Resurfacing Old Account

@Replop the same thing might have happened to you as it did me before the old forum shutdown. What I mean is, before the old forum got hacked, my original account went with inactivity for too long. I remember trying to log in and it wouldn’t let me do so. Then I looked at the huge list of forum members, found my name, and it was grayed out and not clickable. The difference is that I haven’t tried making a new account here under my old forum name because I know it will just make an entire new account. So possibly your original account went with inactivity for too long before the old forum closure and then you unknowingly messed up by creating a new account under the same name.

@INovaeKeith like I said above, my original account on the old forum went without activity for too long. Consequently, it was grayed out and not clickable. Now when I try taking over my old account here on the new forum, the lost password link does not bring back any hits of my old account name.

Is there anything that can be done in regards to resurfacing my old account?

There is something that can be done. At the moment I’m in the middle of updating our auth code due to Google’s move to OAuth2 from OpenID. I’m also removing the legacy account import stuff. I’m thinking of creating a page that allows you to type in your old username, or email address, and password to reclaim your original account creation date for those of you that have run into problems. Another possibility is it just emails you a special link and as long as you still have access to the email address you used before you can validate your old account that way. Any thoughts?

Please note that neither of these methods will necessarily preserve your old username - just your account creation date.

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This is a good idea, would be nice if you didn’t ask for a password and used the email link rather. I have misplaced my old forum password and have no way of retrieving it.

Even after hearing it from you that something could be done, I still have doubt with my unusual situation. It gets me thinking as to why my account on the old forum was ever grayed out in the first place. I suspect it was because I hadn’t logged in within a certain time frame but I could be wrong. Flavien might have inside information but at this point it’s probably irrelevant.

I for one wouldn’t have access to the email I used with my original account. Therefore, a link wouldn’t work. However, I should be able to remember any passwords I’ve used.

I for one would certainly appreciate being able to retrieve my account creation date from the old forums. Did I understand you right that this could then be applied to my current account, regardless of having created a whole new user?

Yes this could be applied to your current account, you’d just have to know your old username or email and the old password. I’m working on getting that stuff sorted out within our website.

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@INovaeKeith do you really need us to know the password if we can supply an email or username?

Hopefully once you send the KS emails, there will be a lot of people coming back to the forums, they might not remember their password, they will have access to the email of course…

You only need to have access to the original email address you used to sign up.

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Old username or email and the password or access to the email address? Or either one…

Either one probably.

Good, because I signed up so long ago that I used the e-mail from my old internet provider and I no longer have access to it. But I’m pretty sure I remember the username/password I used.

Just curious to see if there have been any updates on this front. I’m sure you guys are quite busy at the moment!

Nothing new quite yet.

Thanks for the response!

It’s been 17 months, so I assume this endeavour has been abandoned. Figured I’d ask though - is this still planned? Silly as it seems, I’d like to have my profile indicate that I’ve been in support of this project for more than a decade!

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Also, welcome back!?

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It’s still planned for some point in the future. As you’ve noticed it’s extremely low priority and we currently have a million other things to do. That being said we still have all of that information so it’s just a matter of finding the time someday to get it done.

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Perfect, that’s all I wanted to hear :slight_smile: thanks, Keith

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I just want to voice my support for somehow assigning old forum users their original join date on these forums.

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* smug mode *

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