Totally new to bbpress and buddypress; very experienced in WP.
One of our sites is a public site that services a new interest group. There is an informal small number of people (a fraction of total visitor population who visit the WP site) who are very active in developing the group and expanding the geographical adaption of the subject of the website. They interface with municipal departments, community events organizations, the educational community (public and private), etc; all of whom will be invited to participate in this private forum.
The Goal: We need a separate forum for this group where they can communicate within on each persons results and ideas on a number of projects. We don’t care if these people are already registered users of the WP site. In other words, it’s just fine if the forum is ‘stand-alone’ with it’s own registration. It does have to be private however; i.e., the opening home page needs to be a log-in page not showing the forum(s) content, and access is only available to registered users who will be added by the forum administrators only.

Not being at all informed on either bbpress or buddypress, and not finding the answers I need after many hours of reading through both the bbpress and buddypress sites, I installed bbpress in a subdomain to the WP install. (I used the Simple Scripts install from the hosting company we use, so I’m assuming that it was not a plugin install, but instead a full bbpress install; which appears to be working fine – just not provding me with the secured login we need.)
So the Questions: Is bbpress the right choice here, or should I be looking at something else? If something else, I’m open to suggestions.
Thanks in advance.

[@miguelcortereal Participant 12 years, 4 months ago]

A subdomain is a good idea to ease a lot of extra configurations to keep your forum private from the other site members.

When opening the forums use attributes (private, hidden) and give your members the matching privileges so that a stranger to the site that happens to visit it don’t see what’s going on.

On your WordPress dashboard (subdomain install) at Options –> Privacy block search engines other wise you will have your forums at google listings and other search engines listings.

If you just want those people debating around subjects bbpress is all you need.
If want them to debating on several subjects, and iteracting between them one to one or one to many, maybe buddypress should be better choice and leave bbpress.

Concerning to have your site locked to outsiders there are plugins for that.

[@poppykalash Member 12 years, 4 months ago]

Hello – I’m trying to sort out a couple of private forums for two different but small groups on my site. I have installed bbpress and something called forum restrict which allows admin to choose who has access to which forum. The two forums appear on the front static page and non members of the forum are able to APPLY. Problem is there is no LOG IN available. Do I have to install another plug in so approved forum users can LOG IN?

I’m very very new to all this and wondering if like the originator of this thread I’m barking up the wrong tree. At present people do not have to LOG in to my site to view the pages. I want all the pages to be freely available to the public but I do want control over who can use the forums. Any help in layman’s language gratefully received
Thanks in advance

[miguelcortereal]

Play with three things:
1- when creating a new forum or editing an existing one at your right you have forum attributes. At visibility you have three options (Public, Private or Hidden).
2- The same described above for topics.
3- Go to users, select one to edit and give him Forum Moderator Role, its a dropdown menu in the midlle of the page. Play a litle with that and you’ll understand how it works to find out if it suits your needs. No other login is necessary but just give to certain people the right privileges.

• This reply was modified 12 years, 4 months ago by miguelcortereal.
• This reply was modified 12 years, 4 months ago by miguelcortereal.

[@richardwantstoknow Participant 12 years, 4 months ago]

Miguel,
Thanks. I’ll give your suggestions a run in the next couple of days. I have to decide upon bbpress or buddypress per your criteria.
I didn’t see this info on the bbpress and buddypress sites. Is it in the codex or where?
Thanks again.

[@richardwantstoknow Participant 12 years, 4 months ago]

Miguel,
I just looked at my install of bbpress, and on none of the Forums I’ve set up are there options to make them Public, Private or Hidden. That’s one of the points that has me stuck.

[@miguelcortereal Participant 12 years, 4 months ago]

Edit or create forums and topics from dashboard painel. Once in the editor at your right you’ll see a box forum or topic attributes.

I guess this is only for the latest version of bbpress.