How to access posts on old board

[dennis_burke]

Ok, as an interim,

if you get to this type of page froma google search:
http://www.rafcommands.com/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboard.cgi?az=show_thread&om=5694&forum=DCForumID 6&archive=yes

The above is an old thread about Warwick BV247, a the moment it is throwing up the easyspace cover page.

Take the thread ID number , in this case 5694 and pop it into the old format

http://www.rafcommands.com/dcforum/DCForumID6/Data/5694.txt

You get a difficult to read but nevertheless readable text only version. This is simply the reverse of what I said above haha

[dennis_burke]

For those difficult to read old forum threads, a way to make them a little more readable

You will find this old thread, for example, full of the 'URL encoding', thats the % signs and codes etc:

http://www.rafcommands.com/dcforum/DCForumID6/Data/6401.txt

And since it difficult to read, copy and paste the text into this URL Decoder

http://www.opinionatedgeek.com/dotnet/tools/urlencode/Decode.aspx

click on the decode button

and it becomes a little more readable. I cannot see a way to batch decode the 18000 old threads however.

[janestrand]

This link doesn't work any more. Is there any other way to access the old archives?

Hi Ladies and Gents,

Go to the old board
http://www.rafcommands.com/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboard.cgi

Select the forum eg General

Click on archive on top right of table.

Click page 446 etc on top right

Select the required thread

Or use the old board search function but click the "search archives box" and limit the period to 1 year.

Regards
Ross

[Ross_McNeill]

The Google search function will find everything on both the new and old boards

eg

Warwick BV247 site:www.rafcommands.com

put this into google and all the links will be found.

7th down is one from the old board.

Regards
Ross

[dennis_burke]

Hello Jane,

is there a particular message you need to find?

Search for the terms your looking for in google and enter site:rafcommands.com after the words, then it will serach only for those words. if you have a serial number for example, input that.

The old forum exists only as information now, there is I guess no structure no inks etc, Just the data. Instructions in this thread explained that.

[janestrand]

Hi Dennis,
Yes, I'm looking for a Steve Morris who posted a search in 2004 looking for relatives of John Aelred Sanders of the dambusters. He says John was his great uncle. I'm doing this research for my cousin who is John Sanders' daughter and wants to know anything about his family.

Any contact information would be appreciated.

Jane

Hello Jane,

is there a particular message you need to find?

Search for the terms your looking for in google and enter site:rafcommands.com after the words, then it will serach only for those words. if you have a serial number for example, input that.

The old forum exists only as information now, there is I guess no structure no inks etc, Just the data. Instructions in this thread explained that.

[dennis_burke]

The moderator on the forum asks us not to use the quote function, it always claear what message your replying too, it just takes up space on the servers.

This si the old message your referring too, Stve gave his email address in that message, have you emailed him at that address?

http://www.rafcommands.com/dcforum/DCForumID6/Data/4676.txt

Otherwise, thta was part of the old forum, so unless any of members who mailed him then might still be in contact. You really needed to have posted this on a new thread in themain forum to get the correct level of attention, title the thread with the airmans name.

[janestrand]

Hi, Thank you, I found what I needed and made contact with the member I wanted.

[Jagan]

I spent a good half day's of work (maybe more) put in to migrate all the older board posts to a more readable and user friendly format.

All the former "text" files etc in the dcforum folder .. eg

http://www.rafcommands.com/dcforum/D...Data/15601.txt
http://www.rafcommands.com/dcforum/D.../Data/4676.txt

etc will automatically redirect to the new pages which are more readable and hopefully they will be indexed by Google as well.

new locations
http://www.rafcommands.com/archive/15601.php
http://www.rafcommands.com/archive/04676.php
As a matter of interest - there were 14000+ individual files which were former threads in that forum. which is about the same number of threads in the current forum.

[dennis_burke]

Well done Jagan (and anyone that helped you out). I trust this was possible is some automated fashion. Great resource, and great to be able to read them easily.