggestion for just saying "1.0.x" and leaving it at that.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Daniel15 on April 14, 2012, 09:09:11 PM
What about a title of "End of life for SMF 1.0 (not SMF 1.1)"?
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Fustrate on April 14, 2012, 11:11:56 PM
Let's just leave it as it is and correct anyone who worries out loud.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Antechinus on April 14, 2012, 11:30:21 PM
ZOMG! It's the end of SMF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: live627 on April 15, 2012, 12:01:26 AM
lol
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: MrPhil on April 15, 2012, 09:01:27 PM
Quote from: Daniel15 on April 14, 2012, 09:09:11 PM
What about a title of "End of life for SMF 1.0 (not SMF 1.1)"?

I'm - not - dead - yet!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: TheMortician4 on May 05, 2012, 07:34:20 PM
Once all the mods I am running are supported under 2.0, I will migrate to that version, toooooo many mods and investment into where we are which started with 1.1.9 up to 1.1.16.


GO SMF....!!!!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: 青山 素子 on May 05, 2012, 07:53:41 PM
TheMortician4, SMF 1.1 will still be supported for a bit, so you don't need to worry too much
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Kevin Paquet on May 31, 2012, 09:57:13 PM
Hi there,

It's been a long time since I used SMF - I have since ventured into blogging as Social Networks such as Facebook, Twitter et al have killed my target audience (young adults) interests in forums.

Really great to know that SMF still has a huge user base and gets frequent updates. SMF was the first PHP software I've got in touch with - my first tool in creating something online. Makes me reminisce those good ol' days!

Keep it up!
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Aleksi "Lex" Kilpinen on June 01, 2012, 12:03:36 AM
Strangely, it seems to me that in the grand picture of things, facebook and twitter are not actually competition for forums much. Forums still have their own place and a dedicated userbase, who may still take advantage of other social media on the side though.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Kevin Paquet on June 01, 2012, 10:55:21 AM
Quote from: Aleksi "Lex" Kilpinen on June 01, 2012, 12:03:36 AM
Strangely, it seems to me that in the grand picture of things, facebook and twitter are not actually competition for forums much. Forums still have their own place and a dedicated userbase, who may still take advantage of other social media on the side though.

I guess it depends on the theme and the target audience of ones' forum. Mine was supposed to have teenagers get connected and all, but Facebook and Twitter ultimately killed the show for me. (Philippines is one of the most-Facebook and Twitter addicted countries)
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: MrPhil on June 01, 2012, 11:31:15 AM
I'm sure most kids view the concept of a "forum" or "blog" as a quaint anachronism, something like a typewriter or a telegraph. As (if?) they mature, whether they come to see forums and blogs as useful, or stick with FB/TW and their descendants, remains to be seen.

Is there a clear distinction between a forum and a blog? With most blogs apparently accepting submissions from others, rather than being written by one person, what's the difference? Has "blog" expanded to include the concept of "Forum" (now there's an ancient term, referring to something from the Roman Empire!).
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Arantor on June 01, 2012, 01:01:40 PM
Well, generally, a blog is a roughly equivalent to a single forum board, with additional meta information captured per topic than a forum would normally.

But essentially, a blog can easily be attached to a forum, but it is much harder to go the other way around.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: karlbenson on June 04, 2012, 02:57:00 PM
BBCode is also antiquated these days.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Arantor on June 04, 2012, 02:59:09 PM
It might be antiquated but how else would you do, say, footnotes or the more complex (and informative) style of quoting in regular WYSIWYG as opposed to having the useful shortcode style that is bbcode?

(In fact, such things as bbcode are so antiquated, WordPress has support for very similar to it for just that reason. Look up 'shortcode' on WordPress' site...)
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Fustrate on June 04, 2012, 03:45:50 PM
I'd still like to have a Markdown (http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/) option in future versions, for when you don't need all this fancy-schmancy stuff.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: MrPhil on June 04, 2012, 07:48:25 PM
Quote from: Fustrate on June 04, 2012, 03:45:50 PM
I'd still like to have a Markdown (http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/) option in future versions, for when you don't need all this fancy-schmancy stuff.

Well... there's still markup in-line with the useful text. Whether it's Markdown, BBCode, HTML, Wiki, or something else, there's still markup codes. I see that Markdown can get rid of some explicit markup tags through indentation, line breaks, and list markers, which is good. I guess that's what you like about it. Short of a WYSIWYG system that doesn't permit explicit tags (a la Word), I don't think we'll ever completely get rid of tags. For multiple author projects, I suppose you could permit "any of the above" (just as long as it's one at a time). Rather than imposing a single system on everyone, let them use what they're comfortable with (perhaps changing to a tagged markup internally). Let's not discuss how much this will bloat the code...  :o
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Masterd on June 10, 2012, 11:42:10 AM
It was about time to make this decision.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: MidasBalaa on June 13, 2012, 05:36:29 AM
SMF 2.0.x is the best. Looks really good
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: Angelina Belle on June 14, 2012, 09:07:28 AM
Thanks.  And remember, the SMF 1.1.x line will still be supported until further notice.
Title: Re: End of life of SMF 1.0
Post by: 青山 素子 on June 15, 2012, 03:51:20 PM
I propose that this topic be locked. It's been open for comment long enough.