Best Forum Software

[Third Eye]

vBulletin is the best forum software.

Invision Power Board is good but it can be hacked easily
pbpBB is freeware

 

[thunderbird.117]

One question. Does phpBB 3 have plugin support for skins and mods like vBulletin or IPB?

It is still in beta stage. So far when i checked it is very good. You can check it yourself by using localhost for testing.

 

[iMav]

its theme engine is similar to ipb ... mods will also be released how 1 can install them... i am not aware of that ... but the themes to install require 2 files and all ... u wont need to mod every theme ...

 

[navjotjsingh]

Yeah Ajax is definitely cool to use and makes your server breathe too. Imagine the no. of pageloads and html generated it saves.

Well SMF beats vbulletin unmodded in 1 way atleast. By default SMF has option of sending HTML newsletter which vb lacks.

I support vbulletin as the best. Its seo mod vbseo mod is another excellent utility which I think no forum has such powerful seo mod. Got my forum completely indexed with correct keywords and meta tags for all pages.

SMF seriously needs a powerful SEO mod even if its paid. SEO4SMF mod still has lot of bugs that can seriously get you penalised by search engines. It currently does not allow any other html page in SMF directory apart from converted urls. This is a big bug which the developer of mod is still not bothered to fix it.

I didn't compare the other 2 forum softwares IPB and phpBB because I don't use them often.

But phpbb seriously needs a change in the way mod/themes work since currently installing mods and themes is a big big pain in the a**. Even Easy Mod installer does not work for all mods/themes.

I hope phpBB 3 changes it. I have used the beta version and its ubercool and a serious competitior to SMF. Don't know how its mods/themes work currently.

 

[vish786]

Which forums do you like the most? Vote away!

My favourites:
Best free: InvisionFree
Best paid: Invision Power Board

no idea what your talking about....

 

[thunderbird.117]

no idea what your talking about....

1. *invisionfree.com/
2. *www.invisionpower.com/

 

[thecyclone2k]

I prefer vBulletin as, it is far off secure than other systems.

I have been using vBulletin for more than a year and didn't have had any problems.

 

[iMav]

lets get 1 thing very clear guys .... vb, ipb and phpbb2 (moded) or phpbb3 are all same when it comes to security ....

 

[Aberforth]

I have migrated from IPB to vB and I'd say it is the best decision I made yet, regarding my forum. The conversion took a bit time though considering 50000+ posts and 1200+ users but it was well worth it.

vBulletin has features which are like sci-fi in the IPB world and vB has a responsive and quick action community which contributes a lot of skins and mods free unlike IPB.

By the way, I see invisionfree as a forum software but it isn't actually a software is it? It is a forum hosting service using a modded version of IPB 1.3.

 

[satyamy]

Vbulletin

 

[Sukhdeep Singh]

By the way, I see invisionfree as a forum software but it isn't actually a software is it? It is a forum hosting service using a modded version of IPB 1.3.

Correct, when IPB was launched ,the developers said it will be free for life. But 1.3.1 was the last free version from IPB and it can be freely distributed.

Look at IPB now, most expensive forum script. I am with vBulletin, then IPB, SMF, phpbb last since customizing phpbb with skins and mods is a pain in ass

 

[iMav]

well not any more phpbb3 has a nice theme engine now ... bu yes still u want to manually edit them its a little difficult

 

[nileshgr]

The current forum beast is PHPBB 3.0 It has many features and a cool interface. But the best free one would be IPB free. Download it @ *invision.mihalism.com/

It is a part of Mihalism, Inc my website host. They were allowing to host the forum on their server but due to some bugs they abandoned the project.

 

[Aberforth]

Correct, when IPB was launched ,the developers said it will be free for life. But 1.3.1 was the last free version from IPB and it can be freely distributed.

Look at IPB now, most expensive forum script. I am with vBulletin, then IPB, SMF, phpbb last since customizing phpbb with skins and mods is a pain in ass

IPS was a one house in Virginia company when Matthew Mecham lanched it. After people began to move from Ikonboard and phpBB to IPB as it was a great free software, Mecham changed his stance and started off offering a lifetime license for $200 with support and upgrades free for life. It was around then that I purchased a license, later their support crumbled with wait time for 4 days to a week for each query. I got fed up of their extreme Microsoft style commercialism and decided on a switch. Today IPB is losing popularity as it is one of the buggiest, ill featured forum softwares if the prices and features are compared to vBulletin.

And phpBB is still a pain when it comes to the modding and skinning front, I wish they would follow a plugin system of modding for phpBB 3.0. I would rather save a week's worth of time for improving the SEO and other aspect of my vBulletin forum than spend all time modding and skinning phpBB.

The current forum beast is PHPBB 3.0 It has many features and a cool interface. But the best free one would be IPB free. Download it @ *invision.mihalism.com/

It is a part of Mihalism, Inc my website host. They were allowing to host the forum on their server but due to some bugs they abandoned the project.

Are you sure that site is legal? IPB Terms of Service don't allow public distribution of their forum scripts.

 

[Zeeshan Quireshi]

Which forums do you like the most? Vote away!

My favourites:
Best free: InvisionFree
Best paid: Invision Power Board

Nepcker InvisionFree isn't a Forum Software , it's a forum Service .

As for me ,
Best FreeHPBB3
Best Paid:vBulletin

 

[nileshgr]

IPS was a one house in Virginia company when Matthew Mecham lanched it. After people began to move from Ikonboard and phpBB to IPB as it was a great free software, Mecham changed his stance and started off offering a lifetime license for $200 with support and upgrades free for life. It was around then that I purchased a license, later their support crumbled with wait time for 4 days to a week for each query. I got fed up of their extreme Microsoft style commercialism and decided on a switch. Today IPB is losing popularity as it is one of the buggiest, ill featured forum softwares if the prices and features are compared to vBulletin.

And phpBB is still a pain when it comes to the modding and skinning front, I wish they would follow a plugin system of modding for phpBB 3.0. I would rather save a week's worth of time for improving the SEO and other aspect of my vBulletin forum than spend all time modding and skinning phpBB.



Are you sure that site is legal? IPB Terms of Service don't allow public distribution of their forum scripts.

Mihalism, Inc is Owned by Lubu, Mike, Earl and one more person (i don't know the name).
See this post from their blog:

Invision Power Board is an Internet forum software produced by Invision Power Services, Inc. Written in PHP and primarily using MySQL (other database engines are available), it is comparable to other forum software.

Version 1.3 was the last free of charge version, and IPS still permits it to be used, but does not offer a download or support. This is the only version of IPB free IPB hosting companies can use (the ipb2.x+ license does not allow hosting multiple boards by using the same license).

Regardless of the lack of help, many users still use the older version, even though it has known security holes. Up until 2005, IPS offered security fixes, but with the advent of version 2.1, these have ceased. The website IBForen offers unofficial security patches for the 1.3.1 version, as well as a compatibility fix for PHP5 and MySQL 5, however use of these fixes are not supported by IPS as the version is discontinued.