[Silver.T4R]

Yes I know this is the wrong section. But no posts in the site maintenance section get any attention. I've been on here since 2016 and there's a wealth of information on here, frankly all the FB pages which are far more usable then this site is reference this site for any tech info / FAQ's because of how valuable it is. I don't often post, as this site is hardly usable but throughout this last week I can hardly even access it anymore. 7/10 times I get a 404 error or it says that the server failed to respond.

I am posting this in this section in hopes that someone in here has been around long enough and knows who moderates / runs this site so that they can be contacted. With all due respect to the owners / mods too, if you genuinely don't care about this site can you please pass on your responsibilities to user who are active and care about keeping the site functional? This is primarily directed to whoever runs this site as mods seem to do a good job at removing spammers, but the software for years now has been a nightmare to post with and it now appears that this site is about to die as it's hardly even accessible.

It seems to me that with how many ads, sponsorships ect there are and with us users being responsible for this sites ad revenue and sponsor revenue that we have should have some say in keeping the sire going. Or be able to pass on the baton to those who at least care about it.

I know there are other forums but non have the treasure trove of info this site has it sure would be a shame to lose it.

If anyone knows who to contact it or has some meaningful info to provide to the discussion it would be much appreciated.

Sent from my Pixel 7 Pro using Tapatalk

[hoppyjr]

If a system upgrade is needed to speed it up, maybe the owner could post a donation page? I have appreciated the resources here and I’m sure others have too, so maybe we help out…..

[Silver.T4R]

Wanted to ad to mods / owner (not sure how this site is ran...) this post is by no means meant to be inflammatory. I get that life happens and interests change. It just seems like the owner / whoever is responsible for keeping things afloat should pass on the baton if they are no longer capable of doing so. I also would be happy to donate if need be to keep things running / make the software usable again. I've been reading other discussions and it seems as though the owner can no longer be reached which is unfortunate. I truly mean for this to be a constructice discussion in hopes of improving things and not out of starting drama ect.

Sent from my Pixel 7 Pro using Tapatalk

[Endlessblockades]

I have experienced latency and occasional DNS issues. I suspect the site software is probably a few (to be very generous) updates behind, but if you run a adblocker it is still pretty darn functional (but slow by current standards). I run uBlock origin on FF and the site works fine. I will turn it off from time to time or use a burner browser and click on a bunch of ads to support the site. I don't know if doing that is as helpful as it is to a YouTuber, but it can't hurt.

Edit - Actually the site IS a bit behind the times and they have recently made some hosting changes from Amazon/Apache to Cloudflare. I don't really know much about this stuff and I am probably just annoying the Owner/Moderator. It's all easy to find info.

Content Management System

vBulletin 3.8.11 (6.x is current)
65% of sites use a newer version

Server-side Programming Language

PHP 7.1.28 (8.3x is current)
81% of sites use a newer version

[19963.4lsr5]

I’ve noticed it too. It seem to have a better response today at least.

Plus one of the posts (seat bolt?) sat at the top for two days before I seen a new post.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Previologist]

Admin is active on the site, so we must assume he is ignoring everyone deliberately. I couldn't find a single moderator who has been active in the last 3 years, most have been absent much longer

Is there a problem with the forum? Slow, broken links, failure to load

[Pyral]

I cant remember this website being update in all the time I've been here. The site is working better than yesterday (yesterday being 1 day after outage). So that's good. I get it, servers like this are expensive.

Long term though, if this forum is to survive, it needs to improve so new 6th gen owners will choose it as their forum. A large reason I'm a member is there were already thousands of threads on 3rd gens, but that isn't the case with newer gen 4runners. So why would a 6th gen owner choose this site with its disgusting ads and archaic UI over another? They wont.

And if other forums have stronger communities for newer 4runners, this forum will be dependent on a steadily decreasing number of 3rd gen owners to survive.

I also wish that during the site maintenance they had an error page explaining it was undergoing maintenance. I didn't even know this forum had a twitter until someone told be elsewhere, so I didn't see the post.

[Moist]

I have noticed it too. Been having really poor performance loading this site (or it's just unreachable some days). Real shame I quite like this site. Good community.
If it is a hardware thing I think a good chunk of us would be happy to pitch in (I know I would). There's a huge wealth of knowledge on this forum would hate to see it go.
Could use a few improvements for use (like being able to upload images on desktop.)

[Endlessblockades]

Originally Posted by Moist

Could use a few improvements for use (like being able to upload images on desktop.)

Can you expand on that comment? Images can be uploaded from a desktop browser fairly easily if that's what you mean.

[Pyral]

Originally Posted by Endlessblockades

Can you expand on that comment? Images can be uploaded from a desktop browser fairly easily if that's what you mean.

I think he means upload images directly onto the forum. Whenever I post a photo on this forum I first have to upload it to an image host website like Imgur, then copy the image URL and paste it into the photo adder.

Some forums let you drag and drop the photos easy, no image host website. I'm bet the reason that isn't done here is it would cost a lot more to save photos too.

[AuSeeker]

Originally Posted by Pyral

I think he means upload images directly onto the forum. Whenever I post a photo on this forum I first have to upload it to an image host website like Imgur, then copy the image URL and paste it into the photo adder.

Some forums let you drag and drop the photos easy, no image host website. I'm bet the reason that isn't done here is it would cost a lot more to save photos too.

I have no problems uploading photos from my computer.

[pluton]

1. In order to see this thread, I waited about 20 seconds between clicking on the title and being delivered to the thread. 20 seconds is about 18 seconds too long.
2. To all those who can't learn how to post images directly to the forum: Please learn how...if I can do it... you can do it. All of your externally hosted images will be lost to the forum users when the image hosting service folds(inevitable)or you end your use of it (also inevitable.) PLEASE post directly to the forum so the images stay.

[brillo_76]

I did notice the forum was offline for a while it seems. I suspect changes occurred during that time as its responding again. Before that time for a week or so it was running kinda backwards. I even took a photo to remember the event.

[Previologist]

You can add images directly to the forum by using the attachment option in the toolbar. Most people will understandably try to use the insert image option, which only allows you to link offsite images.

[Endlessblockades]

As others mentioned you can upload directly from a desktop using the paper clip. I sometimes need to resize photos because the native photo size of current mobile devices can be too much for the forum to handle. I just resize everything to no bigger than 1400 pixels in any dimension. Uploading local photos will benefit future info seekers and not cause the Photo No Longer Available issue when a hosting service goes out of business or user moves on or whatever. This site is loading fine for me today. Def use an adblocker of your choce.