[enfotoad]

Would it be easier to convert a WordPress theme into a bbPress theme?

If you guys where in my shoes… which one would you pick for a windows technical support forum?

[wmnasef]

it depends on your needs, if you need a forum that has too many features, then its phpbb for sure.

but if you are looking for a simple forum that has basic functionality, then it’s bbpress.

personally i like bbpress, i like how simple/basic it is, which allows me to add only the features that i want on my own via plugins, while phpbb has too much features, more than i ever wanted, which of course makes it heavier.

[moealza1]

phpbb is much much much more powerful and has dozens of features.

[Ganzuelo]

Well from my past experience with phpbb and bbpress I have to say bbpress would be quicker for you and there are plugins that will allow you to do so.

[enfotoad]

Hi there!

I am sorry if someone else has already created a post on this.

I have a website (powered by wordpress) that has a bunch of how-to windows tech articles. I need to get a forum for my site users. Which one would be better? My users will need the capability of uploading files, pasting code and images. Which forum program would put less pressure on my servers and hopefully keep the running a little faster?

Thank you ahead of time for any help.

[walkerevans]

Thanks for the links, Chris. As bad as the search is in BBPress, it’s still better than phpBB2 (which I’m migrating from).

And John, I saw the Super Search, but didn’t want to use it since it’s in super-alpha mode and I need something that will also search WP posts, and it doesn’t seem like that plugin does that. At least not yet. So for now I’m using the WP search plugin: https://bbpress.org/plugins/topic/wp-search/

Just wondered if there was any way to get Tags/Titles in the existing forum search. Hrm.

[winmutt]

2.7 and 0.9.0.3

I had a heck of a time getting the logins to work properly, the issue was that I would get a wordpress_logged_in_* cookie for /forums but never a wordpress_* for /forums

In the bb-admin wordpress integration I set the forum URL to the wordpress URL http://superturbodiesel.com/ and the same in the wp-admin for bbPress integration plugin and it worked.

Some other changes, I fixed the bb_mail function to use a from envelope for sendmail as the fifth parameter to mail. It should certainly be an install option

bbPress is light and simple but IMO still has a long way to go. Can’t wait to get my hands dirty with some patches. I will probably do a wp integration template and usernames in quoted text (from the QUOTE extension).

I migrated from phpBB out of pure spite. Every upgrade on my stock install would break and the fact that it had to be manually patched was ludicrous. As a professional PHP programmer bbPress is much easier to work with and the coding practices are straightforward.

[TechGnome]

Well, I didn’t exactly dump phpBB per se…. but after looking at the two and what it would take to integrate into my site and get it to do what I wanted…. bbPress turned out the best way to go. What I did dump was Joomla! and WP (GASP! Did I just say that? Yes I did. I needed a forum more than I needed a blog. Last thing this world needed was yet another blog anyways.)

http://tannagh.com

-tg

[Ganzuelo]

Post here if you are ditching phpbb for this.

I have only used soop and phpbb and now bbpress and I am loving this more and more every day.

[salemw]

Hello,

I recently transfered my forum from phpbb3 to bbpress and i really enjoy it

there is only one thing I cannot reproduce with bbpress. I used to have a different style for each category or forums and an image include on top of each. I can do it with forum_id but the variable do not follow in topics

ex:

if ($forum_id == 1) echo 'blabla';

How could I keep it in topics ?

Thank you

[wmnasef]

i wrote it assuming the conversion is done on a new empty bbpress installation. then integrating it later with WP. they call it reverse integration on this post https://bbpress.org/forums/topic/wordpress-and-bbpress-integration-101#post-17411

[John James Jacoby]

How nicely does this play with WP integration in regards to the users and existing WP accounts? I’m assuming that it would take another dump and update to merge the bb_ table this makes with the wp_ table necessary for user integration.

[bryan868]

Worked perfectly. Thank you!

[wmnasef]

yes, after conversion. and you don’t have to install it, just copy the file as is and it will be loaded automatically.

[brh]

I tried installing 0.9.0.3, but I got the message telling me I had an old config.php. I didn’t – my config was named bb-config.php. It turned out the problem was that I was installing bbpress into a subdirectory of my phpBB forums, and it was looking at the config.php for phpBB. I don’t think that’s right. Here was my directory structure:

• /config.php (for phpBB)

  • /bbpress/

    • bb-config.php
    • bb-admin/, etc

When I renamed my phpBB config.php to config2.php, I was allowed to proceed with installation.

[bryan868]

I’m about to run this script. THANK YOU! So for the md5 hashing plugin, do we need to install that after we convert? Or?

[adamhdv04]

I ran this script perfectly. I was running phpbb3 3.0.3 I think, with phpbb-se0 advanced installed. Worked perfect, thanks!

[adam613]

A little about me: I’m working on a hobby web site. It was going to have a forum, a few database-based applications I’ve written the back-end for, and in the process of deciding what should go on the front page, I figured I should start a blog too. I have a version of the site sort of written using phpBB as the the forum and the templating engine for the web apps, but it’s very frustrating getting phpBB to do what I want it to do…you really can’t do much without editing the core code. On the recommendation of a co-worker, I decided to check out WordPress/bbPress. I’m not sure WP/bbPress is the right solution, but I haven’t found anything I like better….it seems like it’s pretty easy to rearrange things on the page and add new elements as needed.

What I want: My forum should appear on the site similar to a Page. I don’t think I need “deep integration”…I’m not terribly concerned about data integration, other than the fact that signing into WP should sign you into the forums and vice versa. I don’t need the forum to be able to interact with other pages on the site…if I need data from my other apps in the forum, I’ll just grab it from the database using a forum plugin. But I am concerned about appearance integration…I want the WP header and footer, including my logo and nav bar, to show up at the top of the forum page, and I want the forum theme to be similar to (if not identical to) the WP theme.

What’s the safest way to make this happen? I’m very new to WP/bbPress, but I’m not afraid to write code…a certain major website pays me a good bit of money do so during the week

[marjolein]

I run phpbb in combination with WordPress. It’s not the best package, but it’s free and looks good .

[Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)]

If phpBB isn’t good, you may have to end up with a paid system. You can try SMF (free) and it may meet your needs, but past that I dunno.

[vadi]

I don’t need any integration, and phpbb doesn’t cut it unfortunately.

[ganzua]

If you want to integrate the forum with wordpress latest version, you have two options; bbpress and simple-forum plugin.

If you need a stand-alone forum I’d go for phpbb3. It has everything that a forum should have.

[rootf]

Hi.

I want to create a forum on my WordPress 2.7 website and I decide to try bbPress, but I don’t know what integration method will be the best and I wonder wheter it is possible at all. I want fully integrated bbPress and WordPress (common header, footer, user database, etc., saying simply bbPress included in a WordPress page). Could you help me? Or maybe should I use an other script like Simple:Press Forum, punBB or phpBB? Thanks in advance.

Regards,

rootf.

[lyrics]

Its great idea to have sub forums. I agree that bbpress does not have an option for hidden forums, but the discussions can be locked and pinned up for limited conversations.

[kevinjohngallagher]

Hi Ipstenu,

I’m going to disagree with you a little mate, and try not to take it off topic too much.

Yes, each adjective is subjective to ones perspective. “easy” and “alot” etc. can mean different things to different people. That said, lets look at them a sec.

“extensive plugins?”

There are just under 120 plugins for BBPress.

Over 1/3rd haven’t been updated in a year. I’d wager a good few of them don’t work anymore.

And the ones with latest comments 6-12 months ago, usually don’t work either.

Also from what i’ve seen about 1/4 of them are redundant or useless in 0.9 / 1.0alpha.

So we’re looking at maybe 40-50 plugins.

Does anyone think that’s “extensive”?

I know it’s subjective, but, um, well you can make up your own mind.

“You CAN redesign the hell out of a bbPress site”

To a certain extent i’ll agree and disagree with it. To redesign a bbpress forum so that it doesn’t look like this theme actually takes a bucket load of work. I’ve done it for 3 websites, and every time it’s involved me writing full on plugins just to output the right code, or W3C acceptable code, or overwrite the damned code thats stored outwith the templates (why is that btw?).

Can i stop and ask that? WHY does a theme designer NEED to write alot of non basic php code as a separate to their theme plugin, just to over write HARDCODED design output? Since when was hardcoding design output into the core of a theme-able piece of software a good idea?

What you can’t do with bbpress, is hand a Designer/ HTML coder your template files and expect to get anything back that’s not a flat output of a table. It’s a point I raised a while ago (and i’ll not bang on about it) but BBpress works at doing one thing. Outputting a flat list from a database.

In terms of your all forums kinda look the same , i have to agree in this instance. Most forums, ipb/vBulletin/phpBB etc do all look the same. but guess what. bbpress doesn’t look much like them. I’ve stated before BBpress’s horrific handling of parent/children with categories etc. is bloody woeful; but if you’re talking about usability, then bbpress starts to fall down a little.

What it outputs is simple, yes, to the user, but it’s not very perceptive. Finding a specific post or vital information (say that 0.9 = WP2.5 – you know , something you’d expect to be on the documentation or download page but is actually on page 3 of a topic started 1 year ago) , is a disaster. It’s reliant on the user

who posted the content using TAGS appropriotely and ofc it requires a better search function.

Lets not forget that ‘tags’ are fairly new, and really only web savvy people use/know about them. A huge chunk of this software’s cross-pollination and iteration is taken out of the developers hands and placed smack bang in teh hand of the end user (whom we know nothing about nor can reply on).

Just because something is simple/plain, does not make it inherently usable.

Think Boo.com.

================================================

Anyway, there are a number of things we’d all like to see fixed in bbpress. Some more vital than others. we’ll all agree and disagree on many, but my over riding feeling is this:

Our Clients, customers, friends, colleagues, schools, own sites, will at some stage like to, nah need to, be updated to the latest version of WordPress. it will vary from person to person, but at some stage you know that a wordpress upgrade is probably in the pipes.

But if you’re using BBpress, then you’ve been forced to hold off upgrading for over half a year. We will be/are a whole version behind, and surely someone can see that it’s got to be an issue.

I suppose what i dont understand is, and maybe i’m the only one, so please 100% feel free to explain it to me like an idiot.

if The most requested topic on this website is “wordpress integration”, and the singular fail point of the software is “wordpress integration”, and teh company that owns this software also own wordpress, and it happens to be your singular initial selling point of the software, um, well, WHY THE HELL HAS IT NOT BEEN THE ONLY PRIORITY AND FIXED IN THE 3 MONTHS SINCE 1.0ALPHA CAME OUT?

We’ve had other fixes, new code, new features, a facebook page (see i hadn’t forgotten), but yet without even a hint of when this base level feature might appear, we’re told it’s a moving target.

Please, explain it to me like a 5 year old, that hasn’t read the blog posts linking to the $29 million dollars investment, that also lead to Sam being taken on as a full time developer on bbpress (i.e. dont say no time/resources).