NewMars On phpBB3

The actual home page was from thee days when most news an articles got posted for readers to find, This was also the case for Red Colony and even MarsDrive back in the day. It was not all about posting discussions without prompting. Even space.com and others that had forums or blogs did the same.

RobertDyck wrote: ↑Tue Mar 24, 2026 9:09 pm What's the long-term plan? We need a forum on a website visible to the public. This isn't just a small community chatting within our selves, it's supposed to be a resource for every Mars Society member. So again, what's the long-term plan?

For RobertDyck!
Thanks for logging in and for asking a great question!
At the moment, the Admins are in survival mode. Asking for a long range plan is a logical stretch from here.
***
I'd like to point out that the old model of being open to the Internet doesn't seem to be very practical. It is possible you haven't noticed, but I've been posting details about the number of spammers online when I perform the morning chores. We've seen hundreds and in some cases thousands of simultaneous spammers attempting to connect to our site. The Mars Society was putting up with that burden on their resources, but the straw that broke the camel's back was the attack upon the site above the forum. That site was hacked (as reported by Void) and no one was able to do anything about it due to work load. My guess is that when someone finally ** did ** look at the problem, they decided to pull the plug on NewMars.com. That site was a tagalong to Mars Society, and never publicized by Mars Society, for whatever reason.
***
I think that the new-mars.org site might be opened to the public, up to a limit of 50 simultaneous users. That limit might not seem as near as one might suppose, because we can authorize accredited members to connect by direct IP. That means there is no practical limit on the number of simultaneous users, if everyone is on the approved IP list, as you are. The new-mars.org/phpBB3/ site then becomes the pokey backup you'd use if you are in a coffee shop and connecting with your laptop (if you had a laptop).
***
The downside from my perspective is that it is time consuming to add a rule to the Azure configuration to allow someone to access the site. We cannot allow unlimited access to the Azure site. Hackers found that IP address and took the site down with only a few hundred logins. The reason for that is the limited disk space I can afford. Hackers can fill up the available disk space quickly, because Apache II tries to record every log in.
***
One thing that definitely will help right now, is activity on the site so that we keep the few folks we had active in recent times.
***
Thanks (again) for connecting and for posing such a valuable question.
(th)

James Burk is on this but I have not heard anything for the time table.

What's the long-term plan? We need a forum on a website visible to the public. This isn't just a small community chatting within our selves, it's supposed to be a resource for every Mars Society member. So again, what's the long-term plan?

Well! The Azure system is still running in March of 2026.

The FluxBB system is running well. There no incidents reported last week.

Microsoft announced closing of support for the Virtual Machine where this forum is running.

Since Microsoft has not closed the VM where we are running we will keep going a bit longer.

To prevent scammer activity taking down the site, only pre-approved IP addresses are admitted.

IP addresses are set using the VM control panel

(th)

Well! The Azure system is still running in February of 2026.

The FluxBB system is running well. There no incidents reported last week.

Microsoft announced closing of support for the Virtual Machine where this forum is running.

Since Microsoft has not closed the VM where we are running we will keep going a bit longer.

To prevent scammer activity taking down the site, only pre-approved IP addresses are admitted.

IP addresses are set using the VM control panel

(th)

tahanson43206 wrote: ↑Wed Feb 11, 2026 1:03 pm [51.4792N, 0.0000E] 02/11/2026, 13:00:02 Europe/London
Object: Mars (open sky map)
RA 21h 11m 10.0s Dec -17° 21' 34.4" Appar J2000
Mag: 1.08 (Estimated: JPL) Const: Capricornus
Sun Dist: 208,574,391 km [26.3 km/s]
Earth Dist: 353,851,908 km [56.2 km/s]

Daily Calendar data for Wednesday 2026/02/11
[51.4792N, 0.0000E] 02/11/2026, 13:00:02 Europe/London
Object: Mars (open sky map)
RA 21h 11m 10.0s Dec -17° 21' 34.4" Appar J2000
Mag: 1.08 (Estimated: JPL) Const: Capricornus
Sun Dist: 208,574,391 km [26.3 km/s]
Earth Dist: 353,851,908 km [56.2 km/s]

Martian Year:
38
Martian Astronomical Month:
8
Solar longitude Ls:
223.6
Sol number:
444

[51.4792N, 0.0000E] 02/11/2026, 13:00:02 Europe/London
Object: Mars (open sky map)
RA 21h 11m 10.0s Dec -17° 21' 34.4" Appar J2000
Mag: 1.08 (Estimated: JPL) Const: Capricornus
Sun Dist: 208,574,391 km [26.3 km/s]
Earth Dist: 353,851,908 km [56.2 km/s]

Daily Calendar data for Wednesday 2026/02/11
[51.4792N, 0.0000E] 02/11/2026, 13:00:02 Europe/London
Object: Mars (open sky map)
RA 21h 11m 10.0s Dec -17° 21' 34.4" Appar J2000
Mag: 1.08 (Estimated: JPL) Const: Capricornus
Sun Dist: 208,574,391 km [26.3 km/s]
Earth Dist: 353,851,908 km [56.2 km/s]

Well! The Azure system is still running in February of 2026.

The FluxBB system is running well. There no incidents reported last week.

Microsoft announced closing of support for the Virtual Machine where this forum is running.

Since Microsoft has not closed the VM where we are running we will keep going a bit longer.

(th)

Well! The Azure system is still running in February of 2026.

The FluxBB system is running well. There no incidents reported last week.

Microsoft announced closing of support for the Virtual Machine where this forum is running.

Since Microsoft has not closed the VM where we are running we will keep going a bit longer.

(th)