Has anyone used both these forum scripts and can tell me which is better? I use SMF but am thinking of switching to myBB. Would appreciate any feedback from those with experience using both of these scripts. Pros and Cons of both? Thanks.
In my experience SMF is similar to IPB 1.3 but with a control panel resembling phpBB MyBB is a fully featured forum resembling vBulletin and with similar plugins, hacks and mods, but as easier to manage as newer IPB versions.
Thanks! I'll give you some green when I can pass it around. That's why I want to switch as I heard MyBB is similar to vBulletin and that's what I am most familiar with. I have a forum starting to pick up and find SMF not so great to use, and my members don't seem to be getting it all too well either.... quoting, profiles, etc.
myBB is like vBulletin in many aspects but not all. I have found the vBulletin admin/moderator tools to be more refined in several regards. For instance, applying patches is very straightforward on vBulletin. In my experience, although the model seems to be the same on myBB, they haven't quite developed it to the point yet where it is as smooth and easy to apply patches or upgrade as in vBulletin. SMF handles this in its own slightly different way which is also nice when it works (which, quite often, it doesn't when you have third-party mods installed.)
Ive used em both and run communities off both. SMF has one of the most confusing customization areas in the acp. 90% of the community has trouble just putting in a banner in the header. vB for sure, though I do think they should check more since there are so many patches out there for security.
once you learn how to use SMF, you can just play with .php via SMF. Simple to use anything moreover SMF v2.0 on it's way
you mean the customized themes? i'm using smf and i don't have problems customizing the themes or the new packages that i'm installing. most smf packages (like ad management ; arcade ; etc..) will only work on the "default" forum theme, right? and they said you need to modify your current (customized) theme to make it work properly.. well, i found an easy way to do that (it worked for me always anyway): everytime you installed something, all you have to do is copy the file from the default and move it to the customized theme (example : copy the theme/default/index.template.php and moved it to theme/yourcustomizedtheme/index.template.php) if you're not sure about it, do a back up before modifying anything.
i have used both forums SMF is good but drawback is its url with Session IDs I like MyBB because i have many option to change layouts but i am still confuse where i can add advertisement?
You can do that by editing templates. I used SMF for about 2 days, then upgraded to phpBB, I was on that for a week before upgrading to MyBB. I hate SMF, and the plugins and hacks in MyBB are great, plus great support. The only thing that could be improved is the moderation controls, and I believe that is coming out with MyBB 1.4. MyBB is the best free software, it is safe and secure, easy to manage, and tonnes of features. BP
i haven't tried MYBB, but i have tried phpbb and smf and i would recommend SMF one person posted difficulty with adding banners etc, probably because your not familiar with it. all smf mods install on the default theme, if your using a custom theme then editing is required, another easy task. one poster mentioned using smf and upgrading to phpbb, sorry, but thats a downgrade. another poster mentioned the control panel of smf being similar to phpbb, NOT, there is no comparison, the admin area of smf is rich with features, phpbb wishes it could do what smf does. when it comes to free forums, i choose SMF VB is the best if your going to pay for it. just my 2 cents worth
I prefer MyBB any day of the week. It's an awesome, easy to use and easy to admin board. Templates > Modify / Delete > Your Theme (Default or other) >> Expand Edit the header or footer to insert, or edit something else to insert them.
Well after much more experience with this SMF, I'm not thrilled, I guess I'm just a vBulletin girl at heart. Today I needed to remove 110 posts of a member I banned (because they pretended to be someone they're not). I didn't want to delete the user. I had to manually move each individual post to the trash, so time consuming. When I do a search for all their posts I should be able to "select all" and move them to the trash at once. I am just going to have to wait until I can afford it and get vBulletin, don't even want to try myBB anymore.
vBulletin is NICE Although the new phpBB3 is quite good as well. In my opinion, phpBB3 and myBB (I always thought myBB was more like IPB) are the free ways to go. I could never get into the SMF thing even though I tried very hard to like it.
Did you express your concerns to the SMF dev team or make a feature request? I agree the feature set of the admin tools is limited to say the very least compared to some other packages.
Profile > Delete this account > Remove posts made by this member: (None / All Posts / Topics & Posts) > Leave Delete this member's account checkbox unchecked.