Locking Down A 1.1.21 Install

[Sockratease]

Hi.

We are running an old 1.1.21 Version of SMF on our main site.

There was a lot of custom work done there by our old admin and that is why it was never upgraded.  Too much would have been lost.

So after a 12 year run we decided to close our original site and make it an Archive.  Our New site is open on a very similar url and currently in beta testing using the newest SMF.

But we are not sure how best to convert a live site to a read-only archive.

There are many member groups and blocking all posting and private messaging for each group would be possible, but tedious.

Some members asked if they'd lose access to their PMs once we locked down.  I'm not even sure we can stop logging in by existing accounts, but if we want to allow access to old PMs by existing members who may have missed our transition, it may be best to allow them to have their access  (the mods for downloading PMs are not easily compatible with 1.1.21 and even if they were, no guarantee all old members will see it in time before we lock down - assuming we choose to forbid logging in should that be possible).

Any advice on this process would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance for your guidance 

[Arantor]

Unfortunately the best way really is to strip all of the permissions for posting. In the case of PMs, read and write are separate permissions, so that's easy enough.

What you can do is set up one group with the barest minimum permissions and then use the 'set other groups like this one' in permissions to apply the same permissions. Not sure whether that holds true for local permissions on a per board basis, but certainly if you don't have many per-board permissions set up, that should work.

There are ways to do it directly in the database but unless you actually need to do it that way, it's better to avoid touching it directly.

[Sockratease]

Thanks for the fast reply!

I was thinking along similar lines, but forgot about the  'set other groups like this one' feature   

That will simplify things greatly.

Many thanks.