# Utter n00b thinking about starting a Forum.



## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 14, 2008)

http://www.phpbb.com/

This is kinda a running project log. I'll be asking questions and trying to get help. Watch this space.


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## Kreij (May 14, 2008)

Go for it. If nothing else it will be a good learning experience.


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## echo75 (May 14, 2008)

there are lots of free forum hosting services out there that are as easy that even total phpbb dummies like myself can use, i actually am using one of them currently for my gaming guild .


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## Kreij (May 14, 2008)

Several years ago when a friend and I set up a guild site (for our EQ guild), I did all the web design and even wrote the forums from scratch. Now THAT was a learning experience.


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 14, 2008)

what forum software is TPU?


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## Darksaber (May 14, 2008)

TPU forum is powered by vBulletin® Version 3.7.0 (see the small print all the way on the bottom of this page)


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 14, 2008)

Ok so what are the advantages and disadvantages of various software.

Ease of use
Cost
Availability of Templates
Visual Appeal
Ease of administraton
Speed


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## Kreij (May 14, 2008)

[I.R.A]_FBi said:


> Ok so what are the advantages and disadvantages of various software.
> 
> Ease of use
> Cost
> ...



My personal opinion on this is as follows ...

Ease of Installation, setup and administration are a key factor. I would not want to have to plow through multiple manuals just to figure out how to install the various components and configure the various features.

Functionality. Does it do what I want it to do.

Cost : I would use a free one unless I was running a pro-site and might need support on the software and upgrade options. Rmember, you can always start with a free one and upgrade later if needed.

Templates are not so important. Most site forums are very similar with just color or other slight modifications.

Visual Appeal : This is of little importance, and is highly subjective. I think that the TPU forums have very little visual appeal, but functionally work very well.  Good color contrast is more important than fancy gizmoes and radical looks. I've seen some very nice looking  boards that were difficult to use because of the color scheme.

Speed : This will most likely depend on the machine the forum is running on and the underlying database structure. The bandwidth of the connection will also determine how users experience the "speed" of the boards.

Another thing that I think is important is the reliability of the forum/DB link. If the darn thing is corrupting records on a regular basis causing you to have to rebuild the DB it becomes a real pain in the butt.


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 15, 2008)

Thanks.

Do i need to learn php or mysql?


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## IggSter (May 15, 2008)

[I.R.A]_FBi said:


> Thanks.
> 
> Do i need to learn php or mysql?



Ive setup many a forum and you really dont need much in the way of php/mysql knowledge.

With my 1st install all the answers were found in minutes on google.

mysql stuff is 90% menu/web interface driven and php is mainly having to edit text files.

example:

<?php

/*
* Request forwarder, look at common/index.php for the action and license
*/

@error_reporting(E_ALL ^ E_NOTICE);
if (PHP_OS != 'Linux')
{
    @ini_set('include_path', ini_get('include_path').';.\\common\\includes');
}
else
{
    @ini_set('include_path', ini_get('include_path').':./common/includes');
}
include('common/index.php');
?>


A common edit to that would be to change the path if you have moved files etc.

With regard to choosing the right software:

If you are going to host it on your own server, install a xamp platform (or apache2triad). This is always the best/cheapest option to start out with. picking the actual forum s/w is a lot more tricky.
If your forum will be hosted on a 3rd party server, there will certainly be constraints on what s/w packages you can install.

Some pakages i like:

SMF by simply machines (nice skins)
phpBB (possibly most popular and lots of online help/guides)

Its also worth checking out Content Management web packages (these give the ability to have an all in one web site/news/rss/forums/galleries/music yada yada.

Try:
Joomla
Mambo
Plone
Drupal


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 15, 2008)

I want to start with a forum but i eventually want to expand to a full website with interviews and ish.


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## Kreij (May 15, 2008)

No, to start a forum you should not have to know the underlying language or database structure.
That is something that you can learn in small steps as you scope out the software that you choose.

It will be to your advantage to learn these things, but they are not required to run a board.
Once your forums are set up, you will be spending much more time dealing with the complaints than the features.


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 16, 2008)

Ok. doing some analyisis and feasibility studies informally now.

How do google ads work?


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## CrackerJack (May 16, 2008)

i'm going try this out. lol just something to play with.


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 16, 2008)

https://www.google.com/adsense/login/en_US/?gsessionid=2D2RhwxKxsI


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 18, 2008)

doesn phpbb come witrha chatroom feature?

i still dont have a name.

Im designing a site map now.


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## ShadowFold (May 18, 2008)

I have a forum for my after school club and its really easy to run with http://www.proboards.com/index.html


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (May 19, 2008)

does the newest ersion of phpbb have support for embedding youtube videoes and such?  what about the chat i asked earlier.


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## vampyres (May 31, 2008)

Both PHPbb and proboards are insanely simple to set up, and run (only 2 I have really used, so the only two forums I can say anything about). Yes, you can embed in PHPbb, and while PHPbb doesn't come with a chat you can get chat mods for it.  example http://www.123flashchat.com/phpbb_chat.html


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