[Stephen Edgar]

I’m closing this in favour of your first topic, there is no need to create a new topic just because your first has not yet received a reply.

Update my original comments page

[Jimi Wikman]

Ok, I’ll make a brief post regarding the documentation section and navigation in general so we can start discussing those areas.

The documentations section have a few issues and I think the main issue is that it does not have a uniform navigation. By that I mean that depending on where I end up in the codex, I get different sidebars with different content. This confuses the hell out of me, especially since the very anonymous breadcrumb always refer back to the codex home and do not show me where I am in the hierarchy of things.

To make this easier there should be one sidebar for all areas of the codex along with a search function.

The related links is confusing as well as they do not seem to have any connection to the topic or page I am at. Instead they seem to be a bunch of topics in the codex in general or perhaps from a specific section/category? Either way if I want to learn more about bbp_forum_post_count I don’t think it’s very likely that a topic about bbp_breadcrumb will improve my experience. These should be removed from the sidebar and added in context with the content and as part of the sidebar navigation hierarchy.

One other thing I find strange is that neither of these pages have discussions, either in the form of comments or to a dedicated thread on the forum. By not having that it’s more difficult for the users to express if the information is confusing and lacking in some way. Essentially the content becomes dead and will most likely see very little in the form of improvement.

When it comes to navigation in general I still find it strange that there are no breadcrumbs below the main navigation. A lot of people will end up on different pages when they enter the website and regardless of where you end up you should always know the context the page you are visiting in relation to the overall navigation, especially on a website with so much content that is spread out in different sections.

I also think that the main navigation look vague and while I appreciate the little bee image it does not help with the visibility of the navigation. I first thought something was wrong with my screen since I noticed the figures that looks superimposed until i realized it’s just a background image. I would say keep the bee, but remove the white traces and the background image, then make the fonts larger for the navigation.

The navigation itself seem to not be in order with what I would suspect people are looking for. I might be wrong, but I doubt people come here looking for the blog before support or that downloads are the least sought feature? It would make more sense to have support right after “about” and depending on how you want downloads to be handled it would either be the most important item so it would be added last with the CTA or as the second navigation after about.

..and i’ll just end with a question regarding the about page: do you really feel that the categories in the sidebar is a good representation on what you have written in this section? It looks a bit strange that you have items such as “i18n” in the category of the about us and then you have added an inline content box with the actual content of the about section. I would love to hear the meeting where that was decided and the discussions on how that would make it easier for the visitor to find relevant information about BBPress 😉

[David Anderson / Team Updraft]

I recently installed bbPress 2.5.4, and imported a load of data from a Mingle Forum install.

All seemed to be going well…

Unfortunately, sometimes when forum pages (pages under the /forums/ hierarchy) are loaded, there is the content; sometimes they are blank.

It’s not a PHP fatal error, or out-of-memory: no PHP errors are logged, and the HTML delivered is complete right down to the closing /html; it’s just that the section where there should be bbPress content is empty.

I’ve tried setting up pages that use shortcodes to display the forums instead – and these pages *always* work. It’s the pages that are going through the permalink structure which sometimes work, sometimes don’t.

There’s no apparent pattern I can discern in when it works and does not. I just hit “reload” lots of times – and sometimes it works, and sometimes doesn’t. The only pattern is that when it flips from not working to working, or vice-versa, then it tends to stay that way for a few reloads – across browsers too.

I’ve tried re-saving my permalink structure, several times – this makes no difference. I put an mu-plugin which always called flush_rewrite_rules() on every page load; no difference.

Example URL: http://updraftplus.com/forums/topic/updraft-migration-issue/ – try reloading a few times, and/or waiting a few minutes, and see the result change.

Example of things not working: http://snag.gy/Sr9eX.jpg … so, I hit reload a few times, and then it works: http://snag.gy/BzTAA.jpg

Also: my /forums/ page has other text at the top (i.e. text entered in the textarea when editing the page in the WP dashboard). When not working, none of that text is displayed either – i.e. not just the forum index is missing, but everything.

Currently, the HTTP server is set up to redirect requests to /forums/ and to the forum index so that they go to pages which use shortcodes. But, the topic links are always linked by the resulting output into the sometimes-works, sometimes-doesn’t permalink structure.

Anyone got any ideas? Theme: Pagelines. WP Super Cache is installed, but there is no cacheing of /forums/ or anything beneath (confirmed that this is working by searching in wp-content/cache/).

Many thanks,
David

[Venutius]

I’ve just discovered my bbpress Participants are unable to edit their own posts.

Anyone any ideas as to why?

Also, I can’t for the life of me find where I change a bbpress users role to change them to a mod etc. It’s not an option in the wordpress edit user profile section. Could someone be kind enough to point me in the right direction?

[Jimi Wikman]

@robkk no one want a bloated software.

It’s important to separate function from form in these discussions. A function like forum grouping with drag and drop has no impact on loading time in the front end yet it is a very powerful function that make it possible to expand BBP to a forum without having to sacrifice the Bulletin board feeling. If you want things just the way things are you just place all forums in one category.

Same thing with moderation or usergroups. It does not impact anything in the frontend, yet it will make a world of difference for managing the forum. If you don’t want to use it you just ignore it. No bloating, but a world of difference.

Then when we come to form we should put things like group icons and topic ratings as plugins. these are hardly used by all and as such they should be optional for those that want/need them.

I however see an issue with plugins the way both WordPress and BBPress plugins are setup a lot now and that is that each plugin have their own set of CSS and JS. If I add 20+ plugins that usually mean that I will have 20+ CSS and JS files clogging up the browser stack. the total sum of the files are usually very small, but the sheer number will slow the site down considerably.

If you have worked with WordPress installations with a lot of plugins you know that it’s a serious pain in the butt to try to get minification and combining JS/CSS to work properly. It’s either that the order of things are wrong or the minification mess something up in one or more files and you get stuck spending hours trying to find what is causing the mess. And even chained and minified the number of items in the browser stack still cause delays in the DOM rendering.

This is why I think as much as possible should be added into as few plugins as possible and that is why I think that Buddypress and BBPress should merge and some basic functionality should be included in the core. I know that this is not what the bulletin board users may want to hear, but if BBPress are to reach a wider audience and become a forum plugin that will appeal the great userbase of WordPress, then I say this is something that need to be done.

With around 70 million installations of WordPress we can assume that 1% at least have need of a good forum. Thats 700.000 BBPress installations that should be out there right now and I am not sure if that is the case or not? In my opinion BBPress should have at least 2.5 million installations by now as I know that the demand for forums are very high and people are searching high and low for any forum that will merge with WordPress.

I know that alot of people here want a watered down and minimalistic bulletin board and I would say you are in majority since that is what BBPress is today. However I have a feeling that sooner or later someone will realize that the majority of users out there don’t want that and they will fork BBPress and go towards a more forum oriented software. When that happens I fear that that fork will boom in a major way and that will eventually reduce BBPress as developers will go where the userbase is and there is just so much you can optimize (of course you can ALWAYS optimize and refactor things, but it might now be very fun or productive for the users) in a minimalistic bulletin board.

I think that BBPress is at a good place right now and before the end of the year with forum grouping in place and perhaps a little better organization of this website we should see more users starting to enjoy BBPress and not just bulletin board lovers 😉

[RChadwick]

I’ve been looking for a forum for my WordPress site, and everyone keeps pointing me back to bbPress. Problem is, I absolutely hate the way it looks. Mentally, I find it confusing to find and read messages. Is there a supported plugin that will make bbPress look like more traditional forums?

[Nelinfo]

In the picture marks the spot to insert “button.”
Tell me which file bbpress marked in the picture place?

[Nelinfo]

Good evening!

There is a desire to put a “button” plugin LikeBtn (http://likebtn.com/en/) within the forum bbpress (see. Wallpapers)
What will advise?
How to find the place where to insert the code <? Php likebtn_comment (); ?>

Here’s a link to the material: http://bludagu.ru/forums/topic/%D0%B…7%D0%B0%D1%8E/

Denis

[Robkk]

as im reading this all i can think is that bbpress better not turn into the jetpack of forum software.

it could have a bunch of features but all im going to do is just deactivate more than half of them.

and then later ILL be thinking will this slow down my site.

i think some features should really be considered if it should go into plugin territory or be part of the core.

[Robkk]

look at the bbpress default stylesheet , then look at your stargazer child themes bbpress stylesheet and see what you need.

heres some code that you might need …i dont know right all that you need

#bbpress-forums div.bbp-reply-content {
margin-left: 130px;
padding: 12px 12px 12px 0;
text-align: left;
}

#bbpress-forums div.bbp-reply-author {
float: left;
text-align: center;
width: 115px;
}

[Robkk]

only thing i can do now is i guess suggest something else ,

https://wordpress.org/plugins/bbpress-post-toolbar/

it has font style, and font color .

but it hasnt been updated in years and adds 2-4 seconds extra loading time to your site.

it would be a great plugin still if it was updated or forked on github.

[desiamerican26]

@robkk

that’s ok friend. you already been helping a lot….If you can or someone else can help with this…..
I myself trying to figure this out too

add_filter( ‘bbp_kses_allowed_tags’, ‘ntwb_bbpress_custom_kses_allowed_tags’ );

function ntwb_bbpress_custom_kses_allowed_tags() {
return array(

// Links
‘a’ => array(
‘class’ => true,
‘href’ => true,
‘title’ => true,
‘rel’ => true,
‘class’ => true,
‘target’ => true,
),

// Quotes
‘blockquote’ => array(
‘cite’ => true,
),

// Span
‘span’ => array(
‘class’ => false,
),

// Code
‘code’ => array(),
‘pre’ => array(
‘class’ => true,
),

// Formatting
’em’ => array(),
‘strong’ => array(),
‘del’ => array(
‘datetime’ => true,
),

// Lists
‘ul’ => array(),
‘ol’ => array(
‘start’ => true,
),
‘li’ => array(),

// Images
‘img’ => array(
‘class’ => true,
‘src’ => true,
‘border’ => true,
‘alt’ => true,
‘height’ => true,
‘width’ => true,
),

// Tables
‘table’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘bgcolor’ => true,
‘border’ => true,
),
‘tbody’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘valign’ => true,
),
‘td’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘valign’ => true,
),
‘tfoot’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘valign’ => true,
),
‘th’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘valign’ => true,
),
‘thead’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘valign’ => true,
),
‘tr’ => array(
‘align’ => true,
‘valign’ => true,
)
);
}

[Robkk]

if its just how the replies content looks like on a topic , i guess just copy loop-single-reply.php from the bbpress plugin templates and put it into your bbpress folder in your child theme.

there might be some css from your bbpress stylesheet in your child theme that might make it look weird though.

[Jimi Wikman]

I understand that, but that just show that there are a lot of people out there that expect more from BBPress and as things progress and the options are available (and easy to find), there will be less and less whining 🙂

For me it was very strange to install something referred to as forum only to get a bulletin board and then it got annoying not finding the quick answers on how to make the bulletin board look and behave as a forum. Once BBPress get more like a forum and there are options to expand it, then you’ll see more feature requests instead of confusion and nagging 🙂

Just hang in there!

[gogitossj34]

Ok, added in !important worked.
Do you know what can help moving the avatar and name to the left and comment to the right like normal bbpress ? Or maybe just the code so that I can edit it myself.

[Jimi Wikman]

@pfswss are looking for something like http://ekatana.se/forums/ ?
If so I plan on making a blogpost on the steps needed to make that happen. Perhaps that will help you get closer to the layout that you want from BBPress?

Also, I have Buddypress on there as well and while I am not very happy about the additional css and JS that it add I think it’s worth it if you want a community and not just a bulletin board.

[Jimi Wikman]

That’s a pretty selfish way to look at the situation Robin. Just because you and many others like you want a scaled down system does not mean that BBPress should head in that direction. I am confident that the majority out there want something more than what BBPress currently represent and as far as I can see the development IS going toward a more forum-like entity rather than BBPress currently is.

I still think that you and everyone else like you should still be able to have a simple bulletin board kind of experience, but the idea that that’s all the BBPress will offer is not a path I see will go anywhere in the long run.

I understand the concept of keeping the core simple and then have modules to expand it, in fact I think that’s the correct way to move forward as that is the only way we can make everyone happy. It should be easy to find the modules needed to expand the forum from a list of topics looking like it just came from 1999 to anything from a high tech forum catering tens of thousands with all the bells and whistles to anything in between.

[Jimi Wikman]

I did not stop using IPB, I still have it on some sites. The problem with IPB is the opposite of BBPress actually and that is that is just a forum (sure they have blog and IP.Content, but they are still pretty bad).

I also do not want to work with half measures so I have to bridge two systems, I want it to be one system all tied together.

[Robkk]

I want (topic 2) and any newer one to to be above previous topic

okay bbpress already does this.

so if i comment on topic 1 or topic 2 , topic 2 will be at top until a new topic is created??

[Robkk]

okay i create a new topic called topic 1, its the only topic in my forum

if i create another one called topic 2 where do you want it to be below or above the previous topic

(bbpress has it where the newest topic is at the top, as long as no other activity has happened)

[OsamaNuman]

thanks for your keen reply ! I really appreciate it

I think that you got me wrong ‘:>
(bbpress arranges topics by latest activity) I want to change that to (published date)

thanks

[Robkk]

How can I display the published date ?

i dont know at the moment , but i know its possible , because in the backend in topics>all topics you see it shows the created date.

as for example if a post is new and another one is old, and if a comment is posted on the old one, the arrangement will change such that the old will be on the top of the newer one !!

But I think still the arrangement will be based on (last activity date) !?

yeah bbpress arranges topics by latest activity

[gogitossj34]

I cant seem to get it working, I downloaded all five php file from the trac and put them in the bbpress folder but this is still what I got : http://mmo4teen.webuda.com/forum-2/
I’m using the normal stargazer theme with default bbpress.

[Robin W]

I do hope that BBPress will eventually cater to everyone’s needs

I do hope it won’t 🙂

bbpress suits many many thousands of forum providers, by being simple and easy, which is what many want.

Complex forums with loads of features that I’ll never use is not what I’m after. There are lots of bb’s out there for those that want all signing all dancing, and just as wordpress is not for all, so is bbpress.

[pfswss]

Jimi, I was also disappointed when I installed BBPress and found it to be very unlike a forum I had known in the past. Out of the box it is too simplistic with several themes I tried it with. I just wanted a forum look but this does not seem possible unless you hire developers or are a really good coder with loads of time.

I do appreciate the effort of the developers as an open source software. unfortunately I had the wrong impression from reading reviews of several wordpress solutions as they all pointed to this one as the best. To be blunt I would not like to try the worst ones.

I have had a lot of issues, many plugins are not compatible and I still have nothing that looks remotely like a normal forum. I actually just searched to how to enable PM’s and that is when I found this post and another which says basically you need to install the Buddypress which is an overkill it seems.

I do hope that BBPress will eventually cater to everyone’s needs but sadly I think I have to look at another solution and revert back to my PHPBB forum form 2 weeks ago. Then I will consider going with IP board or Vbulletin.

Jimi, can you tell me why you stopped using IPB?