The AUSubaru.com.au Forums

Okay kids, so we need to overhaul AUSubaru.com. We need people to help with the following:

1) Main website - HTML, PHP, SQL, Design, Image Editing

2) Members Rides - seek out members to do a writeup on their cars including pictures and/or videos -> 89rsturbo

3) Buildups/Projects - seek out members in the middle of ( or just completed ) a Buildup or Project to write up a journal including pictures if possible. -> LightningSilverRX

4) (Technical?) Howtos - write up technical howtos on any subaru related subject from Spotlight wiring to Sand Driving. Xtreme_RX & Suby Wan Kenobi

5) Technical Manual - work on the technical manual, seek out members to add to it. Find posts with information that should be in there and move the info across. Xtreme_RX & Suby Wan Kenobi

6) News - jaffa he hasn't volunteered yet, but seems to be good at collecting news type stuff

7) Backend Team - stinky, BVP, Peejay - not sure exactly what we need to do here yet, so we can all contribute in the other sections as well.

Right now I'd rather not go back to a CMS system, we didn't do too well with php-nuke, I want to explore other options. There are a few CMS-ish modules for VBulletin which use Forum posts as data source, I'm thinking of using something like that. That way pretty much any aspect ( Tech howto, Members Rides, News, etc ) can just be a forum which makes entering data etc super easy.

Please reply with what you'd like to help with. Including stuff that might not be on the above list.

I'm willing to do technical how to & technical manual.....

I can do anything as long as I don't need to do any sort of code.

I can do just about anything on the list except design, I just have no artsy fartsy flair for it

At the moment I'm pretty tied up with other projects but I will still lend a hand where I can.

If we're talking complete site overhaul may I suggest the CMS Joomla, it's very modular and customisable, and can be incorporated with OSC (same online shop as coffeeguy) and I'm pretty sure there's a vbulletin bridging plugin.

Both Joomla and OSC are fairly easy to customise, mostly with CSS and some basic PHP and HTML.

And they're open source so we can keep the costs down.

Jordan.

ill help out with memberes rides if you like stinky? you have a pm

I can do database/php stuff.

One more vote from me to use Joomla. I've actually had to write a component for work and I was impressed with how easy it was!

Wind me up point me in the direction you want and off ill go

I've updated the first post with what I think is a pretty good start for jobs and who to do them. I've created a Sandbox Forum. I'd love it if the people listed can use it to write up templates and examples of what they're doing.

Eventually Each item will get it's own forum and somehow those forum posts will be put on a/the front page.

Paul I have mentioned this to Brett before, as most of you probably know word on the street is that the BYB site is only for old school subarus and offroading, we all know this isnt the case but is probably one of the contributing factors to the boards gradual decline and is probably something we need to address before its too late. Maybe we need more Liberty, outback, forester and WRX orientated stuff, perhaps a good camping section where we can swap ideas, camping spots, trailer setups and any other camping related stuff. I never really like segregating the states either.

If there is anything more than being a moderator you think I can do to help out just let me know.

Dane (VincentVega) should not be overlooked as a good candidate for the back end team aswell.

Lightning Silver RX (Barry) perhaps could have his own spareparts section kind of thing as he can source quite a a lot of handy parts,tools etc at great prices and has a lot of knowledge in this area. Maybe a whole page with a list,pics and prices of items available.

These are just ideas so feel free to add to them or shoot them down if ya want to.

Cheers
Grant

this site used to be The place to discuss lift kits...however with the well known censorship episodes theres been a bad taste......
There used to be a section "lift kits" once ?
some pple described their diy efforts too...
You know, open discussion (maybe as long as not defamatory) in the long run
benefits even if it hurts sometimes......

The site needs to indicate discussions of newer vehicles too, dunno if you want to section it like usbm olde/new gen vehicles

What happened to "Trip Reports" ?

one other thing, er just a feelin, I don't find this site as compelling anymore....??
maybe because it does have the same sort of look/feel of usmb?

Link to tech manual needs to be more prominent....always need to go searching for it...

hope this is seen as "constructive" criticism.....

hmm..i should finish some things started in the tech manual...so heres criticizing meself

what sort of indo do you need of want for hte news... ill happily help out on the site even if i am designated something to do...

Cheers Justin

I agree, with fredsub, I never really liked the usmb feel, I understand that we moved to VBulletin for security reasons and that it has been paid for, so we're kinda stuck with it, but maybe we could at least find a different skin/template for it, thoughts?

Jordan.

Lets get the graphics people onto a new template then!

i agree with fredsubs comments.
but also i reckon that splitting the states up is good- it lets us plans trips etc tha no one else would be interested in.

It is interesting to read about trips, doesnt matter which part of the country they are in.

fredsub wrote:this site used to be The place to discuss lift kits...however with the well known censorship episodes theres been a bad taste......
There used to be a section "lift kits" once ?
some pple described their diy efforts too...
You know, open discussion (maybe as long as not defamatory) in the long run
benefits even if it hurts sometimes......

The site needs to indicate discussions of newer vehicles too, dunno if you want to section it like usbm olde/new gen vehicles

What happened to "Trip Reports" ?

one other thing, er just a feelin, I don't find this site as compelling anymore....??
maybe because it does have the same sort of look/feel of usmb?

Link to tech manual needs to be more prominent....always need to go searching for it...

hope this is seen as "constructive" criticism.....

hmm..i should finish some things started in the tech manual...so heres criticizing meself

It is seen as constructive and I agree with pretty much all of it.

Trip reports disappeared because there seemed to be no interest in it. Stacks of people liked to read it but next to none of them liked to write it. I have posted up many times asking for people to submit trip reports or "my car" reports so I can put them on the web site and never got one.

Use www.thebackyardboys.com and you don't have to search for any thing. Image hosting, tech manual, links etc are all there and hopefully going to be ugraded.

As for the lift kit thing, I couldn't care less what you talk about on here about kits. Any manufacturer can be talked about and I will gladly talk about all but one. Nothing difficult there.

What a lot of people don't realise is that this board was built by BYB lift kits basically. So, talking about other lift kit builders is kinda like going to a Holden forum and talking about Fords really.

The lift kit section can be brought back if people want it.

ok so a my car peice... what would you want to be included... kinda like in the members ride section? or it there a template to how this interview should happen? ill happily fill it out..

Think of an article in 4x4 australia or some thing like that. It is up to you what you want to say about it.

ok as im them members ride man what the plan was ill will do a detailed artical of my car this weekend and post it up so that way people wiil have an idea of what to put down, also i can post pics if anyone wants to i have some webspce just sitting there...

cheers
bryan

http://www.ausubaru.com/coppermine/
You can host pics here on our own webspace.