[chrishajer]

It’s interesting to me when people say “absolutely essential” in regards to software.

http://www.37signals.com/svn/archives2/the_top_5_red_flags_of_software_development.php

The functionality is available in a plugin, it’s just not built into bbPress. bbPress’ philosophy is to leave stuff like that out of the core, and I’m glad for that. I don’t need it. If you do need it, install a plugin. Or, if you disagree with the philosophy, you’re free to install other forum software that more closely aligns with your needs.

Now, if we want to talk about the lack of documentation, telling you how to do all these things with bbPress, well, that’s a whole different story. I’ve heard before that there probably won’t be much documentation before version 1 is released.