posted
The best free forum software I've seen is at http://www.synthigence.com -- although, as .NET software, you may not be able to run it on all servers.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
I run Invision Power Board, AJ. It has the "fun"-ish parts of the "free" boards available on the net, and the more powerful "administration" features usually reserved for the commercial ones (VBulliten, UBB). Invision has a commercial license, but I happen to use the free license that they offer, in which the only requirement is that the markers for identifying that it is Powered by Invision Power Board remain on the forum. Not a big deal for me, since I totally support the company (they have great support). And it can be run on any web server that can run a SQL database (which most nowadays can) and PHP (which most nowadays can). The other plus is that it really isn't difficult to set up or administer.
Posts: 779 | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
thanks, Leto, is the grenme forum still up?
So far, I'm liking Mack's the most, the UBB stuff seems a little pricey for what we need. I'll look at Tom's links after lunch.
What I'd like is, I think, a closed membership except for one "inquiries" forum. The people that are members of this organization, since it already exists, should be pretty decent about self-regulation, but I don't want to leave it totally open and run the risk of trolls. This may mean I don't actually need as many moderator functions. On the other hand I can see wishing I had them and being powerless to do anything.
quote:On the free stuff can you restrict users to make certain areas closed to members only? Is the free stuff easier to hack?
Most forum software can have certain areas restricted to members only. And any forum software is only as secure (as far as hacking) as the machine it's being run on and the administrator of the forum itself.
posted
Here's a link to the GreNME forums. John uses Invision Power Board, which I think is free, but I'm not sure. I know he's had some problems with it in the past, but things have been going pretty smoothly for a while now.
I run phpBB, which is free. I like it pretty well. It's pretty configurable, and if you have an understanding of php, not that hard to hack. Actually, for a lot of stuff you don't even need php, as you can alter a lot of the board's look and feel by altering templates, although I've found the template language they use to be a bit confusing. So far I have had no problems with it that cannot be attributed to general problems with my hosting service.
If you're willing to pay for a software package, I've heard very good things about vBulletin.
Edit: OK, so I'm slow. So what? Oh, and ditto what John said about restricting access.
posted
I really like CougarBoard. It has great features like html chat (which get's around firewalls that don't like java) and is just a very clean, well layed out BB. If you check it out and want to get in touch with the owners, email me and I could hook you up.
Posts: 995 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
peterh, thanks, I've seen that layout on a lot of sports type sites. But, I think I want a layout style like hatrack given the particular people I'm dealing with (many of them are engineers). The cougar layout gets cluttered,though, which is fine for a rabid sports forum where people are going to participate no matter what, but not so good for a forum where we want to encourage participation and not intimidate people.
Tom's software looks excellent for starting. Very clean and uncluttered, but with the ability to post pictures. The free is a nice touch too. I'm looking at $200 or under in price preferably under since we will have to pay for the hosting too. I'm still looking though...
posted
Ahh both leto and mack are running invision. I didn't realize there was a free version. It says there will be a little banner down at the bottom saying it is a free trial version, but neither Leto's or Macks' acutally says that.
Right now personally I'm leaning towards that or Tom's, and away from the sakeriver style.
(note: all of your forums are wonderful, I'm analyzing software presentations and judging it against what I think would be best for this group.)
How much do you guys pay for bandwith and servers, or do you have your own?
They have a link on the home page to a demo board that you can play around with (you have access to all the admin tools and everything).
Posts: 1336 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
Anna, I think those prices are for the hosting service. The actual software is a free download, although it's $99 for the source code.
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Edit: Ah. That's what you were saying. I didn't realize that you didn't already have a domain and host. You may want to reconsider Synthigence, then, because it's an ASP forum and is consequently fairly demanding, system-wise, when compared to a PHP/MySQL competitor.
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Second edit: As a side note, I've heard nothing but good things about e-blah AND Invision. Really, it's slightly hard to go wrong with forum software, as long as you're comfortable with the code used to write and display it.
posted
Given that the group I'm dealing with is fairly technology savvy (It is actually a very small sorority for women in technical studies) it is possible that someone may have the bandwith to donate.
I'm one of the less strictly code savvy people. The problem that I think is being encountered though is that the non-code savvy people are turned off by using the normal channels of communication (an e-mail list serve that I still don't know the basic commands for), and the communication isn't as real time, and more business oriented in nature.
What has happene is that now we are out of college, the alum types(including the most technically oriented people) is feeling very alientated from each other, and while a few of the friendships are still going on IRL we have lost our sense of community and identity in the greater scheme of things IMO.
We need the fluff to bond us back together again, and help incorporate new graduates. We need some place where you can post that the baby has diarhea and if I have to change another dirty diaper I'm going to scream. We have lost the minutae part of everyday lives that are the little things that hold the group together.
Also even though it is a small sorority it is a national organization, but right now the different alumnae chapters are very isolated in communication between each other. I probably do have "sisters" right here in the Chicago area but other than the national directory I have no way of knowing who they are or finding them or finding out if we have anything in common.
In a lot of ways in my own life, Hatrack took the place of this sorority community after I graduated. And I'm glad to have hatrack, but I feel the other organization is tearing itself apart from within due to member isolation. I know a forum won't solve everything but it might be a good start in getting things back on track.
If it was a forum I would hope it would become a place where I could invite women in technical fields from hatrack to check out, people like CT, and anne kate or The Rabbit to name a few. They are a lot like the cool women that caused me to join in the first place since I have been rabidly anti-sorority in the past. I only joined when I realized that after three years all the girls that were members were people that were already my friends, and that they didn't treat me any differently whether I was or wasn't a member.
posted
You can customize phpBB to look more or less however you like, but if those other boards are configured the way you're looking for out of the box then that sounds like less work. (phpBB looks pretty much like sakeriver out of the box.)
As far as hosting, I currently use iPowerWeb, which is cheap but I've noticed that it's slow and I've had more downtime than I would prefer. The best hosting package I've found, and the one I'll likely switch to when my contract with iPowerWeb is up is Hostony. They have some very full-featured shared hosting packages that come with a lot of monthly bandwidth.
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
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I didn't realize that you didn't already have a domain and host. You may want to reconsider Synthigence, then, because it's an ASP forum and is consequently fairly demanding, system-wise, when compared to a PHP/MySQL competitor. ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
