LES - Progress Update - 19th June 2026

AnthonySmith · June 19

Thought I would provide another update.

The PHP and MariaDB conversion is complete, I now have a fully functional vanilla 3.x (if you can still call it that) running on PHP 8.4.22 and MariaDB 11.8.8, even the polls plugin works

All the plugins are now going to be written in the development version and tested there. Once it is done, I will schedule some downtime and move LES to the new server with the new code base, but I will continue to provide updates anyway so you know what's coming when the switch is made.

Doing it this way to save having to make a 7.x version and an 8.x version then change after.

Plugin: Necro Post Gate done in dev version

Before necro

After

When done, negative karma will count x2 for necro posting.

--

Plugin: Flagged posts

This one will show you if a post has already been flagged and how many times, you can add weight to it by also flagging or you can just see it has already been reported and ignore it.

A mod/admin can take whatever action, and then this indicator will clear.

If a threshold is hit the post will be automatically hidden. This threshold is set lower for <XX day accounts, so for example, if someone signs up from PurplePeopleHost and immediately starts advertising, ignoring the rules, 5 flags would basically remove the post, so only mod/admins can see it.

somik · June 19

@AnthonySmith said:
someone signs up from PurplePeopleHost

Wont that be being racist towards purple people?

AnthonySmith · June 19

The admin side pattern automod plugin has also been done (a basic version)

Simple text replace on post or URL, auto block for known spammers and new accounts>

Nothing added yet, it won't be used lightly, but essentially if you write #dicks it will say #donkey when you post or if you create a link for https://hammertime.com when posted it will be https://www.colocrossing.com/ when posted etc etc.

AnthonySmith · June 19

@somik said: Wont that be being racist towards purple people?

I did not really want to admit this so publicly, but I am a racist against purple people specifically, sorry if that disappoints anyone.

ahnlak · June 19

@AnthonySmith said:
A mod/admin can take whatever action, and then this indicator will clear.

Is it worth leaving some sort of "mod checked" indicator, to avoid it getting re-flagged every time the indicator is cleared?

AnthonySmith · June 19

@ahnlak said:

@AnthonySmith said:
A mod/admin can take whatever action, and then this indicator will clear.

Is it worth leaving some sort of "mod checked" indicator, to avoid it getting re-flagged every time the indicator is cleared?

Well the theory was that the mods or admin resolves the issue it was flagged for so it shouldn't need to be flagged again.

I guess leaving some small indicators behind can't hurt.

SocksAreComfortable · June 19

LES quite literally operating in the future!

AnthonySmith · June 19

@SocksAreComfortable said:
LES quite literally operating in the future!

Ha ... Well spotted

stupidgenius · June 20

@AnthonySmith Would the eventual migration/update add the ability to click on a quoted username's and jump/go to the quoted post rather that user's profile?

I wasn't sure if this was intentional behavior or not, but I found it helpful on the other site when following active discussions with nested quotes.

AnthonySmith · June 20

@stupidgenius said: @AnthonySmith Would the eventual migration/update add the ability to click on a quoted username's and jump/go to the quoted post rather that user's profile?

Thats probably a really good thing to have, I dont really use the other site much so if there is anything there that is cool let me know we will add it.

I would be tempted to leave the users name as a link to the user and add a "view quoted post" button

stupidgenius · June 20

@AnthonySmith said:

@stupidgenius said: @AnthonySmith Would the eventual migration/update add the ability to click on a quoted username's and jump/go to the quoted post rather that user's profile?

Thats probably a really good thing to have, I dont really use the other site much so if there is anything there that is cool let me know we will add it.

I would be tempted to leave the users name as a link to the user and add a "view quoted post" button

Thanks, testing it on this post right here it looks like it adds the link to the usename in the nested quote, but not the top level username.

Not sure if I've ever paid enough attention to notice before now. So its partially there.

Mason · June 20

Amazing to see LES getting the breath of fresh air it deparately needed. Great to have you back at the helm, Ant!

somik · June 22

@AnthonySmith any plans to "enable" image uploads for regular users?

If the disk space is a concern, you can consider using a third party image hosts, like postimages.org (which is designed for forums to upload their images using javascript ajax requests) or catbox.moe (which allows easy image upload through PHP curl calls).

AnthonySmith · June 22

@somik said: @AnthonySmith any plans to "enable" image uploads for regular users?

yep, worked on it a bit over the weekend, update post is half written i found some bugs during testing.

Update to come out today.

AnthonySmith · June 22

I might as well post it now, as I actually dont think I will finish the next thing today:

Some of this was already done/started but tested this morning.

Images / gifs

We have Imagick now instead of (as well as) the standard GD supported in Vanilla, so on the admin side we can now manage compression levels, max hight/width with auto scaling, auto strip EXIF, and convert to the most desirable format.

Defaults for now:
Width = 1920
Hight = 1080
Quality = 85
format = webp (might change to jpeg, having an internal struggle with that, opinions wanted)

Not really any screenshots for this one, we are also adding the ability for you to add alt text in the ui, its available anyway, but not everyone understands markdown. A bit of help for hosts, more than anything, that target keywords.

This, in the longer run, means that the user image upload will come back when the new VPS is sized appropriately.

Not a lot else to say except that when ran on the existing images in dev, we saved around 65% space.

So simple terms, images automatically resize, compress, strip exif data and change to webp on upload, or you can use an external image, you can set your own alt text or accept the default LowEndSpirit alt text. (same for copy-paste into input for images or drag/drop)

Was much harder than expected but worth it, when v2 of LES is live image uploads will be self hosted and available again to end users.

havoc · June 22

@AnthonySmith said: webp (might change to jpeg, having an internal struggle with that, opinions wanted)

Don't think anyone is browsing the forum from their non-webp fridge...so whatever is cheaper to host

Mason · June 22

@havoc said:

@AnthonySmith said: webp (might change to jpeg, having an internal struggle with that, opinions wanted)

Don't think anyone is browsing the forum from their non-webp fridge...so whatever is cheaper to host

Speak for yourself....

Sent from my iToaster

rpqu · June 22

@AnthonySmith don't forget to strip xmp, icc, exif

imok · June 22

@AnthonySmith said:
I might as well post it now, as I actually dont think I will finish the next thing today:

Some of this was already done/started but tested this morning.

Images / gifs

We have Imagick now instead of (as well as) the standard GD supported in Vanilla, so on the admin side we can now manage compression levels, max hight/width with auto scaling, auto strip EXIF, and convert to the most desirable format.

Defaults for now:
Width = 1920
Hight = 1080
Quality = 85
format = webp (might change to jpeg, having an internal struggle with that, opinions wanted)

Not really any screenshots for this one, we are also adding the ability for you to add alt text in the ui, its available anyway, but not everyone understands markdown. A bit of help for hosts, more than anything, that target keywords.

This, in the longer run, means that the user image upload will come back when the new VPS is sized appropriately.

Not a lot else to say except that when ran on the existing images in dev, we saved around 65% space.

So simple terms, images automatically resize, compress, strip exif data and change to webp on upload, or you can use an external image, you can set your own alt text or accept the default LowEndSpirit alt text. (same for copy-paste into input for images or drag/drop)

Was much harder than expected but worth it, when v2 of LES is live image uploads will be self hosted and available again to end users.

Finally you will be able to see images again!

rpqu · June 22

@imok said:

@AnthonySmith said:
I might as well post it now, as I actually dont think I will finish the next thing today:

Some of this was already done/started but tested this morning.

Images / gifs

We have Imagick now instead of (as well as) the standard GD supported in Vanilla, so on the admin side we can now manage compression levels, max hight/width with auto scaling, auto strip EXIF, and convert to the most desirable format.

Defaults for now:
Width = 1920
Hight = 1080
Quality = 85
format = webp (might change to jpeg, having an internal struggle with that, opinions wanted)

Not really any screenshots for this one, we are also adding the ability for you to add alt text in the ui, its available anyway, but not everyone understands markdown. A bit of help for hosts, more than anything, that target keywords.

This, in the longer run, means that the user image upload will come back when the new VPS is sized appropriately.

Not a lot else to say except that when ran on the existing images in dev, we saved around 65% space.

So simple terms, images automatically resize, compress, strip exif data and change to webp on upload, or you can use an external image, you can set your own alt text or accept the default LowEndSpirit alt text. (same for copy-paste into input for images or drag/drop)

Was much harder than expected but worth it, when v2 of LES is live image uploads will be self hosted and available again to end users.

Finally you will be able to see images again!

https://kernelkeepers.com/clickreroute

somik · June 23

@rpqu said:

@imok said:
Finally you will be able to see images again!

https://kernelkeepers.com/clickreroute

You guys are on a forum for hosters. All of you already own one or multiple servers. Just host your own proxy or VPN on that!

Easiest one to setup and run: https://github.com/wg-easy/wg-easy

Keep your data in your control.

rpqu · June 23

@somik said:

@rpqu said:

@imok said:
Finally you will be able to see images again!

https://kernelkeepers.com/clickreroute

You guys are on a forum for hosters. All of you already own one or multiple servers. Just host your own proxy or VPN on that!

Easiest one to setup and run: https://github.com/wg-easy/wg-easy

Keep your data in your control.

pigeonhole principle

david3 · June 23

Imgur often blocks data center IPs and VPNs (unless something has changed). I stopped using it years ago because of this. I use Rimgo, instead, as an imgur proxy.

https://codeberg.org/rimgo/rimgo

I usually use postimages.org for posting images, but even better if it's included on the forum.

Some screenshots are clearer and take up less space as png vs. jpeg.

AnthonySmith · June 23

I am probably going to just batch download and rehost all the imgur posted images and then ban it and any other service the geo restricts content like that.

It's too annoying for a forum, I blame the governments, not the services.

somik · June 23

@AnthonySmith said:
I am probably going to just batch download and rehost all the imgur posted images and thæn ban it and any other service the geo restricts content like that.

It's too annoying for a forum, I blame the governments, not the services.

If that's the plan thæn you definitely need to host the images yourself as you have no idea when which image host goes down or when they are required to geo-block people from certain countries...

somik · June 23

@david3 said:
Imgur often blocks data center IPs and VPNs (unless something has changed). I stopped using it years ago because of this. I use Rimgo, instead, as an imgur proxy.

https://codeberg.org/rimgo/rimgo

I usually use postimages.org for posting images, but even better if it's included on the forum.

Some screenshots are clearer and take up less space as png vs. jpeg.

I use my own script to run my private image host, https://imageperl.com/ . I usually host jpg/png/gif as is, only converting webp back to jpg, but now I am wondering if I am doing it the wrong way. Maybe I should be converting all to webp instead...

AnthonySmith · June 23

@somik said:

@david3 said:
Imgur often blocks data center IPs and VPNs (unless something has changed). I stopped using it years ago because of this. I use Rimgo, instead, as an imgur proxy.

https://codeberg.org/rimgo/rimgo

I usually use postimages.org for posting images, but even better if it's included on the forum.

Some screenshots are clearer and take up less space as png vs. jpeg.

I use my own script to run my private image host, https://imageperl.com/ . I usually host jpg/png/gif as is, only converting webp back to jpg, but now I am wondering if I am doing it the wrong way. Maybe I should be converting all to webp instead...

WebP is more efficient if quality is not a main goal, we already started work on the imgur auto pull/convert system but I think we will probably set up a batch to pull all existing imgur links and do it retrospectively. It will be handy to be able to do that as more and more internet sensorship takes place due to the professionally offended and the hurty words gangs.

rpqu · June 23

@somik said:

@david3 said:
Imgur often blocks data center IPs and VPNs (unless something has changed). I stopped using it years ago because of this. I use Rimgo, instead, as an imgur proxy.

https://codeberg.org/rimgo/rimgo

I usually use postimages.org for posting images, but even better if it's included on the forum.

Some screenshots are clearer and take up less space as png vs. jpeg.

I use my own script to run my private image host, https://imageperl.com/ . I usually host jpg/png/gif as is, only converting webp back to jpg, but now I am wondering if I am doing it the wrong way. Maybe I should be converting all to webp instead...

Most browser handles it properly. But older Android devices aren't optimized to view it...

yoursunny · June 23

@somik said:
I use my own script to run my private image host, https://imageperl.com/

This site is private?
We thought it’s open to the public and have been uploading buckets of popcorn photos.
Can we buy a license to continue uploading?

somik · June 23

@rpqu said:

@somik said:

@david3 said:
Imgur often blocks data center IPs and VPNs (unless something has changed). I stopped using it years ago because of this. I use Rimgo, instead, as an imgur proxy.

https://codeberg.org/rimgo/rimgo

I usually use postimages.org for posting images, but even better if it's included on the forum.

Some screenshots are clearer and take up less space as png vs. jpeg.

I use my own script to run my private image host, https://imageperl.com/ . I usually host jpg/png/gif as is, only converting webp back to jpg, but now I am wondering if I am doing it the wrong way. Maybe I should be converting all to webp instead...

Most browser handles it properly. But older Android devices aren't optimized to view it...

If i download the images to my windows PC, i cant open them in the built in viewer either.

@yoursunny said:

@somik said:
I use my own script to run my private image host, https://imageperl.com/

This site is private?
We thought it’s open to the public and have been uploading buckets of popcorn photos.
Can we buy a license to continue uploading?

Lol, I meant "private" as in I own and run it, but it's free for everyone to use. That's why there is no login or admin panel on it. It also does not have any metrics or tracking or ads and all the images are served from disk by nginx as static files.

Did I mention that it is also fully opensource? If you want to run it on your own servers, you can grab it from my github and deploy it with docker:
https://github.com/somik123/mini-image-host

ahnlak · June 23

@somik said:

@AnthonySmith said:
I am probably going to just batch download and rehost all the imgur posted images and thæn ban it and any other service the geo restricts content like that.

It's too annoying for a forum, I blame the governments, not the services.

If that's the plan thæn you definitely need to host the images yourself as you have no idea when which image host goes down or when they are required to geo-block people from certain countries...

There might be a view that hosting them yourself brings you into even more annoying parts of the OSA (which is why folk like imgur just decided it was more hassle than it was worth)

LES - Progress Update - 19th June 2026

Plugin: Necro Post Gate done in dev version

Plugin: Flagged posts

Comments

Images / gifs

Images / gifs

Images / gifs