Discussion Forums

In this article, Juan Martinez tackles one of the most common features on a website: a discussion forum. Forums are a primary tool for building online communities and driving traffic to a website. In this article, you'll step through the development of a moderated discussion forum from scratch. Analysis, design, implementation, and deployment will be covered to furnish a working moderated forum in C#.

• Get your own forum up and running quickly
• Extensive coverage of the Administration Control Panel to put you on the right track for managing your board
• Learn the secrets of a successful forum from other forum administrators

In Detail Written specifically to allow you to create a discussion forum, Invision Power Board (IPB) 2, provides all of the tools, features and functionality for you to set up and develop a vibrant community. Because it specializes in this one aspect of your website, all the features are geared towards this goal, and you can leave the improvement and additions to the Invision Power Services developers while you get on with managing the rest of your website.

If you are either already running a community forum based on Invision Power Board, or are planning on establishing one, then this is the book for you. This book will guide you through installing, configuring, managing and maintaining an Invision Power Board discussion forum on your own website.

The book begins with the initial installation and configuration of IPB on your system. You will then go on a tour of IPB and its features, for both users and administrators. This will grow your understanding and familiarise you with the power and possibilities of IPB.

IPB's Administration Control Panel is where you can control every aspect of your board. From users, forums and word filters to skins, templates and maintenance, everything can be done through the web-based control panel. The book devotes significant sections to covering these, getting you up to speed on the options available to you, and offering advice to help you make the right choices with your board administration.

To make your forums stand out from the rest, we cover skins and templates to take your first steps in customising your forum.

What you will learn from this book?

• How to Install and configure IPB
• Learn the basics of working with IPB forums
• Find your way round the Administration Control Panel
• Create and manage forums and permissions
• Maintain users and user groups
• Get to grips with IPB skins to customize your site
• Discover under-explored features such as the IPB post office, subscriptions, and filters
• Learn from other administrators the secrets of making a successful forum

This book is a fast-paced guide to the most important features of Invision Power Board, and how to make best use of these features to power your forum.

Who this book is written for?

This book is written for new and intermediate users of Invision Power Board, who want to manage and maintain an Invision Power Board discussion forum as easily as possible. No experience of web programming is required.

Configure, manage and maintain your own vBulletin discussion forum

• Get your own forum up and running quickly
• Extensive coverage of the Administration Control Panel to put you on the right track for managing your board
• Customize the appearance of your vBulletin forum
• Change the site's behavior by developing and installing hacks

In Detail

Written specifically to allow you to create a discussion forum, vBulletin, provides all of the tools, features and functionality for you to set up and develop a vibrant community. Because it specializes in this one aspect of your website, all the features are geared towards this goal, and you can leave the improvement and additions to the vBulletin developers while you get on with managing the rest of your website. If you are either already running a community forum based on vBulletin, or are planning on establishing one, then this is the book for you. This book will guide you through installing, configuring, managing and maintaining a vBulletin discussion forum on your own website. The book begins with the initial installation and configuration of vBulletin on your system. You will then go on a tour of vBulletin and its features, for both users and administrators. This will grow your understanding and familiarise you with the power and possibilities of vBulletin. vBulletin's Administration Control Panel is where you can control every aspect of your board. From users, forums and word filters to skins, templates and maintenance, everything can be done through the web-based control panel. The book devotes significant sections to covering these, getting you up to speed on the options available to you, and offering advice to help you make the right choices with your board administration. To make your forums stand out from the rest, we cover skins and templates to take your first steps in customising your forum. vBulletin is one of the most popular forum platforms available. Well known for its power and speed, it drives many of the most popular discussion forums on the Internet.

What you will learn from this book?

• Install and configure vBulletin
• Learn the your way around vBulletin with a thorough guided tour
• Customise your forum to meet the unique requirements of your community
• Administer users and posts, appoint staff to moderate your forum - or moderate it yourself
• See how to upgrade your vBulletin installation, or upgrade other forum systems to vBulletin
• Create a beautiful forum by designing templates or adjusting existing ones
• Install hacks to change vBulletin's behaviour or add new features - you will even see how to create your own hacks

Approach

Using a highly graphical, practical style the experienced authors show you how to get the most out of vBulletin.

Who this book is written for?

This book is written for new and intermediate users of vBulletin, who want to manage and maintain a vBulletin discussion forum as easily as possible. No experience of web programming is required.