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Is there a forum platform you just can't stand?


dojo

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In all these years since I managed forums, i got to work with various platforms (PhpBB, MYBB, SMF, Vanilla, Vbulletin, IPB and Xenforo to name some of the best known). From them all one was so annoying for me, that I chose to change it in few weeks and try avoid any forums that run on it. That's SMF. Even now, if I see a SMF forum, I think twice before joining it. It really has to be a nicely designed one with some excellent content to make me join it.

 

Do you have such platforms you're 'allergic' too?

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Even I don't like SMF and IPBoard. I prefer the more established vBulletin and phpBB. I have worked with almost all the forum softwares (except Xenforo) and I found vBulletin and phpBB to be the best.

 

Bryce

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  • Administrators

SMF is the one I can't stand. I started a community on it back in 1.x days, kept it updated through 2.x. Then finally converted to IP.Board.

 

SMF has no decent way to combat the spam problems.

 

Never looked back sense :P

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I'm generally not a fan of most free forum platforms. I don't know if it's all in my head, but I've come across a few myBB sites that just turn me off instantly.

 

From the user side I love vbulletin and xenforo. I haven't had much experience with IPB, but this is actually one of the cleanest sites I've seen so I may add IPB to that list.

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From a user perspective, definitely phpBB. Things that should be simple take way too many clicks (finding all the topics I've posted in, for example), and I don't even think it's an active project anymore. Wasn't the 3.0.x series released in 2006? IPB has gone from 2.1 to 3.3 since then.

 

Second would be SMF. I don't think I've ever in my life seen an attractive SMF forum. The navigation (UX) really isn't that bad, but all the available skins are just such eyesores.

 

From an admin perspective, vBulletin. The ACP is such a mess, I'm surprised it wasn't fixed in 4.0, or even 4.1. Off topic, but I swear IB is just after the money.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I don't like SMF to be honest. User wise their system is quite complicated and its not good looking at the beginning. Admin wise they don't have as many features as one would expect from a Forum Software. As someone pointed out, it doesn't have good enough system to combat spam which is becoming a really big issues now-a-days in forums.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I don't hate any forum because of the software they use. I am more put off by things related to their hosts. If it takes forever to load a page, then I am off. Forever, in my opinion, is anything that takes more than 3 seconds to load. The other thing I hate are those forums which never ever send any email confirmation. Makes me wonder how their members got in, in the first place.

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  • 2 weeks later...

SMF is absolutely terrible. Security is poor, the system is cheap and poorly built and the updates are also terrible. The ACP is one of the worst you can use and generally this makes for a poor experience across most of an SMF board. it's ugly most of the time as well. I refuse to join SMF forums unless I have too.

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