What is the software we use here on FT?
 

Hello there,

I am planning to use a bulletin board software for my company and I like the look and feel of FT website. What is the software used here for discussion board? Does anyone know?

Prasad

It's vBulletin.

Thanks for the info. I was just checking the vBulletin site, even the price seems quite right.


Prasad

Perfedct timing...I was just looking for this answer!

Can someone provide more details, please? Do I need a dedicated server, or can I have it hosted somewhere...

I'm very tech-savvy, but creating web sites, etc is the only thing I have little experience with.

Thanks!

Randomman

You can have it hosted somewhere. In fact if you are just starting you probably want shared hosting to help keep the costs down. You might also want to look at phpBB and Invision Powerboard. They are both fine products.

I realise the FT site has a ton of bells and whistles and extras etc, but am I seeing this right that a single vBulletin site is only $160 a year for full licence version?

http://www.vbulletin.com/order/

I have thought of setting one up for the field I work in (postage stamps) and thought it would cost lots more. I have my own business website with 250 different pages, and I presume it can be hosted on that site, but know nothing much about tech stuff. If it attracts a few 100 members I guess that does not consume a lot of bandwidth if graphics/image posting are turned off like on FT?

Anyone set one up .. i.e. after you pay the $160 is there a pretty easy set-up required?

Poking around further I found this:

Professional Installation - $135 per license

If you are unfamiliar with PHP/MySQL or server configuration, you may choose to pay for professional installation. This option includes one first time installation of vBulletin on your server. Note: Each service ordered covers installation of one license on one server.

So I guess after that it is fairly easy to set up and get moving?

System requirements are a webserver with PHP and a SQL database. Pretty much any server will do for a smaller site - don't worry about the CPU/memory specs. You'll need maybe 15MB of disk space at most, and about 25MB of database space.

The actual installation is not hard if you have shell access to the webserver. If you don't have shell access (FTP only), it's slightly more difficult, but still not a problem.

Once you get the software installed, all of the setup, configuration, customization, management, etc., can be done from the web. There are a zillion different options and toggles, so it might take a while to play with them and configure your board the way you like it.

Thanks markbach - very useful info. ^

I guess like all things once you've set up a few it gets easy, but the initial step seems to be very complicated. :)

A colleague suggested for a simple low volume BB that http://www.phpbb.com might suffice? I have no idea about these different products, but she tells me that one is freeware, which is interesting.

This is a demo board they say, and it does have a fairly similar type of look to how FT was pre the last update:

http://www.phpbb.com/styles/demo.php

Hi Glen,

I finally instlled phpbb for my website. I choose that as it is freeware while I am playing with the software. These are the actual costs for me.

1. Website registration: USD 6.95 per annum
I used www.hostway.com

2. Hosting account: USD 60 per annum
www.globat.com
It looks like they changed the plans recently and they don't offer the plan I currently use now. But there are a lot of sites offering one year hosting for about 50 bucks. I used www.godaddy.com in the past and their service is good.

3. Discussion board: Free
www.phpbb.com
Looks fine and just needs some customization at this time


You can look at my site at
http://www.granitesite.com/phpBB2/index.php

Hope this helps.
Prasad