Saving Stuff

No, not physical stuff. TMF stuff.

In the upcoming change to new board software, it appears that most of TMF board history could be lost. Recent posts here at Improve The Fool indicate that only posts from this year may be migrated to the new boards, and only for currently open boards. Boards that are now closed will not have any posts migrated. Indications are that the old boards could be taken completely down in the next month or two.

So a great deal of history seems to be at risk.

I have started saving posts that are important to me on my own computer. My approach is to look for posts I want to save, then view the whole thread. From there, I simply select the whole of the page (ctrl-a for windows, apple-a in that alternate universe) then copy it (ctrl-c). Then I switch to my word processor and paste everything there. I make each thread a separate document. Yes, there is a fair amount of excess info doing it this way. But it is quick and easy. Should I ever want to do so, I can clean up the excess later. Right now, the important thing is to save information.

I’m keeping things organized by creating a folder for each board and saving the thread in the appropriate folder. I’m naming the document with the thread title and date of the first post in the thread.

I highly recommend that if there is some posts or threads on these boards that is important to you, save them now.

I may also consider reposting some of them in the new boards. We’ll have to wait to see if that is necessary or desirable. Or discouraged. But at least I’ll have some info to work with.

–Peter

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