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Vbulletin or Gforum?

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Vbulletin or Gforum?
Which one do you people prefer, Vbulletin or Gforum? VB seems great and promise plus their v3 is comin out soon with many exciting new features, so to me it seems like they outperform Gforum, plus their extensive hack and modifications database and flexibility.... anyone's ideas?
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Re: [xpert] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
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plus their extensive hack and modifications database and flexibility

I've used VBulletin2 and GForum and as far as flexibility is concerned I'm not sure why you'd say VBulletin is more flexible. I find the GT template system far easier to use than VB's. The coolest part about VB's template system is the ability to search for text within templates so you can find things more easily but I think that's only available because the VB templates are stored in MySQL whereas GForum's aren't.

As for hacks and modifications, I'd also say that GForum competes well. New globals and modifications are posted almost on a daily basis. I think what GT should do is perhaps have a read/reply only forum for globals and hacks so they can be easily found and searched for.

Does VBulletin have a plugin system?

VBulletin feature list:

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Blisteringly fast MySQL based backend database

GForum has.

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Completely database driven - everything comes from the database. No more fiddling around with file permissions or worrying about security of the files.

GForum installer sets all permissions and the admin panel handles everything including template modifications. Being totally database driven can be a limitation as well as a feature.

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Scalable solution - database server and web servers can reside on separate machines. You can even run the database on a Unix machine and the web server of a Windows machine if you want.

Same with GForum.

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Every aspect of the interface can be edited with the comprehensive templates system

Ditto.

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Importation facility makes it easy to seamlessly upgrade from other bulletin board systems, including Infopop's Ultimate Bulletin Board, UBBThreads, OpenTopic, ezboard, and Ikonboard

GForum has import scripts as well as an upgrader for new versions of GForum (as well as a windows installer).

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Powerful database-driven search engine

Ditto, plus the search highlighting plugin :)

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Unlimited Forums / Messages / Categories

Ditto again.

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Powerful administrative functionality. Posts can be edited/deleted/moved/locked with one click!

GForum's admin panel has features I've not seen with VBulletin such as action editing etc.

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Moderation queues on posting and registration - check new posts before they become publicly viewable and new registrants before they can post.

This is perhaps something Jason will add in version 2 although I'm just guessing.

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User email notification of answered posts

Ditto, plus watched threads and archives.

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Support for smilies, vB Code or HTML in messages (admin configurable)

Same but I consider GT's markup system to be more powerful.

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Templates - Administrators can edit the design of their board by using the comprehensive templates system.

Same.

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User profiles (editable by user)

Same.

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Unlimited number of moderators per forum

Same.

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Confirm user's email address during registration.

Same.

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Easy to back up - just download one text file and you have a complete image of your forum.

GForum makes backups.

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User groups - give select moderators/users admin powers

GForum has user groups.

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Private forums

Same.

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Word censor facility

My swear filter plugin does this :)

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Ban users based on IP address or email address

GForum does this plus attachment filtering for post/message attachments.

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Integrated private messaging

This too and my pm filter plugin lets you ignore certain users :)

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Posts since last visit are marked so you can tell at a glance whether there have been new posts in a particular forum

GForum does this obviously.

Then you also have tools such as Fileman and MySQLMan that you can access from your admin panel, plus the long awaited community :)

I just think GForum is a much more integrated solution. Who knows what goodies Jason has planned for V2.

Also remember that VBulletin has been around for much longer thn GForum.

Last edited by:

Paul: Dec 1, 2002, 3:53 AM
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Re: [Paul] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
I'm using vB (also installed Gforum on a private site) and won't expand in detail, but:

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As for hacks and modifications, I'd also say that GForum competes well.

Not really. There's a very active hacker community offering more than 1.000 vB hacks and mods.

I like GForum, but had difficulties in customising it to my needs, the template system cannot compete with vB yet. Let's see what GForum v2.0 will bring. Smile
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Re: [Tho-chan] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
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Not really. There's a very active hacker community offering more than 1.000 vB hacks and mods.

If you counted up all the hacks and mods and globals posted over the past few years I'm fairly sure it would total 1000 or more, it is just that they are not all in one place which makes them harder to find.
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Re: [Tho-chan] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
One thing to remember about these hacks and mods is that they're modifications to the actual code instead of a using a plugin system like Gossamer products. What this means is that with every upgrade you have to readd in all the changes you 'hacked' in (what fun!).

Adrian
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Re: [brewt] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
That's true, certainly vB's weak spot. Well, after five upgrades you develop a certain routine. Smile
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Re: [brewt] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
>>>What this means is that with every upgrade you have to readd in all the changes you 'hacked' in (what fun!). <<<

That's not quite true... Wink... I just updated my vB by by 3 versions a couple of days ago and not one hack, style change nor modification was affected...
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Re: [edpak] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
So how does the upgrader know which files you've modified to know not to overwrite them?

Style changes obviously won't be overwritten as your custom templates are not changed, but that's the same with Gossamer Forum.
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Re: [edpak] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
Depends on the hack. As Paul said, styles and templates are (usually) not affected, only PHP files. However, with programs like Araxis Merge or Beyond Compare an upgrade takes no longer than 20 mins.
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Re: [Paul] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
The point I was trying to make was that this statement made by "brewt"

>>>What this means is that with every upgrade you have to readd in all the changes you 'hacked' in (what fun!). <<<<

wasn't quite true...

That's it. That's all...

Last edited by:

edpak: Dec 3, 2002, 3:07 AM
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Re: [edpak] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
One thing i notice is that 90% of forums i see around use VB.. rarely see gforum..
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Re: [xpert] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
vBulletin has been around a long time (6 years?), whereas GForum has only been on the market for one year. That makes a difference.

Ivan
-----
Iyengar Yoga Resources / GT Plugins
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Re: [edpak] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
Hmm I think what he said was fairly true.

He was referring to changes to how the code works rather than cosmetic changes. You can't make changes to how vbulletin works without hacking the code manually and as a result any upgrades will overwrite all your changes.

With the Gossamer plugin system you can override core code without actually editing any of the files and of course that will not be affected by upgrades.
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Re: [Paul] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
>>>He was referring to changes to how the code works rather than cosmetic changes.<<<

How do you know what he was saying???... U a mind reader or something???...

Point is, he made a statement that wasn't quite true... Simple as that...

Last edited by:

edpak: Dec 3, 2002, 3:26 AM
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Re: [yogi] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
While Jelsoft was founded in 1996, vB is around since 2000.
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Re: [edpak] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
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How do you know what he was saying???... U a mind reader or something???...

Nah, great minds think alike. Or perhaps I just have the intuition of a coder :)

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Point is, he made a statement that wasn't quite true... Simple as that...

What he said was true but I guess he needed to clarify what he was referring to.
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Re: [xpert] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
i think stable and speed are more important than features, functions and hacks. i love this picture, can't believe vbulletin can handle this, i have been running a vbulletin forum and the server crash to hell when 500+ users online.

Last edited by:

sh2sg: Dec 9, 2002, 10:36 AM
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Re: [sh2sg] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
To be fair, that's not really 1894 different users, but more likely a spider hammering the forum. The search engine friendly templates don't pass along a guest id, so each click is counted as a new guest.

Cheers,

Alex
--
Gossamer Threads Inc.
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Re: [sh2sg] Vbulletin or Gforum? In reply to
In Reply To:
i think stable and speed are more important than features, functions and hacks. i love this picture, can't believe vbulletin can handle this, i have been running a vbulletin forum and the server crash to hell when 500+ users online.


That has just as much to do with hardware as it does with the software. I happily have over 700 users online during the week on my vBulletin, with the load rarely going over 2. Admittedly, this is on a dual Xeon with 6 drives in a RAID 10 configuration, but still...

In my opinion, the main advantage of Gossamer forum is the plugin API. People will tell you that it's not a big deal to reapply hacks on vB, but it's not just about the code additions. With no official API, there's no way of really knowing how your hacks will affect the board functionality from one minor version to the next. With Gossamer products; as long as you stick to using the official hooks, you're safe... (ish) Laugh

On my smaller site with 150 to 200 concurrent users, I already have LinksSQL and gMail and the only reason I haven't moved to gForum is the fact my users would throw a fit. They don't like change very much. Ridiculous really when you think the site is for British Expats and people about to pack up and move to a completely different country! Crazy