Haven't given this a try yet but this from the same guy that made Stack Overflow.
http://www.discourse.org/about/
http://www.discourse.org/about/
Next-generation internet forums ?
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Two Factor Authentication is now available on BeyondUnreal Forums. To configure it, visit your Profile and look for the "Two Step Verification" option on the left side. We can send codes via email (may be slower) or you can set up any TOTP Authenticator app on your phone (Authy, Google Authenticator, etc) to deliver codes. It is highly recommended that you configure this to keep your account safe.
I'd rather buy a vBulletin license. Kinda in the market as I'm setting up a site for my Planetside outfit. I'll still give it a try.
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My main problem with vBulletin is, ever since they were bought by Internet Brands, they have turned to utter trash in almost every single way. They are still riding the coattails of Jelsoft, and eventually that will end.
There are certainly some nice things about vB, but their support ABSOLUTELY BLOWS. They treat customers like garbage on their public and private forums. They have site-breaking bugs that never get fixed. They straight up admit they will never keep up with PHP updates, even if the updates are during the support period (vB4 still doesn't work with PHP 5.4+ and vB5 still doesn't work with PHP 5.5+, and PHP 5.4 support is touted as a feature of vB5). In terms of how much they give a crap about anyone using their platform, it went from 10 under Jelsoft to -500 under Internet Brands. Part of this is likely because the founders of Jelsoft left the company after cashing out from IB.
It is really depressing. I have considered updating vB on BU for several years, but I just can't justify it. vB4 is not as good as vB3 and vB5 is not as good as vB4. Right now I'm evaluating some vB competitors to see if there is something that will work for us, which is sad because BU was one of the first vB forums around and we've been with the company since its tiny beginnings. I really can't see us extending our relationship with them, though.
There are certainly some nice things about vB, but their support ABSOLUTELY BLOWS. They treat customers like garbage on their public and private forums. They have site-breaking bugs that never get fixed. They straight up admit they will never keep up with PHP updates, even if the updates are during the support period (vB4 still doesn't work with PHP 5.4+ and vB5 still doesn't work with PHP 5.5+, and PHP 5.4 support is touted as a feature of vB5). In terms of how much they give a crap about anyone using their platform, it went from 10 under Jelsoft to -500 under Internet Brands. Part of this is likely because the founders of Jelsoft left the company after cashing out from IB.
It is really depressing. I have considered updating vB on BU for several years, but I just can't justify it. vB4 is not as good as vB3 and vB5 is not as good as vB4. Right now I'm evaluating some vB competitors to see if there is something that will work for us, which is sad because BU was one of the first vB forums around and we've been with the company since its tiny beginnings. I really can't see us extending our relationship with them, though.
they're selling their hosted platform, not the software.
vB version 3 is a great platform, with to much work it could be made to output more modern code. I've used vB4 but it sucks major balls and I don't want to go near vB5.
There are much better free products these days.
What free ones do you like? I've seen Simple Machines Forum, and PHPBB, but neither is as polished as vb3. Plus these free ones are always suffering security problems.
XenForo seems to be the top paid solution.
XenForo seems to be the top paid solution.
I've used Simple Machines for a long time and have never encountered a serious security issue. The only problem with SMF is spam, but that problem exists with every forum software.
every time they change it, people complain for a few days/weeks then completely forget what the old layout even looked like and stop.
"Next-generation" doesn't need to be applied to forums. Forums work fine as they are. They're not mailing lists.
The last hyped up "next gen" forum I saw was Vanilla - which looks horrible and simple like some social networking site. Xenforo is also similar. When I saw these two deployed on a couple of forums i've visited there was nothing but revolt about their regressive 'next gen' changes.
I have had great experience with SMF though, for over 7 years, and I don't have to deal with hundreds of spambot signups a day either because I have this neat little captcha installed where you'd have to rotate 3 images to be upright
and I could get SMF looking 'next gen' by deleting large chunks out of the templates files and increasing the font size.
For vB-esque needs there is this FOSS vB knockoff
The last hyped up "next gen" forum I saw was Vanilla - which looks horrible and simple like some social networking site. Xenforo is also similar. When I saw these two deployed on a couple of forums i've visited there was nothing but revolt about their regressive 'next gen' changes.
I have had great experience with SMF though, for over 7 years, and I don't have to deal with hundreds of spambot signups a day either because I have this neat little captcha installed where you'd have to rotate 3 images to be upright
and I could get SMF looking 'next gen' by deleting large chunks out of the templates files and increasing the font size.For vB-esque needs there is this FOSS vB knockoff
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Or you could make Vanilla more to your taste (heh) by throwing in unnecessary bits and reducing the legibility of the text.
I have some experience with myBB and never had any problems with it, but this was a few years ago.
