Good Forum Software for Website

[Coiledvipers]

I am new to webhosting so this is all fairly new to me on how to set up everything . Where to buy domain name. I know of godaddy but that's about it. I would like to have a nice forum with anti-bots. I want to limit NSF pictures and limit Curse words what would you recommend? For what I am looking for. Thanks in advance.

[kraze]

I am new to webhosting so this is all fairly new to me on how to set up everything . Where to buy domain name. I know of godaddy but that's about it. I would like to have a nice forum with anti-bots. I want to limit NSF pictures and limit Curse words what would you recommend? For what I am looking for. Thanks in advance.

phpBB and SMF should be extremely similar in this case. Both would offer some anti-spam plugins/settings and both would have some anti-spam and bot settings/mods.

It's mainly personally preference. I'd recommend phpBB, but that's just because I'm familiar with it.

As for the domain. GoDaddy or NameCheap are generally the best places but if you wanted other places you could look at HostGator or Site5.

[Coiledvipers]

Is the phpBB and then getting domain easy and hassle free or is it gonna be hours worth of work. Like I said I am fairly new to all this and I don't expect it to be click done click well my site is done I expect a little bit of things to do. I download it then Do I just upload it on the control panel of my Website? Is it hard?

[kraze]

Is the phpBB and then getting domain easy and hassle free or is it gonna be hours worth of work. Like I said I am fairly new to all this and I don't expect it to be click done click well my site is done I expect a little bit of things to do. I download it then Do I just upload it on the control panel of my Website? Is it hard?

The process itself is very easy. It really just requires that you be patient take the time to learn. Buying the domain, adding it to our hosting here and installing phpBB is extremely easy and would likely take you 20 minutes(Not including the DNS propagation for the domain)?

Now, configuring it to your liking and tweaking things will be much longer though.

We offer an phpBB autoinstaller in our control panel which streamlines the process. So you don't need to upload any files on that regard. Adding a domain is also very easy. Which we have a guide on how to do so here.
http://www.nfoservers.com/forums/viewto ... =19&t=8227

[Coiledvipers]

Well I got the whole weekend time to learn something new Thank you very Much for the info time to buy a domain fun fun. Thanks again for all your help.

[kraze]

Well I got the whole weekend time to learn something new Thank you very Much for the info time to buy a domain fun fun. Thanks again for all your help.

No problem. If you get stuck or need any help, please do post here.

[Coiledvipers]

One other thing Should I make my Domain Private or should I have my personal info with it Godaddy has that Privacy thing should I go with that? Do people actually try and steal Domain names? Or contact the domain holder? EDIT on when I am buying to I click new server or existing server? Only has my TS server on there.

[kraze]

One other thing Should I make my Domain Private or should I have my personal info with it Godaddy has that Privacy thing should I go with that? Do people actually try and steal Domain names? Or contact the domain holder? EDIT on when I am buying to I click new server or existing server? Only has my TS server on there.

I'm sure some people try to steal domains, but I've never had a problem with this. If you are worried about people using the whois information you can purchase whois protection which hides this information.

[Coiledvipers]

When I go to my website it has a list of index nothing else I wish it would go straight to the forum is there anyway to do this?

[kraze]

When I go to my website it has a list of index nothing else I wish it would go straight to the forum is there anyway to do this?

Yes, via the domains tab in your control panel. Change the "Where it points" box to something like "public/forums" or whatever the directory is to your forums folder.

[Coiledvipers]

When I go to my website it has a list of index nothing else I wish it would go straight to the forum is there anyway to do this?

Yes, via the domains tab in your control panel. Change the "Where it points" box to something like "public/forums" or whatever the directory is to your forums folder.

Could not find it could you generate a Screenshot of it? So I know where this is?

[kraze]

Go to your control panel and click on the website in the left hand side. Than you'll see a second navigation bar with a bunch of tabs. One of those tabs will say "Domains". That is where you can edit where the domains point.

[Coiledvipers]

I found the domains I see this

Subdomain with @ then type Folder target is Public then another tab is with www Folder and target if Public.


Where would I put The Public/Forums so it directs to the forums page.

[$atanic $pirit]

Basically what is recommended is you upload your forum files to a folder inside public_html.

Then you will redirect your domain to that folder. By default domain name will point to public_html, but creating a folder inside will allow you to manage things better. You can add as many domains as you want, with each pointing to different folder or website.

The way I like to do stuff is lets say I made a website in one folder and then I installed forum in another. Most probably you wanna use it for gaming so things like amxbans and sourcebans can go to different folders. Overall it will be well organized.

[rymax99]

So to sum up the 3 major free forum software available:

SMF: Simple, not many mods, easy to use, doesn't have many advanced features, but it gets the job done. Doesn't have very many decent themes.

MyBB: My personal favorite of the 3. Decent themes, easy to find good premium themes, great template system, easy to edit themes, lots of plugins, great community.

phpBB: A bit outdated, pretty simple, has most features you'd need, lacks a few features that you'd want, hard to install some plugins if you don't know what you're doing. A GREAT selection of free themes on the phpBB site.

All 3 are decent overall as a whole, I wouldn't venture off to no mans land and use newly developed forum software, as they often are not very optimized, and have lots of vulnerabilities in them. You're better off to use well established forum software.