[illustrationism]

How do you post a ticket there? I don’t see where I can do that.

[Michael]

Hi all

I’m embarking on a little change in appearance on my forum. I have got most of it sorted, though there is a little something I’d like to add.

In my forum, a member pointed out that a new forum should not have too much on it – well at least too much with lots of zero’s at the end. I have a lot of sub-forums, and half of them have not been utilized yet.

So I changed the front page code to only display categories, instead of a huge list. I also had hidden some irrelevant forums, for the time being.

What I need to do now is add columns that will list the total posts and topics for all the forums in that category and the last person who posted in that forum, in the same format as I have for my ‘Recent Converstations’, and an extra line in the row that would display the sub-forums that have posts in them.

For example, this is what a row’s format would look like (Category | Posts | Topics | Last Post):

Category Name – Category Description | 92 | 24 | 3 minutes ago by Michael

Sub Forum 1, Sub Forum 2, Sub Forum 3

Can anyone point me in the right direction? Even a little bit of help here would be great.

Michael

[Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)]

You can only vote for one thing (Facebook was my second if I coulda)

[Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)]

I’m assuming (based on Matt’s leanings) that he would like it to be a plugin and accepting that as probably the way it’ll go. A gross assumption, but the chat sounded rather pro-plugin to me. Could be wrong!

There’s no need for deep integration either : you just make bbPress work with the WordPress stylesheet .

Which is what I did, but it begs the question: Why?

If BuddyPress can make it work with one (two) clicks to integrate login and theme, why can’t WordPress and bbPress? Integration means I don’t have to edit two places if I want to modify my theme which, with a superficially ‘integrated’ WP, BB, Wiki and gallery, is much nicer! One less thing to do!

Some people also invested a lot in bbPress ( energy or money ), and trusted the bbPress team, so why make this big and unexpected change to bbPress ?

… I don’t see what that has to do with the price of rice. We’ve all invested time and money in bbPress, WordPress and a hundred other free, open-source applications. If bbPress ‘belongs’ to Akismet, then it’s their right to make the changes they feel would make the software more supportable and usable. They don’t have to ask us anything, but there they are, being good peoples, asking our feelings on the matter. They’re well within their rights to say we’re all fools and do what they want.

And bbPress is GPL open source, so unless I’m mistaken, you can port it to your own forum app. As long as you stay in the GPL too.

[Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)]

Can people now use these plugins created and improve upon them so that they are now available in the latest version of BBpress?

Yes, that’s called GPL Just credit her original plugin in your spin-offs and make sure to release them under GPL.

[Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)]

Also, with deep integration, the theme works instantly, except that it seems to be discouraged in the installation instructions because of the heavier load. But if bbPress turns into a plugin, wouldn’t the end result (and load) be the same as in deep integration?

Yes and no. As it is now, deep integration with standalone bbPress duplicates many functions included in WordPress. The load gets larger becuase you’re doing the same thing multiple ways, multiple times.

If bbPress was a plugin, one would presume that instead of duplicating WP functions, it would instead utilize them.

Mind you, I’m neither pro-nor-anti plugin, I’m just accepting that was the decision, and wanting to make the move the easiest Same as the whole WP -> WPMU eventuality. It’ll happen, regardless of my opinion, it can be made to work, so let’s make it work! (tm Tim Gunn).

[daudev]

We have progress, now I can login in wordpress and after that in bbpress and to be active logged in the two sites, but I’m not automaticaly in bbpress, when I login into wordpress

[QuickD]

Looking for a plugin to put Adsense Code in between forum posts. Is the Adsense for BBpress plugin working?

[Olympus]

The thing is, even if an official said it, and even if the author of the GNU Project said it ( officials aren’t gods ), I still defend my opinion : themes or plugins aren’t changes to the code itself, and so, they don’t have to be GPL’d . Just take the Linux proprietary drivers example .

So, in my opinion, arpowers doesn’t need to GPL the theme, because it’s not a change made to bbPress’ code .

[Steven Hodson]

@bEn L .. thank you very much .. we really need a codex with bbPress template tags

[buddha-trance]

@Jim R – I see, thanks for the info. Can be helpful for future reference.

@Olympus – I agree about the theme integration.

With clear instructions it’s really easy. With a code rewrite, the templates could use the same header and footer calls used to build wp themes, and put the hot tags in a sidebar call.

Also, with deep integration, the theme works instantly, except that it seems to be discouraged in the installation instructions because of the heavier load. But if bbPress turns into a plugin, wouldn’t the end result (and load) be the same as in deep integration?

Another option, is to create an “A list” section in the WP themes directory for those themes that already come with bbPress-ready templates. This could encourage theme developers to add those files with a few simple tweaks, and have their themes be the “complete package”. A member of this forum arpowers has done this: https://bbpress.org/forums/topic/new-theme-for-bbpress

If bbPress turns into a plugin, would it be expandable through extra “modules” (the current plugins)? How would one customize the capabilities?

[Ben L.]

Or, if you want to follow coding standards, <?php bb_load_template( 'sidebar.php' ); ?>.

[Olympus]

Very well done, I love people who redesign bbPress from scratch !

As for paying for the theme, I don’t think it’s a problem . When I think about the hard work you must do to have such results, I think it’s worth the money . And don’t forget that the theme is, as I see in the screenshots and the feature list, customizable via the admin panel, so it’s perfect for newbies !

@chrishajer : I don’t think that the GPL issue matters ( BTW, f**k the GPL ) . Do you know Thesis ? Its PHP code isn’t GPL, but they don’t have any issues . Do you think that the Thesis team will be dumb and will release its PHP code ( which is the core of Thesis ) ?

You should publish in GPL only changes made to bbPress ( or WP ) code, but themes/plugins aren’t changes to bbPress, but rather separate new code which is loaded by bbPress ! In fact, it’s a little bit like the proprietary drivers in Linux . The manufacturer doesn’t make any change to Linux’s kernel, so he doesn’t have to make the drivers also GPL, because drivers aren’t modifications to Linux’s code .

[chrishajer]

Steven, here is the exact way to do it if you still need help:

<?php include("/www/yoursite/forum/my-templates/your-template/sidebar.php");?>

Then the file you are including just goes in sidebar.php in your template folder. Write the sidebar once, use it anywhere.

[Steven Hodson]

@Taeo Ya I realize that bbPress doesn’t have the same sidebar ‘functionality’ as WordPress. What I’mm looking for is more of hte code re-use idea .. write one (or two) sidebars.php and then just include them so thanks on the PHP confirm – I am pretty much a PHP n00b …..

[chandersbs]

Last night and this morning and the whole day, I’ve been busy trying to figure out where new users where going.

After the integration I noticed that all users where showing ‘anonymous’, I did some reading and I discovered that it was possible that it wasn’t reading the appropiate database.

But I checked and checked, and I know that it IS reading the appropiate database, since the admin account is ONLY available in the wp_users table. I have been able to login with it, in both my bbpress area and my wp area.

My existing accounts, I couldn’t login with that. I kept getting User does not exist.

I created new accounts to see where those went. I couldn’t find them.

I just realized that the new accounts, they replaced random old accounts. But just the USER_NICENAME in the forum, if I check my database, I still the original name corresponding the account ID.

To summarize it:

Integrated wp + bbpress. It was an existing bbpress website.

Integrating went kind of OK. after the integration, I noticed its not reading the users, hence the ‘user does not exist’, all users are showing anonymous.

I really really would love it, if someone could help me out

Anyone?

[Olympus]

Theme integration can still be performed without having to turn bbPress into a plugin, and in fact, it can be done via a simple CSS trick ( that means that the default CSS of bbPress should be rewritten so that it becomes more flexible, and every element ( forum tables, forms etc… ) should act as “objects” which can be automatically stretched vertically independently of their parents or I don’t know, where the parents will be objects in the WP stylesheet ) . So again, for theme integration, NO NEED TO TURN BBPRESS INTO A PLUGIN, because it’s just a CSS issue ( + little PHP coding, nothing serious ) !

Connecting the Admin sides of WP and bbPress ? This can be easily done via an OPTIONAL plugin ( or via XML-RPC calls, so that you can handle your bbPress forum even if it isn’t in the same host ) .

Turning bbPress into a plugin would be a nightmare, think of all the unnecessary WP calls … Why did I choose bbPress again ? To have a light forum or to have TWO frameworks ( WordPress and bbPress ) + unnecessary calls and files ?

The reason I choose bbPress at the beginning ( 3~4 years ago ) is because it’s from the creators of WordPress, so I hoped that it will be as easy to customize as WordPress, and that’s what I got ( even though, at the beginning it was really hard for me because I had to guess the function names, as there’s no Codex for bbPress ) and I’m very satisfied . I had the choice between bbPress, PunBB and Vanilla ( the lightest forums out there, and at the time, Vanilla had a greater number of plugins than bbPress ), but I stick with bbPress because it’s the easiest one to customize . So for those who think that bbPress can’t compete in the light forums market, you’re wrong !

[kevinjohngallagher]

The code is also 1 year old mate, and for a version of BBpress long since given up on since the RC1 was rushed out with no beta testing and very little alpha testing.

[Jim R]

I moved from an SMF forum, using SSI to distribute content through a handful of PHP pages. Making any theme changes was a nightmare. I was introduced to WordPress in the summer and loved it. I spent a month looking for a good forum that I obviously wanted integrated, but that was not easy. I found bbPress and was very disappointed it wasn’t more easily integrated. In fact, in the beginning, I couldn’t get it to work.

(side note) GerikG was one who helped me a lot, and the odd thing was I was doing everything properly, but as we troubleshot the issues, we found a simple mistake, there can’t be a www. in the URL’s. (/side noate)

I’m four months into WordPress, and I have switched forums twice. I came back to bbPress with the assumption it would eventually be more integrated with WP.

To me, someone who isn’t much on the coding side but understands it a little, the WP / bbPress integration isn’t an issue of whether it’s a plug-in or separate. It must be about these features right out of the box:

1) Unified login.

2) Theme / navigation integration

3) Post / Tag synchronization

4) Widget integration

As a code novice, I could never understand how these issues weren’t present out of the box. (Much the same as I don’t see how WPMU could be born separate from WP code.) It’s not like the people who designed these products are dumb, so maybe there was a reason for it that made sense to them, but as someone coming into it just never made sense.

Other things it should include, and to my understanding this would be inherent in any PHP based system, the ability to handle WP conditional and template tags. Admin integration would be nice as an option. In my case, I would use it. I know the plug-in makes it possible, but a simple setting would ask, “Would you like to use bbPress admin panel in your WP admin panel?” That would come with an obvious explanation of what bbPress is.

All of that said, without a strong opinion on plug-in vs. stand alone, if the above features are ready to go out of the box, I’m not sure why it couldn’t remain stand alone. But again, I’m a complete code novice.

I mean my gosh, with the PHP widget and Widget Context, I can do just about anything to my WP pages. It’s very nice. No reason bbPress can’t be that simple too….for users. (wink)

[citizenkeith]

I posted this in the bbPress Attachments thread, but thought it would get a little more exposure here….

I have a small community of musicians who are collaborating on music. We decided to start using bbPress Attachments to share Torrent files. This way, we can use Bit Torrent to share large WAV files (40-100MB each).

I would love to be able to extend this plugin to display the contents of the torrent file. As it is, one person might share multiple files in one upload and we need a way to navigate the torrents. Since there are ten of us sharing files, you can imagine that it is getting confusing. You have to download every torrent just to find one file.

I realize _ck_ isn’t working on bbPress Attachments anymore, but am hoping somebody in the community has the ability to add this functionality. I suppose one could even re-use code from bbPress Attachments to write “bbPress Torrent” or something…

I found some php scripts that will parse torrent data, but I’m no programmer.

[windyjonas]

I had problems with the “search in forum” feature. The “select” input control is displayed, but it seems as if the value i choose isn’t used by the code.

When I press submit, this is he URL that is sent to the web server:

http://my.hostname.com/forum/search.php?search=nisse&forum-id=2

In this example, the forum restriction does not take effect.

However,

if i manually change the URL to:

http://my.hostname.com/forum/search.php?search=nisse&forum_id=2 (note the underscore; forum_id)

then it works!

I can track it down to the file:

/bb-includes/class.bb-query.php

and this code:

if ( $forum ) {

$r .= "t<div><label for="forum-id">" . __('Forum') . "</label>n";

$r .= "tt<div>" . bb_get_forum_dropdown( array( 'selected' => $q_forum_id, 'none' => __('Any'), 'id' => 'forum-id

' ) ) . "</div>n";

$r .= "t</div>nn";

}

Changing forum-id to forum_id here fixes the problem, but I would prefer not to tamper with core files.

[Steven Hodson]

is there the ability to use the WP type INCLUDE in bbPress in order to include an custom php file? What I want to do is take the repeating “sidebar” code into a separate file so I don’t have to update all the files that include the sidebar code

[plutopsyche]

Thanks, I tried it with the default theme and it worked. I compared side by side and still couldn’t figure out what was causing the problem, but scrapping what I had and starting from scratch again seems to have resolved the problem.

Can’t wait until there’s a codex.

Thanks!

[buddha-trance]

I tried what Ben L. suggested and it works fine even with a forum with no topics (in which case there is no topic title shown because there is none, and it shows a view count of 0)

I implemented it this way:

<td class="num"><a href="<?php $topic = $GLOBALS['topic'] = current( get_latest_topics( array( 'number' => 1, 'forum' => get_forum_id() ) ) ); ?>"><?php topic_title(); ?></a></td>

[buddha-trance]

I would also prefer if bbPress and WordPress stay separate. That would make bbPress much more powerful.

What we need for new users is very clear instructions on how to integrate. The login cookies was the nightmare part when I first set it up, because of so many different threads and inconsistent advice on how to do it, so it became a trial and error thing, with a great loss of time. The same could be done with clear instructions on how to integrate a WP matching theme. If all the steps are defined clearly, and there is a codex like WP has, having bbPress as a standalone would allow for a lot more customization and expandability than if it were a plugin. Many would rather use certain plugins on WP, and others on bbPress, without bloating either one (and possibly avoid plugin conflicts between the two).