Should I upgrade to SMF 2.0?

[Furvert]

Pros:
It should greatly allow reduction of spammers
I have not looked at other features yet

Cons:
Many Mods may not be available

Current Mods:
Users Online Today Mod--I like this one
Googlebot & Spiders Mod--I like this one
Member Color Link--want this one, I like colored names
Google Member Map--needs fix anyway
Location Mod--needs fix anyway
Location Mod - Who Flags--my favorite
Location Mod - Additional Maps
Ignore user--only used once so no loss
Quick Upload--not sure if it helped

Code changes I have done will need to be redone to new version:
Winger Yippie will need to be added to new forum page, need to fix the shrink button for it too
New art may be added at that time for banner headers or logo
Age and Last Login or other such columns in Memberlist may not be needed to be readded
Duplicate file name detailed error message?
Others I dont remember

[cheawick]

Speaking from inexperience, is it possible to re-write/re-engineer those mods to be compatable with SMF 2.0?

[Furvert]

yes, though many have authors already doing so.
Most have mods at least partially operative in 2.0

[Me-luv-Mink]

Sorry Guys, Not My Area of expertise.

[cheawick]

I fell ya MLM, I barely can grasp the concept at this time. =+\

Furvert, in all honesty, I guess then that upgrading would depend on how much spam is being battled vs. the effort of upgrading and re-modding. Kinda like electing an official or president, sometimes ya just gotta choose the lesser of two evils. =+P

[Furvert]

I suspect a majority of new members are just spambot attempts
I delete many every day, usually if they use a common IP with random looking names and emails, and don't appear to have looked at any topics.
But with foreign names I cannot be sure if what looks random is.
So I let many stay live until they do something or I see indications of new accounts that compromise the previous.

Here is a list I just now deleted accounts for "meeddessefreechat, Voffclemeretpf, meeddessefreechatt, HoosteCon, acespapssesbdsm, Rergroori5421" all on same IP using free Russian emails in last 3 days.

So besides cluttering the database, it wastes hours.
Real Spam posters I spend more time on notifying ISPs etc, but those have been rare.
The majority have been name-spam or failed robots.

My ban list grows daily, there is usually pages of errors from banned attempts to get in.
Overall the bans are becoming too wide and may be effecting legit people from those servers.
Though so far no one has emailed me wanting to know why they were banned.

So the #1 gain would be better spambot blocking for registration which may allow me to drop some bans on IP or emails.

Looks like Image Verification was added to registration on SMF1.1 RC3 and newer
But any upgrade will need to reinstall mods and code changes so may as well go to 2.0

[cheawick]

I wish I knew how to help ya and take over some of the burden mon, but the only thing I've done right so far is activating the MySQL server, haven't figured out how to access it yet to try a version of SMF here at the house. =+P

Ofcourse lack of time don't help either, I hope that improves within these two weeks, maintenance only weeks. =+}