Although 4.4 is not out of beta yet, the drafting of version 5.0 has begun. This is going to be a major overhaul and I'll go through some of the things to expect.

1) Currently each board creates it's own table in the database, and another table to store each user's last viewed time for that forum. This leads to some problems with keywords and also on sites with a large number of boards. This will be combined into 2 tables. 1 table for all boards and 1 table for all last viewed times. Indexing will be used so it won't make a difference on performance but will make the whole system more reliable.

2) An API. This will have small, quick functions for adding users, adding messages, changing passwords and a few other things. This will help tie the program in with existing sites.

3) Possible user table alteration. This might be split into 2 tables. One for preferences with the Key being the Username, and one for just the Username and password. I'm not positive about this one, but it will be mulled over. The goal is to help tie the program in with existing user databases. Again, this is one isn't for sure.

4) Updated administration. More ways to search for users, more information displayed for the users. Also, admins and moderators will have links within the front end for changing a user, closing threads, keeping threads, unkeeping them, etc. Basically instead of being forced to go to the administration area to do some tasks, you will have the option while viewing posts or users.

5) Many of the feature requests will be coded in. Options to let users specify their own passwords at registration, options to allow users to post under a username (will look something like JoeBlow(Anon)), print page screens, and most of the smaller feature requests that have been asked for.

There will probably be more but this is a good basis on what will be going on.

Target date is the new year. The original coding of WWWThreads with SQL integration started at the first of the year, and now that I've had time to learn more there are a lot of things that need to be changed.

When 5.0 is released the 2 tier pricing will probably go away. This has made it very confusing for some people as to what license they need, and also has made some people get a personal license when they clearly should have gotten a commercial one. So, there will be one price. The price will be either $200 or $250, currently it is $200 for commercial licenses and we will be working with an outside company to get a better idea of what to charge. The most will be $250 per license.

Also as a side note, there needs to be alot better documentation on how the program works, administration, features, etc. So if anyone is interested in taking this on we will trade $600 worth of licenses for good documentation. This can be either personal or commercial licenses, or a mix of both. If you are interested in this then you can send me an email with a sample of any documentation you have done before or your writing skills. I don't want everyone to work on it only to realize they did it all for nothing, so send me an email and you will be notified if you are chosen for this.

Any questions or suggestions about version 5.0 can be posted on one of the forums below that fits.

---
Scream
<A HREF="http://www.wcsoft.net" target="_new">http://www.wcsoft.net</A>