MDGarcia Posted February 20, 2023 Report Share Posted February 20, 2023 Hello everyone! This will likely be the final year of Ad Astra in its current form. Even though there's a really nice group of people developing for eFiction (after many many years of abandonment), we've made the decision to move the site to OTW-Archive, which is the same application that AO3 uses. Furthermore, instead of using AO3's preservation feature, we didn't want to abandon the community for AA entirely by simply being absorbed into a much larger writing community. It runs counter to the vision of Ad Astra. So, over the course of this year, we'll be working on building a new server and deploying the software. Testing is going to take a really long time as we figure out the load of the new application under stress, as well as evaluate security issues, as well as a bunch of other needs to look after in the long term. We're getting really helpful advice from people with practical experience that will assist us in avoiding the pitfalls of administration and maintenance, but we're going back to school on this and it'll take some time. In short, the goal is that by this time in 2024, we'll be fully on the new hardware/software. As we move in that direction, @SLWalker and I will be making periodic updates on progress. We're not asking for any monetary assistance at this time; it's early days so the cost is nominal for right now and well within our budget. If you have any questions, concerns, or wish to have your curiosity sated, feel free to reply and one of us will respond with info. Thanks for your continued support! MDg 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gibraltar Posted March 11, 2023 Report Share Posted March 11, 2023 Glad to hear that we've got a plan moving forward! I'd noticed some site-security issues lately, with people I'd directed to Ad Astra not being able to connect to the site due to what looks like a security certification lapse. Is that something that this new move will fix? Many thanks to Mike and SLWalker for all your work keeping this amazing place up and running. - Gibraltar 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MDGarcia Posted March 13, 2023 Author Report Share Posted March 13, 2023 Hey, welcome back! Short version is yes, it'll be fixed when we move to the new application. Long version is that eFiction is horribly broken and it's been in "development" by three different people over the last six years with little to show for it. The last real update we got was back in 2013-2014. Unfortunately, it means we can't make any changes to the site for fear of breaking it, and also I think when we upgraded the environment for security purposes, it broke eFiction's ability to secure itself somehow. We just need to move away from abandonware. MDg 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
