[_ck_]

For those not familiar with BuddyPress or how it uses bbPress, let me give you a quick example.

Here is a typical BuddyPress group’s discussion area (without forums it’s just a group of bloggers which also can be done with basic buddypress but it’s boring)

http://culturadigital.br/groups/banda-infinnita/forum/

Here it is natively inside the bbPress engine:

http://www.culturadigital.br/forum/forum.php?id=151

If you look back on their bbpress front-page you can see how all the groups are exposed as individual forums. This is how buddypress needs bbpress.

(I have no association at all with that site, it’s just a rare example of behind the scenes – unfortunately this kind of demo is not possible on most buddypress sites because JJJ has learned over time to “lock down” bbpress to prevent direct examination)

BuddyPress doesn’t need the bbPress front-end, at all. But it desperately needs the backend. And JJJ needs that backend to be faster and not have to load it’s own core. So by switching it to use WordPress’s core, buddyPress will be faster.

ps.the buddypress version of the forum takes FIVE times longer to render than the bbpress version – I’m not talking about the time to send the extra images on the page, I’m talking just server time to render the page. And that’s against bbPress 1.0, not 0.9