Good Free Message Forums?

[johnjohn320]

I want to make another attempt at setting up my own message forums, just for weird purposes, any suggestions of good, free, message forums? In the past I've used AmazingForums and YaBB, I want to try something different. Thanks.

 

[helloedchen]

Ikonboard <-- easy as pie to install
phpBB <-- needs php/mysql, needs to be hacked a bit to get everything right. this is the one i use

 

[Pr0Hawk]

phpBB 2 looks pretty good

 

[Lars]

Xmbforum is a great piece of software.

 

[AdamDuritz99]

phpBB2 is the best free bulletin board i know of.

peace
sean

 

[johnjohn320]

Well, I've got a problem guys. All those boards look excellent, but they've got all this MySQL stuff or whatever that I don't understand. I don't want this to be a project, I just want to set up some decent looking boards that people register to. Doesn't have to look as nice as FuseTalk, but I don't just want threaded stuff like AmazingForums either.

 

[AdamDuritz99]

Well, i don't really know what to tell you. You are going to have to learn the very basics at least if you want to install any bulletin board that requires a database of some sort. phpBB2 is really easy to install. If you have mysql, just d/l phpMyAdmin at sourceforge.net. That will help you out a lot with the database stuff.

peace
sean

 

[helloedchen]

i mentioned Ikonboard in the above post...that DOES NOT require mysql...hence i said it was easy as pie to install...

 

[Lars]

<< Well, I've got a problem guys. All those boards look excellent, but they've got all this MySQL stuff or whatever that I don't understand. I don't want this to be a project, I just want to set up some decent looking boards that people register to. Doesn't have to look as nice as FuseTalk, but I don't just want threaded stuff like AmazingForums either. >>



You don't need to know MySQL to install xmbforum. Hell, I don't know anything about MySQL and it only took me 5 minutes to set the board up; I tried Ikonboard on another site before and it took much longer.

 

[RSI]

I highly recommend phpBB. I know nothing and set it up perfectly fine, awesome for free.

-RSI

 

[goob2k]

OpenBB is good. I set it up for a company I was interning at. OpenBB was designed after vBulletin, i believe.

www.openbb.net

 

[johnjohn320]

I PM'd the following to some people here, but what the heck, it never hurts to try everyone else too.

Ok, well I'm a computer moron--do you think you could help me out, maybe take me through it step-by-step? I would greatly appreciate it. I have downloaded XMB & IkonBoard, and and I have WS_FTP and a geocities account. Now what? If you could give me a dummied-down instruction list, I would be very grateful.

Thanks guys!

 

[johnjohn320]

b-iznickityiz-ump

 

[Pepsi90919]

sorry to burst your bubble but you're not gonna be able to install any forum software on a geocities account. you'll need at the least CGI-BIN capabilities and for most of the vBulletin ripoff software that's out there now (openBB and phpBB2) you'll need PHP and mySQL installed as well.

 

[johnjohn320]

What about F2S?

 

[Deeko]

Dawg so your just gonna toss aside those YaBB boards I made ya? lol those took alot of work

 

[johnjohn320]

I'm not tossing them aside, they're tossing me aside. I tried to login as admin, it works, but then it won't let me go into the "Admin" section. It tells me I'm not authorized.

 

[Deeko]

haha you suck jk

 

[Lars]

<< What about F2S? >>



F2S.com is shutting down the free hosting as of the 28th of Febuary; at least that is what I have heard.

 

[johnjohn320]

No you suck.

 

[KevinMU1]

Ikonboard has worked really well on my site, I haven't had any problems. I haven't upgraded to 3.0 though, haven't had the time yet. Their forums at ikonboard are also very useful for help and advice.

 

[Deeko]

lol at least I can still access the admin functions on my YaBB board

 

[johnjohn320]

OK then, so here's what i need now.

A free server/webspace that supports cgi/sql/whatever the hell I need to run these boards that everyone's suggesting

Incredibly dummied-down instructions (i.e. click HERE and type THIS) for whatever board.

 

[helloedchen]

johnjohn, find a host, give me access to it..and i'll have ikonboard installed in less than 5 mins for you...

 

[rippy]

<< Incredibly dummied-down instructions (i.e. click HERE and type THIS) for whatever board. >>


just do a bit of research about what you will need and how it will work. It's not that hard.

A little bit of knowledge goes a long way.