The Future of Y-Corner Forums - Switch to phpBB3?
Posted: October 9th, 2007, 6:21 pm
Alright, now that I have my own webspace and domain, I now have the opportunity to host the forums directly, instead of using ProBoards.com (our current forum host).
In the past week or so, I've been tinkering around with phpBB3, a free message board software. It's quite impressive, offering much more customization options than what ProBoards.com provides for us. I've listed some of the pros and cons below:
PROS:
* No random advertisements or Google ads!
* Forum is on a dedicated web server and is not bound by ProBoards.com Terms of Services. (No fear of "accidents" or abrupt termination of service)
* Ability to customize the forum looks and layout even more than Proboards.com.
* Users will be able to have more control over which forum theme they want to use while browsing the forums. Unlike skins on ProBoards, themes on phpBB3 do not conflict with each other.
* A variety of forum themes to choose from, such as: http://www.phpbb3styles.com/viewforum.php?f=13
* Users have ability to upload custom avatars.
* Forums load faster than ProBoards.com.
* More "browser-friendlier" than ProBoards.com.
CONS:
* There is currently no method to automatically transfer ProBoards.com threads, posts, and user accounts to phpBB3. This is because Proboards.com does not provide access to their database to allow this.
* Users will have to re-create their accounts.
* Old posts and threads cannot be converted, unless they are manually entered (unlikely, due to the enormous amount of threads/posts).
One way around the old posts/thread issue is that I can directly link to the current Y-Corner forum threads/sections from the phpBB3 Y-Corner and just lock down the current ProBoards.com Y-Corner forum and keep it in place (won't be deleted). The ProBoards.com Y-Corner forum would essentially act as an "archive" forums.
The big question I would like to ask everyone is, should we make the jump to phpBB3? Or should we remain using the current ProBoards.com Y-Corner forums? Please vote and post if we should make this move or not.
I can put up a link to the demo phpBB3 version of Y-Corner, if people are curious in how it looks compared to our current forum.
DEMO PHPBB3 Y-CORNER FORUM LINK: http://www.yoonhuh.com/phpBB3/
In the past week or so, I've been tinkering around with phpBB3, a free message board software. It's quite impressive, offering much more customization options than what ProBoards.com provides for us. I've listed some of the pros and cons below:
PROS:
* No random advertisements or Google ads!
* Forum is on a dedicated web server and is not bound by ProBoards.com Terms of Services. (No fear of "accidents" or abrupt termination of service)
* Ability to customize the forum looks and layout even more than Proboards.com.
* Users will be able to have more control over which forum theme they want to use while browsing the forums. Unlike skins on ProBoards, themes on phpBB3 do not conflict with each other.
* A variety of forum themes to choose from, such as: http://www.phpbb3styles.com/viewforum.php?f=13
* Users have ability to upload custom avatars.
* Forums load faster than ProBoards.com.
* More "browser-friendlier" than ProBoards.com.
CONS:
* There is currently no method to automatically transfer ProBoards.com threads, posts, and user accounts to phpBB3. This is because Proboards.com does not provide access to their database to allow this.
* Users will have to re-create their accounts.
* Old posts and threads cannot be converted, unless they are manually entered (unlikely, due to the enormous amount of threads/posts).
One way around the old posts/thread issue is that I can directly link to the current Y-Corner forum threads/sections from the phpBB3 Y-Corner and just lock down the current ProBoards.com Y-Corner forum and keep it in place (won't be deleted). The ProBoards.com Y-Corner forum would essentially act as an "archive" forums.
The big question I would like to ask everyone is, should we make the jump to phpBB3? Or should we remain using the current ProBoards.com Y-Corner forums? Please vote and post if we should make this move or not.
I can put up a link to the demo phpBB3 version of Y-Corner, if people are curious in how it looks compared to our current forum.
DEMO PHPBB3 Y-CORNER FORUM LINK: http://www.yoonhuh.com/phpBB3/