It takes two separate and independent user accounts to access all of Small Wars Journal:
- an SWJ Username for the main site, including the Journal, SWJ Blog, etc. (new in Aug 2011)
- a Council Username for the Small Wars Council discussion board (since 2005)
Existing Council users as of August 3, 2011 have their Council Username reserved or parked as an SWJ Username. Here's how to retrieve it.
We encourage new users to sign up on both sides of the site (SWJ Main and Council) with the same username and manually maintain the two accounts in parallel. Unfortunately, we don’t (yet?) have the system linkages to take care of that for you automatically.
Access
Access to the Journal, SWJ Blog, and other section of the main site is now controlled by a new SWJ Username. More info here. Registration is still free and easy, but it is a separate registration from the Council. Registered SWJ users can comment on all items as before, and can now rate items (1-5 stars). Comment replies are now threaded, and users can flag inappropriate comments.
There have been no changes to the Small Wars Council discussion board. It is still alive and well as a separate section of the site, with access via your Council Username.
Which Login Should I Use?
Short answer: the one for the part of the site you're in.
Longer answer: you are welcome to sign up for either or both areas of the site. We encourage you to register simultaneously on both sides of the house using the same username. That quickly gains and maintains a consistent, ubiquitous online presence here in what we hope becomes a favored stomping ground.
You need to be logged in with your Council Username in the discussion board (make posts and new threads, view privileged forums, etc.) and with your SWJ Username to make comments on the SWJ Blog and Journal.
The social, messaging, and community features are much more fully developed and implemented now on the Council (vBulletin) side; if you want to lean in to any of those, that side might be a better bet. But we do have some minimal but eminently usable messaging and profile features on the main site (Drupal) side, so it is players’ choice.
Why are you doing this to me?
The two parts of the site run on different software; both are best-of-breed packages, but they are not integrated (yet). There is, at present, no ongoing linkage between the two sections so any synchronization of account information is manual.We hope to integrate the separate sections’ logins, profiles, messaging, subscriptions, and all that username-related stuff in the future and are pursuing that path before we try to steroid up the new main minimal site profile functionality. All we need is money, time, and skill (pick two).
Notable Changes from July, 2011 & earlier
There aren't any notable changes to registration or login in the Council.
We no longer accept anonymous (i.e. unregistered) comments on the SWJ Blog and Journal. You must be logged in under an authenticated SWJ Username to comment. Our Terms of Use fully support you registering and behaving responsibly under an anonymous (i.e. pseudonymous) username.
If you are an OpenID user, once you establish an SWJ Username you can link it to your OpenID account via your user profile.
We no longer recognize the old TypeKey authentication option for SWJ Blog comments.
Pre-populated SWJ Usernames for Council Users as of August 3, 2011
When we went live with the new software in the main site area, we created clone SWJ Usernames for all users in good standing in the Small Wars Council. This reserved your existing Council username for you as an SWJ Username; you can activate it by using your your Council username or registered email on the SWJ password recovery page.
More detailed instructions to recover your parked username and activate it as a new SWJ Username:
- Go to the new SWJ password recovery page, or from the top bar click Login then Request New Password.
- Enter either your existing Council Username or the email address that your Council Username is registered to.
- Click on the activation link sent to your registered email and set up your new account password.
If you are getting an Access Denied error message, please review this page for how to clean up our lingering mistake.
The reservation of your Council username will not expire, so there is no rush to activate it as an SWJ Username. There is no linkage between the two usernames other than the one-time parking of your existing username under your registered email; you will have two parallel accounts with identical usernames in separate systems. Once you activate the accounts, we suggest you maintain them in parallel for things like your password and registered email, but there is no requirement for that and no automatic synchronization between the two.
We realize that is a PITA at best and hopelessly confusing at worst, but it is the best we can do for now with what we've got. Again, please note this basically clones your Council Username as a valid, active and SEPARATE account for the new sections of our site.