New Forum Software

[Azareal]

This discussion is to discuss the new forum software which are entering the market, the positive benefits of the features which they are introducing to the forum market and the potential impact on the forum market as a whole from these features.

The forum market has been mainly stagnating for a number of years as many of the forum software have largely sharply slowed down when it comes to improving their software and the lack of progress eventually led to running my own open source forum software project called AtomBB as I needed a modern forum software which is capable of meeting the needs of my forums.

As you may know, a large number of new forum software projects have been starting over the last few years in order to bring much needed innovation to the forum market however, I don't think that their approach is going to have much of an impact on the forum market as they either lack key functionality (like usergroups) or they have insanely high software requirements (like Discourse).

With my project however, we are going with an approach where we have extensive Plugin API as it would make plugins much less likely to break between releases (plugins would in theory, almost never break when they only use the API and don't touch the code directly via hooks).
Another thing which we are going with are template hooks which allow plugins to inject content into certain points in the templates which is intended to make it easier to upgrade, so that plugins don't have to jump through hoops in order to modify the templates properly.

The Plugin API would have a positive impact of upgrades being a lot less painful as you don't have to chase as many plugins around (can be very bad when you have a large number of plugins installed) when a new big update is released which means that you can take advantage of the new features or changes made in the updates much faster. The same thing can be said about the template hooks.

A likely and possible impact on the forum market would possibly be the other forum software taking this functionality and using it themselves (or prioritising it further, if they already have it planned out) which would mean that the forum market as a whole would be pushed towards much less painful upgrades (particularly, in the free space where these features are nearly non-existent).

 

[Delirious]

Sounds promising. I always hate it when the software updates and a mod/plugin breaks because a bunch of code is changed. This is why you still see a lot of older version of forum software running because the people who made the mod isn't updating it anymore but the forum software makers are still updating. Phpbb3 has a big issue with this, though a lot of older mods still work. Which is a good thing.

 

[Azareal]

Sounds promising. I always hate it when the software updates and a mod/plugin breaks because a bunch of code is changed. This is why you still see a lot of older version of forum software running because the people who made the mod isn't updating it anymore but the forum software makers are still updating. Phpbb3 has a big issue with this, though a lot of older mods still work. Which is a good thing.

phpBB3 is a fairly bad one when it comes to that as many of the mods involve altering the code directly which makes it much harder to upgrade, than with a plugin based system.

 

[Quacker Jack]

Sounds promising. I always hate it when the software updates and a mod/plugin breaks because a bunch of code is changed. This is why you still see a lot of older version of forum software running because the people who made the mod isn't updating it anymore but the forum software makers are still updating. Phpbb3 has a big issue with this, though a lot of older mods still work. Which is a good thing.

phpBB3 is a fairly bad one when it comes to that as many of the mods involve altering the code directly which makes it much harder to upgrade, than with a plugin based system.

That is true.

I look forward to seeing your work Azareal. You know what they say, if you don't like it, make your own. I don't know how good myBB are and phpBB are, but another key element is, assuming you plan to make it into a competitor of these softwares, is developer simplicity. Make sure you can make it as easy as possible to develop, both from a design and plugin perspective. It sounds like you have that in mind for the plugin perspective though. 😉

 

[CM30]

So, do you have any information about anything other than potential customisation? Like, what the software might be called? What it'll look like? Etc? Because I like the sounds of it, but your post here just seems like a bunch of jargon and 'forum software is dated' cliches without much backing them up.

 

[J Greig]

So, do you have any information about anything other than potential customisation? Like, what the software might be called? What it'll look like? Etc? Because I like the sounds of it, but your post here just seems like a bunch of jargon and 'forum software is dated' cliches without much backing them up.

I agree. Could we know a little more about the software itself and not how it will be run. I'd like to know what the default design would be like and how it would handle themes/styles.

 

[Azareal]

Like, what the software might be called?

my own open source forum software project called AtomBB

I can give you tons of information. You actually have to read it though.

'forum software is dated' cliches

Forum software is dated. It's absolutely ridiculous that some of these supposedly "modern" software aren't even capable of giving a notice when a plugin is out of date. It's equally silly how easily plugins will break between minor updates and this is a huge problem whenever I'm having to upgrade a forum.
These are real world issues which forum administrators have to deal with all the time. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

What it'll look like?

A banner at the top, navigation bar below it, content below that and a footer at the bottom. Will probably have a configurable sidebar.

As for the functionality which the other forum software seem to have planned: It already has many of the "next generation" functionality like conversation style messaging, edit history, one-click theme uploading and so forth. With things like updating on the click of a button being on the way.
I didn't mention these before as the other free forum software seem to have these planned or are already implementing them.

 

[mav3n]

I am actually excited to see what you can do with this. It's amazing what people can do when they put their mind to it.

 

[Delirious]

Seems to me like CM30 just tried to shoot you down. I took the time to click the link in your signature and did some reading and even found screenshots of AtomBB. Seems pretty basic to me so far, but I have to remember it is in pre-alpha. With some work this forum software can be promising. If you ever need something just let me know and if I can help I will try my hardest.

 

[J Greig]

how it would handle themes/styles.

Will it be something like phpBB, or a system that MyBB uses? I think this is extremely important, because for me, the way phpBB works their style system is not very good at all, whereas MyBB has a much easier way of styling.

 

[Azareal]

how it would handle themes/styles.

Will it be something like phpBB, or a system that MyBB uses? I think this is extremely important, because for me, the way phpBB works their style system is not very good at all, whereas MyBB has a much easier way of styling.

I'm generally going for the best of both worlds.
For instance, phpBB has a proper template engine while MyBB has a fairly decent theme inheritance system.
I've also heard that you can browse the extensions from the Control Panel with SMF which is something which I'm aiming to do.

 

[J Greig]

I've also heard that you can browse the extensions from the Control Panel with SMF which is something which I'm aiming to do.

You can to a point in MyBB too, but it shows you some of the more popular plugins and a link to the mods download site.

 

[Delirious]

I've also heard that you can browse the extensions from the Control Panel with SMF which is something which I'm aiming to do.

I would like that. Something like WP (not a forum) has. Just have some type of server/website that handles all of the extensions. When you update your extension you could just delete and upload the new one so that the Control Panel would update it as well.

 

[Chadook]

Nice project, make sure to make it more unique than the existing forum softwares, i can't wait to see it done. 🙂

 

[Delirious]

Just a quick question. Since you said it was going to be open source this means it will be free right?

 

[Chadook]

Just a quick question. Since you said it was going to be open source this means it will be free right?

Usually it is.

 

[Delirious]

I was thinking the same thing. I've noticed some software that are open source you still must obtain a free license to use it. I forgot the name of it but I remember I had to register at their site and get a free key. I could get the better version if I purchase the pro version. The free version was pretty good though. The pro version just had stuff like 24 hour support and cool mods not in the free version.

 

[Chadook]

Ummm...in that case, let's see what he would say.

 

[J Greig]

Just a quick question. Since you said it was going to be open source this means it will be free right?

Usually it is.

No. Open source software never means it's free. You can get paid open source software.

Open source software means the user is free to modify the code to 'better' the software itself. It basically means that the code is viewable and can be edited to the users needs.

 

[Delirious]

Thanks for clearing that up some. You don't really see many paid open source software much though right?