Replying to Which Is The Best BBS ?

Invision Power Board is a good one, it's also got a lot of free add-ons to add just about any feature you could want. but a Permanent License costs $130. ^^;;;
Demo : free forums

if you want a free one or just start off free, id say MyBB. its really good.

if you want to pay for one then vBulletin. its the best there is in my opinion.

other ones like smf and phpbb are ok but for me, mybb stands out from the crowd.

I recommend phpBB, but that somewhat depends on (1) how easy it is to have an AstaHost script install it, or (2) how proficient you are with debugging. I have a small home network. I have been running phpBB for about 4 years, and MediaWiki for two. I first installed it on a Windows-95 class machine (400 MHz, 128 MB ram, SuSE Linux) 4 years ago, and spent several days figuring out which of the several userids it asked for belonged to it, to MySQL, and to me. Recently, I moved the data in the board to a much newer computer (Acer Aspire laptop, purchased July 2007), and a much newer version of phpBB. The scripts to update the data (changing the record structure in MySQL, etc.) were all in the package, though it took a while rooting through bulletin board posts to find out where to look for them. Very much to the developer's credit, the scripts looked at the original files, determined the origional (4 year old) version number, and applied just the fixes needed to bring the data up to the current version.

There are certainly easier bulletin-board systems out there, but phpBB is very capable, as far as I am concerned. As a bonus, the developers just finished 3 years of work, and came out with a totally rewritten version (which I have not, however, tested myself.

InvisionFree is not a trial site, but it's a website that provides free installation of the last free version of Invision Power Board (which was version 1.3). Thereby, your forum right now hosted off site and is not currently installed on your system. If you are like me and love to go all out with your forum software and want full customizability, I highly recommend you to download a forum software and just install it to your Astahost host webspace.

xboxrulz

I guess you actually went out and bought a license? I loved it when Invision was free. When they decided to go paid, a lot of people split and went back to phpBB or went on to SMF or QSF or other big boards. I think some of them even went on to make MyBB since that board system is very similar to IPB.

xboxrulz

Hmmmm.... so now I wonder if this is the part where I kick myself... It might only be a free trial. Now that I have seen your reply, I am wondering. My address was showing invisionfree.com, so is it like a watered down version!? Or now I wonder if now my addy is free because maybe that is possibly what trial sites are like... If it is free, that would be pretty sweet, it would have ads on it, but I am just WAY too new at forums to get really concerned about it... kind of like when I first started out doing webpages.... it could change once I get the hang of it!

I guess time will tell... and if it does end up staying free, I'll post it!

- skedad -

Well now... I have followed along with BBS and creating forums. I just wanted to see what it was all about, and I must have found the same host that astahost uses. It is a pretty cool thing to bump into, because it is almost just like working through the Astahost forums. I didn't really do anything as of yet, but dang, I really like it! I think there will be a lot of work involved being an admin in my own forum and then come here to post, but as the idea is similar, there is a lot of priority and involvement level.

I would be involved with Astahost maybe on a more professional level compared to my own... but I would still be myself as to participation and how I will post to each. I don't expect I would have a lot of movement to my new forum site, but I would still like to have my crew be able to connect together... and not so much try to get them involved in web hosting!

Ok, so I guess I am writing this post backwards... but I guess I can say I am now trying Invision... it was brought up so I thought I would give it a try myself... and since it is SOO close to what Astashost has layout wise, I will have to do A LOT of customizing! But isn't that what it's all about!!??

- skedad -

I guess you actually went out and bought a license? I loved it when Invision was free. When they decided to go paid, a lot of people split and went back to phpBB or went on to SMF or QSF or other big boards. I think some of them even went on to make MyBB since that board system is very similar to IPB.

xboxrulz

Well now... I have followed along with BBS and creating forums. I just wanted to see what it was all about, and I must have found the same host that astahost uses. It is a pretty cool thing to bump into, because it is almost just like working through the Astahost forums. I didn't really do anything as of yet, but dang, I really like it! I think there will be a lot of work involved being an admin in my own forum and then come here to post, but as the idea is similar, there is a lot of priority and involvement level.

I would be involved with Astahost maybe on a more professional level compared to my own... but I would still be myself as to participation and how I will post to each. I don't expect I would have a lot of movement to my new forum site, but I would still like to have my crew be able to connect together... and not so much try to get them involved in web hosting!

Ok, so I guess I am writing this post backwards... but I guess I can say I am now trying Invision... it was brought up so I thought I would give it a try myself... and since it is SOO close to what Astashost has layout wise, I will have to do A LOT of customizing! But isn't that what it's all about!!??

- skedad -

some somethe free host does not provide mysql database as their free service. Any BBS can run without Mysql?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... I almost DIED laughing there! Every single phpBB update brings MORE security holes along with patching the old ones... you shouldn't have to create a patch every other week. The current phpBB release: 2.0.20.... that number seems a little strange. You'd think by now they'd be at 2.5.0 after all the releases to fix holes. When do they plan on reaching 2.1??
I'll drop you a PM.

[N]F

Wow , u guys are 'creating' a forum ?? Wow ! Cool !
And nightfox, i shifted from phpBB to SMF following your advice. i really loved the automatic mod installation feature, but had some problem installing mods. It asked for the FTP account details and i gave it, but while some files in the mod package show success , one or two show failed. My SMF is at http://www.FundaZone.Com/forums while my phpBB is at http://www.fundazone.com/forum
i'm still figuring out the mods part. Might need help

And dont say anything to my cute little phpBB , of course I use it only for my Arcade Mod to play online with friends. But doesnt mean that they have a lot of security patches if they release a lot of updates, may be the updates are for enhancing phpBB, do you know?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... I almost DIED laughing there! Every single phpBB update brings MORE security holes along with patching the old ones... you shouldn't have to create a patch every other week. The current phpBB release: 2.0.20.... that number seems a little strange. You'd think by now they'd be at 2.5.0 after all the releases to fix holes. When do they plan on reaching 2.1??

If you really want to help, i would like that, i'm into creating it already, i have begun with the authentication system which from there, people can register usernames, login and logout from the bulletin board, i become bored with all these untrusted software, i need some secure and stable board, that's the point i began thinking about that from, how could users trust you while your board could be hacked so easily, specially while it will be a service in a commercial site.
it's a site for business, so no time to lose and no place for mistakes, just now searching for a partner, at the same time i'm coding some of its features now.

I'll drop you a PM.

[N]F