# (Completed) Upcoming Forum Downtime - February 9th



## Jeremy (Feb 6, 2022)

*Update: This has now been completed. Thanks for waiting!*

Hello everyone, the forum will be down for an update *this Wednesday, February 9th starting at 8:30 AM EST*. We will be updating the forum software to *Xenforo 2.2*. This will be our biggest software update since moving to XenForo in 2020. Due to this and because of the large size of the forum, we unfortunately do not have an estimate for when we'll be back online. However, we will announce updates on our Twitter and, as always, our Discord server will be open to use for discussion in place of the forum.

You will probably not notice a large amount of changes on the front-end after the update, especially because we will wait to utilize some of the new features such as *thread types*. Thread types will allow us to use article-like threads in boards like The Bulletin Board and it will also allow us to better organize site suggestions in Bell Tree HQ. This and a couple of other features will be announced sometime after the update is finished so we have time to prepare them.

Features that you'll see right away include an update to the post editor and activity summary emails. *Activity summary emails* are emails from the site that will be automatically sent to you if you've been inactive for a period of time. They will summarize some of the popular discussions that you've missed across the forum. This is an optional feature that will default to the status of your "receive news and update emails" setting in your account preferences. After a while, activity emails will stop being sent if you remain inactive.

There will also be a lot of small changes here and there that you may or may not notice, including many bug fixes. As you may know, The Bell Tree is powered by XenForo and several XenForo add-ons, all of which will be updated at the same time. Even if things may not look too different, a lot of changes will be applied at once, so please bear with us if this takes a long time or if we need to work out any issues after we're back online.

In other more exciting and non-technical news, this update will also be taking place in the middle of a new TBT event. We will be starting a *Valentine's Day event tomorrow, February 7th*! This will be a small, standalone creative event that will reward collectibles and bells. Look out for that tomorrow and thanks in advance for being patient during our update!


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## xSuperMario64x (Feb 6, 2022)

I'm sure I'll be getting on the site a lot on wednesday just to realize it's still down lol  

can't wait for the valentines event though! i always love an opportunity to flex my creative muscle


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## Merielle (Feb 6, 2022)

Thanks for the heads-up on the downtime!  I'll do my best to make do without my TBT fix for a little while, ahahaha.
Also aaahhhh I'm already so excited for the Valentine's event; I can't wait to see what it'll be!  Last year's Valentine's event was the first one I participated in; I can't believe it's been a year already.


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## Midoriya (Feb 6, 2022)

Wooooo!!!  Looking forward to the event for sure.  I’ll be really busy on Wednesday with work, so don’t have to worry about the site going down as much.  Thank you guys for all you do.


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## xSuperMario64x (Feb 6, 2022)

Jeremy said:


> Hello everyone, the forum will be down for an update *this Wednesday, January 9th starting at 8:30 AM EST*.


you mean Feb 9th right?


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## BrokenSanity (Feb 6, 2022)

Thank you for the heads up! Better finish up doing some important things before the forum gets temporally closed for this update.
I'm really hyped to take part in that event hopefully I can get some bells and maybe there might be some adorable Valentines collectiables


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## Ichiban (Feb 6, 2022)

woo yeah forum update


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## Croconaw (Feb 6, 2022)

If it’s morning, I’ll likely sleep through the update. Thanks for the heads up, and I’m looking forward to the Valentine’s Day event.


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## Millysaurusrexjr (Feb 7, 2022)

o0o i'm excited for the valentine's event, I haven't participated in one on TBT before! Got my fingers crossed for a new gyroid collectible


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## DaisyFan (Feb 7, 2022)

Thank you for the update! I’m going to take a break from TBT on Wednesday hehe.

Valentine’s Day event is coming! I wonder what it will be...


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## xara (Feb 7, 2022)

thank you for the heads up! i’m back in school now, so thankfully my tbt-obsessed self will have a distraction. 

i’m super excited for the new event! i loved what you guys did for valentine’s day last year, so i can’t wait to see what ya’ll planned this year!


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## mouthrat (Feb 7, 2022)

thanks for the heads-up! i'm sure the new update will be wonderful! i just hope we aren't down for too long - tbt is my everything :')

as for the event, this is my first year on tbt, so i'm quite excited to take part in this one later today! <3 see you all soon :)


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## Antonio (Feb 7, 2022)

Honestly, I haven't been that active, so I'll definitely be active when the maintenance is happening because my brain is weird.


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## Mutti (Feb 7, 2022)

looking forward to the valentines event


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## ZeldaCrossing64 (Feb 7, 2022)

Can't wait for the Valentine's event!! I wonder what it's gonna be about? I haven't participated in an event before, so I'm excited to see what it's like! ^^


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## corlee1289 (Feb 7, 2022)

Woo-Hoo!

Another event to look forward to!


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## King koopa (Feb 7, 2022)

Thanks for the heads up, and the event seems really cool! I wonder if it will work like last year's where you made a card for someone else


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## Venn (Feb 7, 2022)

oooo Exciting! Can't wait!


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## Croconaw (Feb 8, 2022)

I’m liking the fun little event. I was lowkey wondering if we’d get a Valentine’s Day one. That Love Potion is a nice addition to the other potions! I’m actually surprised it’s trade-able since it is an event prize? I can only imagine how much it’ll go for, though.


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## bestfriendsally (Feb 8, 2022)

thanks for letting us know....   i'll try to remember about the mantainace ... :>

*although, that stinks... :< but i want to play pokemon snap & i don't play acnh much now, so it's fine :> *


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## mouthrat (Feb 9, 2022)

alright yall, the downtime is starting in a half hour or so, so i just wanted to wish everyone a good day and i can't wait to hear from you all after<3


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## Jeremy (Feb 9, 2022)

The forum is back online! Thanks for being patient and please let us know if anything seems like it's not working properly.

Edit:

We are currently aware that the "Accepted" reaction on the Valentine's Day event isn't showing.


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## tessa grace (Feb 9, 2022)

i'm glad all i had to do was sleep through it! things look so different!


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## Khaelis (Feb 9, 2022)

Ay, forum's back in time for the Nintendo Direct.


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## xara (Feb 9, 2022)

ah, nothing like some site maintenance to  show you just how tbt-obsessed you are LOL. the downtime wasn’t for as long as i was expecting, but i’m definitely not complaining — i missed you guys! 

i’m a lil shook that the “preview post” feature seems to be gone, but maybe now i won’t obsess over the structure of my posts as much lol.


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## Jeremy (Feb 9, 2022)

xara said:


> ah, nothing like some site maintenance to  show you just how tbt-obsessed you are LOL. the downtime wasn’t for as long as i was expecting, but i’m definitely not complaining — i missed you guys!
> 
> i’m a lil shook that the “preview post” feature seems to be gone, but maybe now i won’t obsess over the structure of my posts as much lol.



It's actually not gone! See "Preview" to the right. The difference is it changes the edit window to preview mode instead of adding the preview above it.


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## Croconaw (Feb 9, 2022)

Thank god preview post isn’t gone, lol. I’ll have to get used to the new post box, not gonna lie… it’s a bit weird not seeing everything at once for me. I’m so glad I slept through the forum downtime, though!


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## Paperboy012305 (Feb 9, 2022)

Soo, are they any new features that have been added?


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## Croconaw (Feb 9, 2022)

Jeremy said:


> You will probably not notice a large amount of changes on the front-end after the update, especially because we will wait to utilize some of the new features such as *thread types*. Thread types will allow us to use article-like threads in boards like The Bulletin Board and it will also allow us to better organize site suggestions in Bell Tree HQ. This and a couple of other features will be announced sometime after the update is finished so we have time to prepare them.
> 
> Features that you'll see right away include an update to the post editor and activity summary emails. *Activity summary emails* are emails from the site that will be automatically sent to you if you've been inactive for a period of time. They will summarize some of the popular discussions that you've missed across the forum. This is an optional feature that will default to the status of your "receive news and update emails" setting in your account preferences. After a while, activity emails will stop being sent if you remain inactive.



It’s listed in these two paragraphs… but it’s more small updates.
@Paperboy012305


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## Ichiban (Feb 9, 2022)

reply bar looking slick, i like it


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## Paperboy012305 (Feb 9, 2022)

Croconaw said:


> It’s listed in these two paragraphs… but it’s more small updates.
> @Paperboy012305


Oh, sounds good.

I still mourn over the death of the Album feature, hopefully that'll make it's comeback (With my photos I put in there before the Xenforo move) soon.


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## xSuperMario64x (Feb 9, 2022)

what happened to the reply bar lmao

i mean I guess it's still functional so yay new udpate!

	Post automatically merged: Feb 9, 2022

also love how most of the "similar threads" are locked


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## Alienfish (Feb 9, 2022)

Jeremy said:


> The forum is back online! Thanks for being patient and please let us know if anything seems like it's not working properly.
> 
> Edit:
> 
> We are currently aware that the "Accepted" reaction on the Valentine's Day event isn't showing.


Yeah I didn't see the free bells link but thanks for keepin' the site up


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## Midoriya (Feb 9, 2022)

I noticed that I have less followers and am following less members than before.  I’m assuming this is just because the new update removes anyone that doesn’t qualify as an actual follower or member you’re following.  It seems like this is affecting others as well.  I thought I had made a bunch of people upset/angry in the span of hours, LMAOOOOOOO.


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## Shipper-Girl-27 (Feb 9, 2022)

Lol I slept through this.


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## Franny (Feb 9, 2022)

Shipper-Girl-27 said:


> Lol I slept through this.


same, i was expecting to wake up and refresh the home page several times lol.

update looks good! i like the new text boxes here


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## Croconaw (Feb 9, 2022)

About the similar threads box at the bottom of each thread, I do like this feature. However, most of the threads are very old. If you’re not paying attention to the date, you could be bumping a very old thread. Still, it’s nice to see similar threads to look through.


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## Sheep Villager (Feb 10, 2022)

I've also noticed the Similar Threads feature is a bit wonky. I've been keeping an eye on it out of curiosity and most threads I see end up being from 2020 and not active since then. Especially bad when it sometimes pops up sales posts / giveaways that have long since concluded.  Not sure how hard it would be to implement, but maybe sales posts and giveaways should be removed from the pool of threads it can pull from.


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## Jeremy (Feb 11, 2022)

The Dodo Code queue feature is now fixed.


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## Croconaw (Feb 12, 2022)

I don’t know if this was always a thing, but I really like how you get a confirmation when content you’ve reported has been resolved. I’ve never gotten one of these before, so this is a nice add-on.


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## Chris (Feb 12, 2022)

Croconaw said:


> I don’t know if this was always a thing, but I really like how you get a confirmation when content you’ve reported has been resolved. I’ve never gotten one of these before, so this is a nice add-on.
> View attachment 429890


This isn't a new feature; you actually received this notification in error. I didn't realise that the update had changed our default settings in the moderation queue and they've since been reverted back. We typically only send resolution/rejection notifications when we need to communicate with the user(s) who reported the content.


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