Firstly, which forum is easier to skin, phpBB or Invision Board?

Also, how do you start skinning a forum, and are there any good tutorials you lot have seen on your travels? around the WWW?

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I am hoping to set up a message board for my swimming club, and want to find out the best ways to customise it.

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Thanks,
Ol.

As i have never used either of these programs I wouldn't really know which is better, however I have read alot of forums etc. and I think that the general opinion is that IB is better. You might find something to help here :
http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63450
Hope this helped

I have a self made skin, or template as they are called in phpBB, on my forums. It bases on the basic subSilver and what I have changed are pretty much only colours and pictures. I also repositioned some menus.

All that was easy as pie to do, and I managed to pull it so that all mods that I have tried to install so far haven't caused problems with the template.

Anyways my tip is that first install the forums and all the mods you are going to need. Then download the basic template with FTP and start building your own over that.

I personally think that invision power/free skinning is th easiest. Go to:
http://ifsz.net
Go to their forum you should find some really great guides and help ful tips, you can ask questions as ther are genrelly helpful.
If you need help with the css of the forum the go here:
http://www.duggyd.co.uk/css

I havent tried phpbb skinning but Im happy with invision i dont need phpbb anyways

Neither are easyier than SMF (simplemachines.org) it has its own template system built into the admin panel, to get a really different theme you only need to edit 3 files and youve got something way different, there was even someone making a notice board theme where it had pins and messages like that, and there is a comic theme which i think is this www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?theme=5 and it is really different, and all the theme makers swear by its easyness. Try that.

phpBB is easiest to skin and good in that sense. But you can have a lot more freedom when skinning IPB, although its harder, you can do so many more things. I'm not too good at either but these are not really my skills. So to answer your question, phpBB is easier to skin but, IPB it better.

I think Invision is easy to skin its just that it takes a long time, you are better to download a skin and custimize that. If you are going to do that take a look at invisionize.com for both downloadable skins and I am sure a tutorials there to.

I daubled with Invision for a while, never really completed the skin but I think you should listen to Xaine and visit invisionize.com. Also check out http://www.invisionskins.com/index.php

Note however that you need some fundamental CSS skills to build your own skin from the ground up.

I use Invision Power Boards and I have skinned it a few times, I find it easier than the other boards out there.

I also have many tutorials on my site that ppl can view and see. Guest are welcome to view the basic tutorials, the more advanced ones are for members.

I also in my galleries have some CSS maps for the IPB 2.x boards to help members out. More to follow.

SO being a newbee here, I just wanted to say HI and I found this post while looking for some good css maps on phpbb boards..

Thanks for letting me join.

Nightfox PC Asst
NH-PC Tech Support.net

IPB use CSS skining and PHPBB use HTML skining so i will say phpbb is easyer to skin because the usage of html .