News:

Simutrans Sites
Know our official sites. Find tools and resources for Simutrans.

Simutrans forum: enabling Tapatalk?

Started by Caspercom, July 10, 2010, 11:09:31 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Caspercom

There is this service called tapatalk that enables forums to be accessed through a mobile application. I own an iTouch myself and I would really appreciate it if this forum would be enabled to be accessed through the application. They have made apps for iDevices (touch, iPhone and iPad), Blackberries, Androids and Nokia phones. Forum enabling is free and the app comes in a free and a paid version (free version is read-only). The service is compatible with SMF 1.1.x, so that shouldn't be a problem. For more information you can check out their site: http://www.tapatalk.com

Question: Could the forum owners enable tapatalk to make sure the forum is accessible through mobile devices? Because viewing the full version through such a small screen isn't very comfortable.

60% of all people on forums have witty signatures. Copy this if you like cookies.

Zeno

#1
Nice app but not compatible with WM... meh! >:(


Btw, if this means modifying current SMF config/setup, it will be difficult that it ever gets installed here, because it would make forum upgrades and mantainance more difficult for very few worth in exchange :S

Isaac Eiland-Hall

These already exist:

http://forum.simutrans.com/?wap

http://forum.simutrans.com/?wap2

http://forum.simutrans.com/?imode

The reason we are very very hesitant to install plugins for the forum is as Zeno said: When I first started hosting the forum using SMF, I installed a lot of plugins. But the problem, as with so many things that have plugins, is that when one updates, the plugins so often aren't updated... And, we had major troubles with the forum - we were unable to update it - twice, I think that happened. And SMF must be kept reasonably up to date, as exploits are occasionally found for automated attacks.

So, unfortunately, it is extremely unlikely that I would consider installing a plugin...

But before I definitively say "no", what do you think of the three links? They're all different, so each is worth a try...

Caspercom

Ok, thanks anyway. I'll try those links and see if they are useful then.

60% of all people on forums have witty signatures. Copy this if you like cookies.

vilvoh

I've tested them and the bad news is that all options are text only versions of the forum, not so bad if you just want to read the post contents but any of them show the images.

Escala Real...a blog about Simutrans in Spanish...

Ashley

Use Firefox? Interested in IPv6? Try SixOrNot the IPv6 status indicator for Firefox.
Why not try playing Simutrans online? See the Game Servers board for details.

kalapadago

Hey, isn't there any 'mobile mode' already integrated in SMF? Well I noticed that some vBulletin boards are mobile ready -- your view is simplified, but the images are still viewable -- even with spoiler boxes. I myself travel a lot. And a lot of those times when laptops aren't practical to carry, I just access the full site using my phone's browser. :)

HDomos

I also use the full mode on my phone on a weekly basis... Just to see whats happened when i'm going home or in university when i'm bored :D But it's not the best solution as it needs a lot of horizontal scrolling, zooming, etc...

Fabio

I regularly read the forum (e.g. Right now) using my Android phone.
Opera mini browser displays it pretty well.

Fabio

Today I tried enabling Tapatalk support... I would appreciate any feedback on the matter.

Quote from: Isaac.Eiland-Hall on July 10, 2010, 03:20:50 PM
The reason we are very very hesitant to install plugins for the forum is as Zeno said: When I first started hosting the forum using SMF, I installed a lot of plugins. But the problem, as with so many things that have plugins, is that when one updates, the plugins so often aren't updated...
I think things changed a bit over three years, and I noticed many major forums use Tapatalk. Also, being a professional service, I expect it's going to be kept rather up-to-date.
It's also worth notice that Tapatalk went free of charge for normal users recently.

Isaac Eiland-Hall


sdog

#11
I'm not very happy with using apps like tapatalk. As i find their business concept extremely unethical. It also is tedious with commercial non open apps to find out what the intent is.

However SMF is such a pain on a mobile device...

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

sdog

Somehow editing my post didn't work in tapa, sorry for double posting:

Apropos updates SMF here is 5 patches behind. One of those supposedly closed the hole that was used to hack SMF's own forum and retrieve the user database.

Fabio

And why should I care about their intent? Their offer their base service for free and without nagging ads. Pragmatically, it's most of what I care about.




I will see when I have time to upgrade, if no other admin is faster...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

sdog

Quote from: Fabio on December 10, 2013, 09:51:42 PM
And why should I care about their intent? Their offer their base service for free and without nagging ads. Pragmatically, it's most of what I care about.

Quite a lot of apps out there are made with extremely malicious intent.

It appears their business model is to provide the app for free, to get a user base and reknown, and sell an app toolkit to others who want to "monetize" their visitors. Ie building tapatalk-like apps specifically for a certain forum. Now that's something which is not very ethical, but there is a clear busniness plan visible that does not rely on **** over the users that use tapatalk directly. They'd probably lose reputation if they didn't play fair, but ultimately, we don't know what they are up to however, and with every comercial app put ourselves at risk of being "monetized" by someone.

Afterall, we're sending the forum messages through their system, and they would be able to do terrifying things, like doing semantic analysis to gain marketable data. For example about brand awareness, user preferences, consume paterns and so on.

I've had to do (research regard to their job offers) with a company that creates app-frameworks, and provides data analysis tools for their customers. When you read what they are offering, you really really get sick.

Quote
I will see when I have time to upgrade, if no other admin is faster...

Upgrading a content management system, as a forum software also is, is i suppose, a big pain.  Thank you (pl.) very much of taking care of it.

Also, re-reading my previous message, it sounds rather ungrateful. Which i am not, i see how tapatalk makes the forum much easier to use. Forum software is sadly lagging half a decade behind recent technology*, else it would make tapatalk completely superfluous. Good new html works on any size.

*also, no blame, most are open source projects, with volunteers working on it.

Fabio

Yes, they build branded builds for a price.

About data analysis here my opinion in short: a decade ago, most web pages had ad banners, 80% of which related to various degrees of pórń. Since google ads revolutioned the market, most ads shown when I'm on the net are related to fields I am interested in, sometimes they're even useful. I don't care much for ethics, but I like dámn better the new model.
Interestingly enough, mobile ads are much dumber and, guess what, they're 60% pórń and 39% gambling...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

An_dz

With a little CSS the forum can be fixed for mobile.

IgorEliezer

#17
Quote from: An_dz on December 11, 2013, 12:42:54 AM
With a little CSS the forum can be fixed for mobile.
¬¬'

What An_dz can't do?

Quote from: Fabio on December 10, 2013, 09:51:42 PM
I will see when I have time to upgrade, if no other admin is faster...
I tried once or twice, but I was too afraid of breaking something so I stopped at the 1st step... considering my knowledge is limited to usability not covering the bowels of net stuff. *hands up*


An_dz

Quote from: IgorEliezer on December 11, 2013, 12:44:28 AM
¬¬'

What An_dz can't do?
Well, I can't play a guitar. :) And get great grades in Calculus. ;D

sdog

Tubas are way cooler anyway.
Passing grades are enough, calculus is a tool.

Ves

Due to not being able to create new topics on the forum, I post in this related thread instead..

I have noticed that now since a month or so I have not been able to acces the forums using Tapatalk anymore.
It tells me there is a network error and (get_config) in parantes.

An_dz

I think I fixed this, but there are still some random bug about IPv6.

THLeaderH

I cannot still start a new thread, from IPv4 network.

---------

Ouch, I posted this message by mistake but cannot remove. Sorry for that.

Vladki

I still can't open simutrans forum via tapatalk at all.

Vladki

Now the simutrans forum completely disappeared from tapatalk

Ters

The forum apparently hasn't been working for anyone the past days, and certainly not for me. Either tapatalk caused it, or it has nothing to do with tapatalk at all.

Ves

The Simutrans forum has completely been removed from the tapatalk app, even when searching for "simutrans". It appeared in the search results for a couple of days, but is now invisible.

I have noted another forum (xplane.org) that started to behave strange on tapatalk (no pictures where showing) and that forum is now completely gone from tapatalk. Now they apperently have removed the support for tapatalk because of "tapatalk software is horrible" (according to this thread: https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/forums/topic/129912-tapatalk-and-this-forum/&page=3)

I know tapatalk have had lots of updates recently with "random" (and IMO unnecesary) features and I guess this in some ways might be the cause of this interruption, I hope that this forum can keep support for tapatalk, as that really is a help for mobile phone users.

Isaac Eiland-Hall

Quote from: Ters on October 09, 2019, 08:37:34 PM
The forum apparently hasn't been working for anyone the past days, and certainly not for me. Either tapatalk caused it, or it has nothing to do with tapatalk at all.

Troubles with the new server. Apparently one of teh things I installed made the server very very very unhappy. Am working on getting it fixed, but disabled it. So no blame on Tapatalk.

Also, it seems that adding the shared IPv6 address to sites (finally starting to be supported by cPanel) caused some difficulties - prissi couldn't access the forum at all. So I've removed that for the forum account (also Japanese SMF account).

Maybe Tapatalk thinks the site is down, too? :(

Ters

You managed to quote a post I made that I can't even see myself! It is on the recent post listing, but I can't see it here. The reply number on each post shows no gap where my post should have been.

Mariculous

Quote from: Ters on October 09, 2019, 08:37:34 PMThe forum apparently hasn't been working for anyone the past days, and certainly not for me. Either tapatalk caused it, or it has nothing to do with tapatalk at all.
It's post #25. I can see it :/


I also couldn't access the page for a long time yesterday afternoon/evening.

An_dz

Thanks a lot for fixing the forum Isaac.

Isaac Eiland-Hall

Except the likes, at least.

The new server we're on is faster, but it's definitely been a difficult journey with unexpected problems. This time one of the largest has been that one Wordpress site has been HAMMERING itself with a request for a file that doesn't even exist. I think that was the most severe problem so far. :|

Ters


An_dz


Isaac Eiland-Hall