Operation Copy Pasta (or how to preserve a forum)

[j3gq_imp]

Ok. Sure. Not right at the moment, but later in the year I'm happy to have a crack at it. Do you have any idea how large the site is?

Not sure why the size matters, but let me give you a better estimate based on numbers we do already know:
- from forum statistics : 300,000 posts
- bare size of one average post ~ 2k of text
- database overheads per post up to 20k of text
= this turns it into 300,000 * 22kB ~ 6.5GB

- come on top pictures, but only those pictures uploaded as a real attachment (links through imgur etc. do not take up space)
- my guess only on in a 50 posts uses this feature
- pic size is limited to 250 kB
- 300,000 / 50 * 250kB ~ 1.5 GB

- finally space to expand in the future ...

All in all the forum database today, I cannot imagine is more than a total of 10 GB, a far cry from the 1TB mentioned before. I haven't seen a cloud hosting service lately, not offering this amount or much larger. In other words, our 10 (or future 20) GB can be hosted anywhere in the world at very low cost.

Based on the idea that even a bad guess is always better than no idea at all ...I hope this helps.

Well, given that, as metaphysical questions go, “Does size matter” is right up there with questions about the existence of god and free will, it’s not altogether surprising that even you are not sure, j3gq ...

The point of the size question is that misterprofessionality is looking to download the entire forum to a private drive to make sure its data is at least preserved. I had thought to do the same thing. For my part, I have no interest in owning the forum or becoming it’s administrator; nor do I want to host the data for others to access. But, if needed, I’d be happy to try to capture the data to hand it on to someone who might want to resurrect the forum in the future. Knowing how much storage may be required will help.

...
it’s not altogether surprising that even you are not sure, j3gq ...
So that's my rep down under ? i guess it's time to move on, find another m/c and another forum with a clean slate.