How to create a forum

[Greedo]

I am toying with the idea of adding a forum to my sites. Does anyone have experience of doing this?

I have half decent site design skills but no programing skills or owt like that yet.

Of the top of my head...

1) How easy is it to do?
2) How long does it take?
3) Can you get by with basic skills?
4) Any recommended software to do the job?
5) My server is Apache with seperate CGI and SQL servers. Any issues?

I know some of these questions are a bit vague but I am after general ideas/feelings to start with from people who know how it's done.

Cheers chaps.

[Brendon]

Software is the easy bit. If you don't have the skills, or the time to spend setting it up, hire a decent techie, shouldn't be more than a couple of hours to get a forum script installed and running.

Actually managing the forum, getting it to self sufficiency, and building the community is by far the greatest challenge. I was a mod at Webmasterworld for quite a while, and watched it go from "read every post every day" to "Christ, HOW many posts in Google this hour?". Managing that is/was a serious challenge. You have NO idea how much work goes into keeping things running smoothly there. Be prepared for that

[scifind]

if you want a freebie, PHP MYSQL try phpbb. simple setup BUT you have to stay on top of the security patches.
http://www.phpbb.com/

Many paid for forum software packages out there.

[rsmini]

Another freebie to try is http://www.simplemachines.org I've been using ot for some time and it is simple to set with loads of support / themes / mods etc. If you are using Mambo or Joomla CMS it will integrate into them as well

If you need you can view my forum here

[accelerator]

I would say phpbb is worth considering if you are looking for a free option. I have an installation running at:

http://flatscreenforum.co.uk/phpBB2/index.php

Which is not exactly the busiest forum on the internet yet!

As scifi rightly says, you have to keep patching it with security releases. With phpbb, you will attract a lot of spam. I switched on the image verification of new users, but I still get a few spammers. In answer to your questions:

1) How easy - I found the install quite easy, but then I'm a coder and my host was set up with auto-install scripts. It took me about six hours start to finish working everything out. If you don't know php and MySql, it's going to take you a lot longer to get your head around everything (25 hours??)

2) Oops answered in 1)

3) Not really

4) phpBB if free, Invision Powerboard (like this forum) if you're going to pay.

5) phpBB is php/MySql, which you should be able to run on Apache

Rgds

Accelerator

Originally Posted by Greedo I am toying with the idea of adding a forum to my sites. Does anyone have experience of doing this? I have half decent site design skills but no programing skills or owt like that yet. Of the top of my head... 1) How easy is it to do? 2) How long does it take? 3) Can you get by with basic skills? 4) Any recommended software to do the job? 5) My server is Apache with seperate CGI and SQL servers. Any issues? I know some of these questions are a bit vague but I am after general ideas/feelings to start with from people who know how it's done. Cheers chaps.

[globoChris]

Theres a nice looking piece of forum kit called vanilla. Never set it up myself but if I did, thats the one id try first.

[David Bowley]

As said above, but I just want to hammer the point home: running the community is the biggest thing to be worried about. I'm not even sure it's worth all the hassles and that. I would say, only go down the forum route if it's a definiate money maker, otherwise it's just a whole load of stress for nothing. If you think it might be sucessful then go ahead and do it, but as soon as you can get someone who'll be able to admin the forum for you.

Perhaps someone that knows a thing or two about computers and the net but doesn't do it full time and has a few hours a day spare. And as for mods and admins and the like - if you recruit online and you don't really know them, don't pay them as they'll probably be happy to do it for free and would just like to know that they're appreciated. But if it's an offline buddy, I'd seriously consider paying him for his time.

[AcornDomains]

Forum administration is a lot of work and can be stressful but rewarding at the same time if the site takes off.

My domain name forum just passed 1,500 members which is still low compared to some of the big US sites (and this one).

I started with PHPBB and then upgraded it to vBulletin.

If you are serious about the site, go with VB from the start, the upgrade was very tricky and to be avoided if possible.

With VB you get many more Administration options and features but it comes at a price.

[David Bowley]

Another thought for you - try and make the modding as automatic as possible! It sounds strange doesn't it but if you're tricky enough it can work out for you. At a forum I mod on the main problem was that new users posting in specific subforums were only registering to spam and advertise their own sites. So we created a system whereby new members didn't have the same priviledges as more established members - for example they couldn't post in the subforums where they would usually cause the most probs.

This has pretty much cut down the spam level to almost zero, although you'll always get the one or two stupid fools who think that they can make a difference for their site.

Just goes to show that although it does take a lot of work - sometimes a little bit of the workload can be taken off your shoulders.

[AcornDomains]

I agree, spammers on forums are a big problem.

Using VB I am able to set it so that new members signatures do not show until after they have made 25 posts. I did this as I found people would sign up and post "thanks" to every post just to advertise their signature.

[brightmobile]

My mate setup satcoders.co.uk using vbulletin. His site has is running very smoothly although most people use his site solely for setanta sports codes and red hot adult tv codes.

The user after registration doesnt have as many privelages as premium users which is a good thing as new members sometimes dont have a clue what to and what not to post.