Ok, first, there should be a forum for posts about the forum... perhaps these go in the pa.com forum? I don't see that either.
Second. and why the first...
The bizarre thread view is killing me. I click on an email link and it opens the thread view with no indication of what is new or where it is...
Surely there are options to this forum software? Can we not at least use a commonly understood version of myPHPformus or whatever they call that (brainfreeze)
thanks
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I believe this forum a module of Drupal, which this site is running. People have expressed a disliking of the forum layout in the past but there is no great motivation to change it. I assume a big point against changing is that it makes site maintenance a little bit easier using only one application to run the site.
One thing that might help you is that if a thread is highlighted as "new" then you can actually click on "new" and it will link to the new post, not just the thread in general. I'm not quite sure how multiple "new" entries are handled but it's something at least.
I think the forums here are poor but they are perceived to serve their purpose, so I guess that counts for something.
iff i get an email notification, i can just open pa.com and sign in to read the new posts, rather than clicking the post link in the email, which does not show the new posts.
I have heard other say that drupal sucks... from at least one web developer, anyway. Their forum module certainly does. My feeling is that myPhP is the way to go... (i think that is it, anyway)
I heard mention of a wiki in development. That is, a privately managed wiki, rather than a free one, or wikipedia, etc. I have a wiki link in wikia... i think it is portableapps.wikia.com ... yeah, haven't done anything with it in over 6 months...
anyway... uh... ok
;>jamvaru
I think you mean phpBB, what Ars Technica uses for their OpenForum. Darkbee is correct; we use a forum module of Drupal, a content management system (CMS). The difference between the two, as I understand it, is that phpBB does not offer a full CMS, which includes news stories and the front page as well as the forum. Invision Power Board, arguably the most advanced forum platform on the net, does (I believe) but it also costs money and is not open source. Drupal is free and is open source, and because PortableApps.com is open source, Drupal is chosen because it
fits PA's needs, and (B) to show solidarity with free, open source software. At least that is my understanding.
As to the topic view, PortableApps.com uses the "nested" forum view. NaNoWriMo.org (National Novel Writing Month) runs a forum which uses Drupal, but uses the "flat" forum view. And I will be the first to agree that the "flat" view is better.
Regarding the "new" stuff, it only works if either
the topic is only on one page or (B) all of the "new" replies are on the last page. If a topic has two (or more) pages, and someone comments on the first reply, say, and everyone else is commenting at the end, clicking "New" will only take you to the first new post. Since you're now counted as having viewed the topic, you don't get the new posts highlighted on subsequent pages. Another reason I believe nonlinear threads (allowing people to insert their posts anywhere in the timeline) is wrong. However, this forum is largely intended to track bugs, so there is a justification. Quoting solves that, but not everyone can be expected to write the code. The Firefox extension BBCode solves that, but not everyone can be expected to use Firefox.
PS: If you think phpBB is cool, look up the plugin FlashBB. Not sure if it's being maintained anymore, but a few years ago, it was hawt. Summary: Turns your forum into something that looks kinda like Mac OS 9... Control Panel is Control Panel, forums are directories, threads are subdirectories... pretty radical stuff.
Ahhh yes, I believe you are right with regards to the "new" link because I've noticed there are times when there is a "new" on a very old post, several pages long that it's almost impossible to find where the new post occurred. I pretty much give up because I refuse to spend time hunting through 6 or 7 pages to find a, most likely, one-sentence post.
Just one more reason why I don't like the Drupal forum mod. I'm wondering if there are other forum mods for Drupal. It seems there are several for Joomla, some better than others from what I've read.
Just to re-emphasize to the community at large in case it is unclear, Drupal is Content Management System, using a forum module (I'm assuming the forum is "on" by default). phpBB is a dedicated forum application NOT a content management system. So if John decided to run phpBB on this site he would have to run Drupal and phpBB alongside it. While not horrible this does lead to additional maintenance because you have to run two apps instead of one (separate updates etc). Quite frankly the less time John has to spend on the website itself the better. Let him worry about other things.
Bottom line for me, this forum module of Drupal is horrible but it's functional and it probably gives John the least maintenance. That's a pretty solid argument for staying with it.
very good stuff. Perhaps we can discover a workaround, though the plugin thing sounds very good, I'll check it out.
thanks
;>
;>jamvaru
It's possible there are other, "better" forum modules for Drupal but that isn't my area of expertise. I do know for instance that there are several forum mods for Joomla (another popular CMS), but not all modules are created equal. Besides which, I think you'd have to give a pretty darn good sales-pitch to John to give him reason to change it.
it sucks
;>jamvaru
It doesn't "suck". Take away the unnecessary indenting and force a linear timeline and Drupal works out okay. Just poke around the NaNoWriMo forums; they use the same software we do, and their forums make more sense.
Regarding Drupal as CMS and phpBB as the forum platform, it's possible Drupal has support for external forums, but if John did that, I don't think registration would carry over. It might, but newcomers might have to register twice. phpBB would keep its own member registry. Unless Drupal also has a module to use an external member registry. But that's talking about too much work.