phpBB vs. vBulletin

In my opinion the templating system is also a lot better in vBulletin. I always found it extremely annoying in PHPBB, and editing the colours in the admin panel never seemed to make any difference. In vBulletin the ability to revert to the default is also very important in my opinion.

Oh, and the mambo thing can be done easily with vBulletin as well.

 

My feelings exactly. I prefer to have a quicker loading forum with ONLY the bells and whistles I'll actually use.

 

My users are not exactly the most IT literate in the world. I have been looking at the "bells and whistles" here and thinking how badly a lot of my users would cope with them!

jema

 

I suspect that's generally true, jema. I'd say the majority of the add-ons/mods I have installed are there to make my admin tasks easier to do rather than to add enahnacements for members.

 

I have even wondered about the use of pulldowns in general in VBulletin?

Yes I know that they are everywhere in applications, but on web pages they are still not that common, it is easy to under estimate just how web illiterate people can be. Have you ever seen poeple routinely type a web address into a search bar to find a site

Having been coding for 25 years, I do find it hard to grasp exactly what people fail to grasp!

jema

 

I personally prefer IPB over vB and definately over PHPBB... vB makes me not want to post usually, it's weird, I just don't feel like posting on vB forums very much... IPB on the other hand, I love it

 

To be honest, it never entered my mind as to the software used on a forum as a poster. I will post on any forum as long as the administrators are not censors or complete numbskulls.

Next, the software that is used on a forum is not the real issue for users, but the technical and administration of the site are the most important factors for the users.

If a forum is being hacked and is down that is bad, it is also bad when the webmaster does not know how to enable features that are standard on most forums.

So the technical operation of the forum is the most important factor, not the software used.

The reason Digital Point is so successful is with a small staff (Shawn) is because of Shawn's technical ability which is mostly unmatched by most forums across the internet, even those with large technical staffs.

How much downtime have I seen a DP since I have been here, NONE.

That means a hell of a lot.

When I first got here, I got on Shawn's back real bad for a missing thread and he was able to rebuild it quickly, he mentioned the database crashed or something.

I thought he was just censoring me as other forums were doing at that time, but I believe his answer was true as to why the thread came up missing.

 

I guess that's why it's nice to have choice... Different people... Different software.

 

I'm having a bit of a problem picking out which forum software to use (I'm starting my own forum, watch this space, lol)

Like blueUniverse I'm also 15 and I'm not really sure whether it's worth spending my cash on software if their is a free, competitive alternative.

Should I wait until my forum hits the bit time before I change over, or will that be too much work changing over to be worth it?

I'd really appreciate the advice.

~ kiddo

 

Forget phpBB. If you have the money, vBulletin. If you don't (and most 15 year olds probably don't), give SMF a try.

 

If all I had in my name was $180.00 and I was starting a forum, I would spend it on vBulletin.

 

Maybe you would. That would be pretty dumb, though.

Have you even tried SMF? or phpBB for that matter? or anything else in terms of alternatives?

And byt the way, it's still $160 USD last time I looked.

 

vBulletin, people would much rather visit a vbulletin forum that phpbb in my experience. I'm 14 and there is always money too get a little $$, whatever happens, in the end if you spend 1 month raising the cash, its worth buying vbulletin.

 

SMF is not bad, but vB is far better. I don't recommend phpBB to anyone.

 

If money is an issue, going the phpBB route and coverting to vB further down the track is easy enough. I did it this way and the transition was pretty seamless. Members weren't too fussed having to adapt to new software either (and they ain't very internet savvy)

 

I agree with dcristo except for the phpBB part - I think SMF is a better option at this point.

 

SMF is not bad (example). But still not the same quality as vBulletin

 

I am always lost on phpbb forums as there is no "New Posts" or "Todays posts" like VB,Imagine a forum like DP with 30 categories and number of sub-categories running on phpbb,i will have to spend half a day looking for new threads/posts.

Also the support for plugins make VB a lot easier to customize.

 

To be fair, there are MODs for both phpBB and SMF that will do that.