Re: PunBB 1.2

well regardless what everyone says, i truly dont think a PM system and Poll is required by the authors of punbb, however i would like to see a professional plugin by either the community or the author, dump the files to the server and use the install script, and done, poll and PM is added.
i like that idea better than community made component.... well for PM and a poll anyways, a huge modualar system is to much work and might bloat things alot, so keep it down the only things that are common like a PM and poll system.


yes, i know jeckyl, how bad mail servers can be, i been at many hosts, and i know other sites that always go down tongue i think u know what im talking about lol
PM is a good way to talk, instaint messaging too.

Re: PunBB 1.2

you don't need a mail server to send emails through PunBB though do you?

Re: PunBB 1.2

well for the peeps who do want a PM system (like myself), there will be an offcial mod of chacmool for 1.2 someday, isn't it? smile

79

Re: PunBB 1.2

My vote:
==>  Forget the Private Messages and Polls. 
They waste space on my server.  I like this forum because it's lean and mean, and I hope it stays that way.

Rickard, I just got news of the v1.2 release!  Very cool, very exciting.  I can't wait to install it and play with it.  Thanks so much.  I love that it's xhtml 1.0 strict - that's what I write with.  You're the man!

Re: PunBB 1.2

D9r wrote:

Rickard, I just got news of the v1.2 release!  Very cool, very exciting.  I can't wait to install it and play with it.  Thanks so much.  I love that it's xhtml 1.0 strict - that's what I write with.  You're the man!

If that's one of your favorite things about 1.2, Paul's the man actually smile

"Programming is like sex: one mistake and you have to support it for the rest of your life."

81

Re: PunBB 1.2

My apologies to Paul.  We talked about this a few months ago and I knew there were several of you involved with this project.  Taking another look at the first post, I see that you credit Paul Sullivan for the semantically correct xhtml/css, and Bert Garcia for the documentation.  Is it mainly the 3 of you or are there others?

>>> "Programming is like sex: one mistake and you have to support it for the rest of your life."
LOL.  Great tagline.

Regarding upgrading from 1.1.5 --
Would it be just as easy if I make any needed changes to the old database, delete the forum files, and then do a basic install of 1.2?  It won't be any trouble for me to have my forum down while doing that.  Is doing a clean install of 1.2 (while saving the old database and modifying it via phpMyadmin) easier than following the upgrade procedure?

Re: PunBB 1.2

no why would that be easier? theres lots of mysql changed just run the upgrade script AFTER making a BACKUP wink

Re: PunBB 1.2

Dr.Jeckyl wrote:

LMAO!
i think it comes down to personal preferance definatly. also it may also depend on the type of board you run and the reason it's there. ie: if it's a board that needs the polling, for example a board that alot of the daily topics are votes that decide something like contests. on the other hand the same can go for a pm system. i personally would rather have a pm system since the mail server on my host is very unreliable at times.

You have hit the nail on the head. There is no universal answer for this and I'm willing to bet there are more people for it than against it anyway. The answer wether or not to have a PM system can not be decided in a poll. If 51% vote no and 49% vote yes then there is a lot of people who would like a left out.

The solution is to make the PM system opional, toggle it on or off.

Some people here have been trying to tell others that they don't need a PM system. Who are they to say that? Everyone who would like one has a very good reason for saying so. The email form is no substitute for a PM system and never will be in my eyes and the eyes of others who wish to use a PM system.

I'm not going to explain my reasons for needing them once more since they shouldn't need justifying anyway. I simply asked if it was planned for the future and still have no answer so I guess I should take that as a no. A definate answer would be a plus however as I would like to know for certain before I start work on a PM system which I will have on my site one way or another.

Connorhd, PM's are more obvious that Emails? How did you work that out? I don't have an advertisement for PM's on my site and the PM button is no bigger than the Email button. People are given a fair choice between the two and they choose the PM system everytime.

Maybe someone should release punBBpm lol big_smile

Re: PunBB 1.2

D9r wrote:

My apologies to Paul.  We talked about this a few months ago and I knew there were several of you involved with this project.  Taking another look at the first post, I see that you credit Paul Sullivan for the semantically correct xhtml/css, and Bert Garcia for the documentation.  Is it mainly the 3 of you or are there others?

It's the three of us, yes.

D9r wrote:

Regarding upgrading from 1.1.5 --
Would it be just as easy if I make any needed changes to the old database, delete the forum files, and then do a basic install of 1.2?  It won't be any trouble for me to have my forum down while doing that.  Is doing a clean install of 1.2 (while saving the old database and modifying it via phpMyadmin) easier than following the upgrade procedure?

Well, I wouldn't say it would be just as easy. The upgrade script does that for you. Why do it manually?

"Programming is like sex: one mistake and you have to support it for the rest of your life."

Re: PunBB 1.2

deusiah wrote:

The solution is to make the PM system opional, toggle it on or off.

thats not really a solution as for alot of people that is a bloat

deusiah wrote:

Connorhd, PM's are more obvious that Emails? How did you work that out? I don't have an advertisement for PM's on my site and the PM button is no bigger than the Email button. People are given a fair choice between the two and they choose the PM system everytime.

i think you'll find most people will click the PM button if there is one as they think it is better, or easier to send a PM than to send an email, since many people don't "look after" their email account as well as they could

deusiah wrote:

Maybe someone should release punBBpm lol big_smile

yeh Chacmool did for 1.1.5 and hes working on 1.2

Re: PunBB 1.2

Connorhd wrote:

thats not really a solution as for alot of people that is a bloat

That line makes no sense at all. If it's optional where is the bloat.

Connorhd wrote:

i think you'll find most people will click the PM button if there is one as they think it is better, or easier to send a PM than to send an email, since many people don't "look after" their email account as well as they could

You have just given another reason for the useage of them.

Connorhd wrote:

yeh Chacmool did for 1.1.5 and hes working on 1.2

I am aware of this mod but it did not function as I would have liked it too. It seemed to be less of a mod and more of a hack. When I said punBBpm I meant another version of punBB with a PM system included since it is requested by so many people.

You can say what ever you like about PM's but you can't deny they are more popular than emails.

Re: PunBB 1.2

i'm not saying they are more popular i'm saying email is a good alternative, even if its an option its still there, its still in the code and taking up space

Re: PunBB 1.2

deusiah wrote:

That line makes no sense at all. If it's optional where is the bloat.

It's still there. In the source. Making PunBB larger, more difficult to maintain, more prone to bugs and security problems etc etc. Just because you can disable a feature in the admin interface doesn't mean it isn't there.

deusiah wrote:

You can say what ever you like about PM's but you can't deny they are more popular than emails.

You must be joking.

"Programming is like sex: one mistake and you have to support it for the rest of your life."

89 (edited by deusiah 2005-01-13 20:25)

Re: PunBB 1.2

OK you misunderstood me Rickard. I am well versed in PHP and fully understand that it would still be there if included in the way you are thinking of. I meant making it in such away that you can install just upload the mod and then enable it wink As soon as the Mod is launced it auto-installs it's DB tables. That would be nice big_smile

As for the PM's being more popular than Emails, surely you didn't think I mean that outside of forums? Inside forums, PM's rule tongue

90 (edited by Hikusaak 2005-01-13 20:31)

Re: PunBB 1.2

Rickard wrote:
deusiah wrote:

That line makes no sense at all. If it's optional where is the bloat.

It's still there. In the source. Making PunBB larger, more difficult to maintain, more prone to bugs and security problems etc etc. Just because you can disable a feature in the admin interface doesn't mean it isn't there.
You must be joking.

Hi, first post here. smile

From what I've tried PunBB is fine as it is, but I do agree with Deusiah, adding the system wont bloat the software into an unstable, low-security board.

I know there are many who want to keep it minimalistic, but if the system was added it would still be minimalistic in my opinion. big_smile

Re: PunBB 1.2

deusiah wrote:

OK you misunderstood me Rickard. I am well versed in PHP and fully understand that it would still be there if included in the way you are thinking of. I meant making it in such away that you can install just upload the mod and then enable it wink As soon as the Mod is launced it auto-installs it's DB tables. That would be nice big_smile

Yes, it would. Any ideas? smile

Hikusaak wrote:

From what I've tried PunBB is fine as it is, but I do agree with Deusiah, adding the system wont bloat the software into an unstable, low-security board.

I never said it did.

Hikusaak wrote:

I know there are many who want to keep it minimalistic, but if the system was added it would still be minimalistic in my opinion. big_smile

Sure. But what about when someone wants me to add attachment support? Or what about an avatar gallery? A full-fledged template system perhaps? I have to be very, very careful with what features I choose to implement or one day, I'll wake up and will have turned PunBB into a new vBulletin. Then all the work will have been in vain.

"Programming is like sex: one mistake and you have to support it for the rest of your life."

Re: PunBB 1.2

Rickard wrote:
Hikusaak wrote:

From what I've tried PunBB is fine as it is, but I do agree with Deusiah, adding the system wont bloat the software into an unstable, low-security board.

I never said it did.

I never said you did. tongue But you can't deny that PunBB is a board along those lines. I love it though! big_smile

Rickard wrote:
Hikusaak wrote:

I know there are many who want to keep it minimalistic, but if the system was added it would still be minimalistic in my opinion. big_smile

Sure. But what about when someone wants me to add attachment support? Or what about an avatar gallery? A full-fledged template system perhaps? I have to be very, very careful with what features I choose to implement or one day, I'll wake up and will have turned PunBB into a new vBulletin. Then all the work will have been in vain.

Yes I fully understand this, I've been staff on dev boards in my time (not that long tongue) and I fully understand how pressure from the community can sometimes lead the author to do things to his/her board that they originally didn't want to do.

I know my place and it's fully up to you, but I am in favour of a pm system intergrated. wink

Thankyou.

Re: PunBB 1.2

deusiah wrote:

OK you misunderstood me Rickard. I am well versed in PHP and fully understand that it would still be there if included in the way you are thinking of. I meant making it in such away that you can install just upload the mod and then enable it wink As soon as the Mod is launced it auto-installs it's DB tables. That would be nice big_smile

maybe you should take some interest in this - http://punbb.org/forums/viewtopic.php?id=4974

Re: PunBB 1.2

I just had sort of a random thought on an alternative PM system. Now take this with a grain of salt as it is just a flash idea.

Perhaps there could be a forum specifically for private conversations. It could have a column for 'to' and one for 'from', carrying the ids of the people they are meant for. The specific threads would only be viewed by those in those columns. It would also help maintain a thread look and feel which I believe is much more efficient. I understand it would require a change in the forum schema, but I think a relatively small one. For example, if the forum were public, both of those columns would be '0' or NULL.

This is a simple feature, yet no other board has it. Thoughts?

Re: PunBB 1.2

Any ideas Rickard, what type of ideas do you want exactly?

I understand your point about adding too many features but even with all the features you just listed punBB wouldn't be to bloated.

To me bloat means two things:
1) Two many gimmicks (features of no real use that will rarely be used).
2) Slow in speed due to no bad use of PHP code and/or lack of consideration for performance.

PunBB's code is such that even with those features you mentioned I can't see it having a great impact on the forums. The code is tight and there has clearly been care taken to improve performance where possible.

Anyone can code a forum (well anyone who can code but you know what I mean), it's easy to assume that your script will perform just as well on your host as it does on your local host. The hard part is making the code good speed/resource wise, spoting ways to rewrite this process in a better way or restructing a system.

I guess the decision has to be made just how minamalist punBB should be. I think there is a balance and that balance is decided by how much need there is for a particuar feature.

What you have to do is look at your target audience, I understand that punBB is minamal and it's an attractive feature that it isn't too similar to other forums. However, if you had two versions of PunBB, This version and a version in with all the features you mentioned. Which one do you think would have the most downloads by now tongue

It's a difficult choice Rickard, one that only you can make. Only you know which direction you want punBB to take big_smile

Fast and Minimal or Fast and Featurefull?

Re: PunBB 1.2

Which one do you think would have the most downloads by now tongue

Developing software to "please the masses" isn't difficult. Just cram in every possible feature you can think of and most people will love it.

can i just point out PunBB was not made to get the most downloads, i think if Punmod can apply mods smoothly and easily then PM, Poll and any other features can be easily added

Re: PunBB 1.2

Connorhd and Bwongar you posted whist I was writing my last post so I'll reply to those first.

Connorhd, thanks for the link, a usefull and interesting project.

Bwongar not too sure about how your idea would work. I think I would just prefer a normal PM system lol. P.S. Nice site you have there, just checked it out wink *Bookmark's Site big_smile*

Now, Connorhd I understand what you are saying and yet it's easy to write software to please the masses. However in this case the masses want performance and that comes at a price. What I'm talking about is a balance between features and performance.

As for PunBB not being made to get the most downloads I understand that but is it so bad if more people download it because it has a PM system for instance? Like I say, it's a balance smile

I think there is a solution floating around here somewhere guys big_smile

Re: PunBB 1.2

I think a large reason for PMs that is consistently overlooked is to help prevent thread hi-jacking... which happens a lot.

Thanks for the comment about my site! I'm working on more articles as quickly as I can!!!

Re: PunBB 1.2

Can you emplain how PM's effect thread hi-jacking? Not saying I dissagree, just interested in your logic smile

Hey no prob. If I see something that deserves a comment I'll give it one tongue

Re: PunBB 1.2

If a user wants to comment on something totally unrelated to another party, they will typically do that via PM. Without enabled PMs, they're forced to either use email (highly uncommon) or post in the same thread. Think of this as an argument for your side...