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ensane
05-15-2005, 09:57 PM
I recently start to get involved with a computer club at my
school. I have proposed the idea of setting up and running a
web forum at the school as part of my contribution to the
club.
I decided to try out phpBB. Which i was able to get running
successfully on my Suse 9.2 box. I emailed the link to my
fellow computer club members, and one member posted on
the site that I shouldn't use phpBB because it is buggy.
So my question is simple really.. in anyone's experience,
which *free* forum software should I use for this site, and
why? I want the layout to be like this forum site, I want
an easy to use administration section. I need to use MySQL.
I want to beable to assign rights to certain people only
allowing them to post on certain threads (I.E. club meeting
minutes section should only be allowed to be posted by
person who writes the minutes)...
I personally like phpBB, and unless someone can convince
me otherwise with a valid arguement supported by some
hard evidence, I am going to stick with it. So please
share your insight and experience on this matter..
TheSpeedoBeast
05-15-2005, 10:18 PM
Just go for it; I have never noticed it being buggy at all. What's the worst thing that could happen, you lose all of your posts ?:p But seriously, I never have come across any bugs in it.
And bugs normally love me; they are the reason that I had to write 2 12-page lab writeups for chem instead one a few weeks ago!
drummerboy195
05-15-2005, 10:51 PM
There were a couple of issues in recent history with phpBB exploits giving remote access to attackers, but nothing that an upgrade didn't fix, and the worst one I personally saw was the attacker turning the box into a bot-net server. Fairly easy to fix, no root access granted, no major harm done. But my guess is that these are the problems to which your friend is refering, and so far as I know, all of those issues have all been addressed. Additionally, keeping on top of versions and upgrades will keep the majority of these problems at bay.
thaddaeus
05-15-2005, 11:56 PM
phpBB2 is probably the best i've tested so far. Its user management and forum managment could use some work, but the actual forum itself hasn't been a problem for me. Best part is phpNuke uses a (if not the full) version of phpbb2 as a module. phpNuke is a very powerful and customizable content management site. I'd suggest for a club, to do the phpNuke setup with phpBB2 just for more funtionality, expandability, and organization.
je_fro
05-16-2005, 04:38 AM
phpBB was (and may still be) full of exploits.
eskaypey
05-16-2005, 09:24 AM
Originally posted by je_fro
phpBB was (and may still be) full of exploits.
theres a proof for you http://securityfocus.com/advisories/8574
Originally posted by je_fro
phpBB was (and may still be) full of exploits.
Yep, that's the bad thing about it..other than that, it's a great forum, I really like it (or I'm just used to it, heh).
thaddaeus
05-16-2005, 01:16 PM
Another idea is to just make your own using some scripting language like php or asp, I suggest php. Most learn php books contain the code to make a forum as part of the process of learning to interface php with mysql. Doing it yourself will allow you to customize it to the fullest and provide a good learning expirence. Get the whole club involved, thats whats its for, everyone enjoys some form of computing and most likely they will either know how to program or be able to learn.
vontez
05-16-2005, 03:32 PM
If it's good enough for gentoo.org (http://forums.gentoo.org/), it's probably good enough for your computer club!
I use it for my friends and me, and I've never had a problem with it.
Originally posted by vontez
If it's good enough for gentoo.org (http://forums.gentoo.org/), it's probably good enough for your computer club!
I use it for my friends and me, and I've never had a problem with it.
Yeah :)
I don't think it can be that bad as long as you know when new vulnerabilities come out so you can patch them, of course!
je_fro
05-17-2005, 12:57 AM
the gentoo forums are running on a heavily patched and modified version of phpBB.
Icarus
05-17-2005, 01:04 AM
Then "emerge gentoo-phpbb" :D
the_imax
05-18-2005, 04:14 PM
try http://www.simplemachines.org/ its pretty good and much secure than phpbb, if you are looking for some light weight cgi based forum than you can also try eblah (http://eblah.com
paj12
05-18-2005, 10:03 PM
Another site I'm a member of uses phpBB and just had a crash. They lost about two months worth of posts.
Just food for thought.
ensane
05-18-2005, 11:34 PM
Originally posted by paj12
Another site I'm a member of uses phpBB and just had a crash. They lost about two months worth of posts.
Just food for thought.
Did they ever find out what caused the crash? It seems like maybe that could be an issue involving the database.
Parcival
05-19-2005, 04:16 AM
Originally posted by serz
I don't think it can be that bad as long as you know when new vulnerabilities come out so you can patch them, of course!
Yes, but that works only as long as you don't program any modifications of your own into it. Upgrading individually altered code is pretty nasty. ;)
paj12
05-19-2005, 09:37 AM
Did they ever find out what caused the crash? It seems like maybe that could be an issue involving the database.
I think it was an issue involving the database, and I think they've got about 95% of the lost posts restored from their backups. It's a strong endorsement for backing up regularly, regardless of what software you eventually decide to go with.
Read more about it here (http://forum.trombone.org/viewtopic.php?t=14711).
ensane
05-19-2005, 10:15 AM
Originally posted by paj12
I think it was an issue involving the database, and I think they've got about 95% of the lost posts restored from their backups. It's a strong endorsement for backing up regularly, regardless of what software you eventually decide to go with.
Read more about it here (http://forum.trombone.org/viewtopic.php?t=14711).
thats scary... definitely understand why I should back up a database. That right there makes me a little hesitant on using phpBB. As stated in earlier posts on this thread someone suggested these as other alternatives:
http://www.simplemachines.org
http://eblah.com
Any input or experience from these free forum software?
doogiehowser
08-25-2005, 04:22 PM
the gentoo forums are running on a heavily patched and modified version of phpBB.
What did the gentoo forums do to secure phpbb?
Is it something the avarage admin can do?
Yes, but that works only as long as you don't program any modifications of your own into it. Upgrading individually altered code is pretty nasty. ;)
Oh well.. :(
Actually, I've never administrated a phpBB forum, but I did and I do administrate a vBulletin one and it's really easy to upgrade there.
celticgeek
08-25-2005, 05:53 PM
My hosting service will provide simplemachines forum software if you go for one of the advanced hosting plans. It sounds fairly easy to manage and run. (I have been looking into this sort of thing.)
I have not administered any forums, but phpBB, vBulletin, and simplemachines are run on various forums that I am a member of, and they seem to work fine.
lnx_nu_b
08-26-2005, 04:01 PM
Been a while since I've posted, but getting back into linux.
I own an Invision board, Moderate a PHPbb board and administer a PHPbb board.
My Invision board has TONS more admin control options, and the support is great! PHPbb runs well and more often than not very stable, most issues are caused by the DB backend. Also, there have been some recent exploits that have been a PITA. If you keep it updated, nothing to worry about.
Just my .03$
Oh I also have setup an Ikonboard here at work on our Intranet (before I knew about phpbb), and I like it the least amount of all (invision, phpbb, ikon)