I've noticed for quite some time now that really helpful threads that could serve as information for years and years become pretty much useless overnight due to the images within becoming broken as the server they're hosted on decide to prune through old uploads. I'm sure most of you have encountered this. I can't count the number of times I've been frustrated by searching for something and finding numerous threads that seem to be what I'm looking for, but upon looking at that thread, finding nothing but text and broken images. The worst part is knowing that the exact pictures I'm looking for are now replaced by "This image is no longer available" or a lovely red X.

I've also seen people flamed for not searching prior to making a new post; so I go ahead and search for whatever that person is looking for and while I do find plenty of threads, the images are broken, deeming those threads useless and justifying new threads regarding that topic to be made again (or bumping 4+ year old threads).

I saw one thread in here regarding this but it only seemed to be about stickys and no further solution: https://www.evolutionm.net/forums/si...nt-theads.html

I understand EvoM allows for images to be uploaded and I myself use this feature. It's great to just be able to upload on here and then picture link to those URLs. Not sure why not many others seem to use this way.

Anyways, I just think it's a shame that EvoM relies so heavily on third-party hosting. Given how long EvoM has been around, a huge library of information has been built for the Lancer/Mitsubishi community. However, much of this library has been ruined by such broken images. It would be nice if EvoM wasn't dependant on anything but it's own servers. So we all can be sure that when searching for information, any threads we venture to will have all images intact because they are hosted here. Being able to go back to how-to threads from 5 years ago with all images still available would be awesome (and very helpful). Same goes for old topics about "what does ___ look like on an Evo _" and "any pictures of ___" and the list goes on.

I'm not aware of who manages this forum, so I'm not sure if features to fix this problem can be implemented. It is possible that upon a topic creation, the forum will automatically take the links between any [ img ][ /img ] tags, upload and save that image to the local server, and switch the link inside the [ img ][ /img ] tags to the new EvoM ones. It's really not all that difficult (sounds more difficult than it is), and I've even done it myself to my own PHP projects. Or I'm not sure if there is a vB mod someone already made that does anything like this or makes uploading easier/more convenient (adding the functionality that people like about third-party hosts). But again, I don't know who's admining the forums. The alternative non-script way would be to either recommend or require members to start using the upload feature. It's already there, just not used.

Or if anyone has any better suggestions that would be great. I just didn't want to post a rant without giving any potential solutions.

So yeah, in a nutshell having EvoM rely upon nothing but itself in terms of venturing back and looking for information/images would be a huge plus. Thanks for reading!

 

Hi!

We appreciate your comments and suggestions. You've made some very good points as site content ranks very high in value to our community. Your suggestions make sense, however, the problem has always been the volume of data that would need to be stored. The site owner (Internet Brands) has the ball on storage. They own around 90 automotive related sites and any decision concerning self storage would have a large impact on system capacity and cost.

As far as plug-in's etc. to 'auto house keep' images and links, I'm not aware of any add on features, but I'll ask our IB team to review your post and offer any info they have concerning VB updates etc. Thanks again.

Bob..