We immediately turned in a trouble ticket to GoDaddy, where we rent a dedicated Linux server. GoDaddy kept pointing the finger at us telling us we needed to optimize our database or that we had a poorly designed website. Completely disreagarding the fact that the website has been running for about 1-1/2 years. After going back and forth with GoDaddy for two weeks, they finally figured out they had an overheating processor and a failing hard drive.

Since we were planning a major facelift to the website by Jan 1, we simply pushed up that date so we wouldn't have to worry about upgrading it all again in a month. Our forum was the major problem at the time. The forum was based on Fireboard which is no longer in distribution, so the next step was Kunena. However, Kunena required us to upgrade several other components of our Joomla template. After much research we decided on phpBB3 which also allowed the "style" to be used from the homepage making it look seemlessly incorporated.

We had the Fireboard data completely backed up. However, there was a two step process getting it into phpBB3. STEP ONE: convert Fireboard to phpBB2, STEP TWO: upgrade to phpBB3 and use the built-in converter. Step one went without a hitch, Step two threw errors and we were never successful. The database structure is so different between phpBB2 and phpBB3 it would be impossible for a simple SQL Statement to pull it off. Nonetheless, it requires everyone to re-register and start the forum from scratch.

The shear time it has taken to reinstall this website has boggled my mind. The countless errors that have to be tracked down and resolved has extended the website from going online that we just said "GET IT UP" and then resolve it LIVE. So here we are...live, and the web pages are still being built. Can't say that this is my favorite thing to do, but it is one of my duties. I would certainly love to be working on Shooting Tips and visual effects. Thank goodness we're on a rerun cycle.

Gary Baughman
Best of the West