Site: PhpBB

Site: PhpBB

Discuss the source code and development of Spring Engine in general from a technical point of view. Patches go here too.

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Tim Blokdijk
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Joined: 29 May 2005, 11:18

Site: PhpBB

Post by Tim Blokdijk »

Another site topic, this time about phpbb.

The problem:
PhpBB lacks good support for non Latin languages, problem is that people can't use this board in there native language and we can't translate the site header into languages that use characters outside the Latin alphabet.

I'm have been looking into the problems with Unicode support and phpbb. Essentially phpbb2 only supports ISO-8859-1 characters outside this encoding seem to be "supported" by some black magic on the browsers side. PhpBB3 solves this with good Unicode support and some hacking around php limitations.

The fix:
So to get solid support for Unicode we have to upgrade to PhpBB3, patching up PhpBB2 to use Unicode is not realistic.

Problems with the fix:
- PhpBB3 is still in RC status.
- The site uses a PhpBB2 code parser, but replacement code written by clericvash is available.
- Any existing PhpBB2 data with characters outside ISO-8859-1 can't be correctly migrated to PhpBB3. (at this time)
- Passwords can't always be converted but this can be solved by the user with the "forgotten password" function.
- Migration will take some time and the board must go down for it.

Suggestion:
I would like to migrate this board not long after PhpBB3 is released.
Until that time I suggest we release the 2.0 site with PhpBB2 configured with ISO-8859-1, keeping things like they are at the moment.

Anybody (dis)agrees?
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Peet
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Post by Peet »

I'd actually suggest we switch to SMF for the next forum (an example is at http://xtaforever.com ). I find it's much easier to use and has 9001 more handy features, both from the side of the user and that of the admin, than phpBB. And I think it supports unicode, back on topic of this thread.
edit: yes, so it would appear :)
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Tim Blokdijk
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Post by Tim Blokdijk »

I looked at it, SMF is not released under a OSI certified license and the license they use won't allow us to put it in our public svn as we would need express written consent from Simple Machines LLC.
So I don't like the license, I see lots of problems with GPL incompatibility etc..
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Peet
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Post by Peet »

Ah, too bad :(
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Caydr
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Post by Caydr »

Why does the forum for a GBL game automatically need a GPL license? The site and the project are seperate entities, aren't they? If they aren't, they probably ought to be.

SMF is a great forum system, PHPBB is very restrictive, doesn't have a lot of good features, and has had a history of security problems. To be completely honest I thought the project would've outgrown it by now.
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SwiftSpear
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Post by SwiftSpear »

AF, this is an official warning, no more flame baiting, no more accusing people of flaming you for innocuous remarks.
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Tim Blokdijk
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Post by Tim Blokdijk »

GBL game?
The project and site are separate but I'm talking about the rest of the site here. My work is GPL and so is MediaWiki and Mantis. The SMF forum has a restrictive license, which will make it impossible to work with the source in the way we do now.

But "if" SMF would be released under a gpl compatible license:
- We would have to migrate the existing data, which is a pain I ratter don't go through.
- Rewrite the site news posting code for SMF.

PhpBB3 would probably have a lot of features you like about SMF, if you would like to have a few features that are not available in PhpBB3 then it's more practical to look for (or write) a mod for it.
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BvDorp
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Post by BvDorp »

blah, just go ahead with it. I can't imagine one dude sue-ing you over non-compatible OS licenses.
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SwiftSpear
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Post by SwiftSpear »

We work with the source of the PHPBB forum now? Last time I checked we couldn't even figure out how to apply plugins :(
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Tim Blokdijk
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Post by Tim Blokdijk »

Yes, the PhpBB source can be found in our svn. Also the MediaWiki source is in svn, and I'm going to commit the Mantis source soon.
Are you mixing up discussion about planning site changes with not knowing how to work with code? I don't understand?
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clericvash
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Post by clericvash »

No offense but we don't need SVN to put a forum on a website.
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AF
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Post by AF »

I say we stick with phpbb2 untill phpbb3 is out.
AF, this is an official warning, no more flame baiting, no more accusing people of flaming you for innocuous remarks.
If you had seen the shit storm over at the XTA forums you would know very well that I would not be happy with smf. I feel very strongly about it.


And any project will have a history of security problems if it has more than 20% market share at any one time, especially in a field such as message boards. You should instead judge by the speed and consistency with which the bugs are squashed.
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Tim Blokdijk
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Post by Tim Blokdijk »

A shit storm over at the XTA forums has no business in this topic here.
clericvash wrote:No offense but we don't need SVN to put a forum on a website.
You should ask this in a other way as now I can't reply to this without having to directly counter your statement. Something like "I don't understand why you would put PhpBB in svn, can you explain why?" would be better for the discussion. But, well I'm already happy you say it in public as now I can explain the reasons to all without having to repeat myself to each person. But keep it in mind.

Now that PhpBB is in svn all people with some web skills can update or modify it, also everybody can make suggestions for improvements that web dev's can implement. And you, I and others can make those modifications at the same time. And "maybe" if we would write some cool code we can point upstream (the phpbb project) to our svn so they can implement our changes in the regular PhpBB release.

And before some ass is going to post something along the lines of "If you like to develop PhpBB so much then why not join that project." well I like to develop the site (including a forum) in a way that fits Spring, upstream is just about providing a standard PhpBB installation package. Also I would take offence to a remark like this so think about your tone.
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AF
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Post by AF »

I agree with tim. For creative works you could possibly apply some level of criticism but phpbb is a php application with lots of potential changes to be made, many of which do not directly affect the design such as security fixes, captchas, header values, and browser fixes.

On top of that the fact that phpbb extension would not be the same as say word press or joomla plug ins and could mean modifying the core php code base in places means we need to be able to track what's changed if only to make things clean and easy in the future. This is true of any forum software we use.
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Tim Blokdijk
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Post by Tim Blokdijk »

AF Understands! That makes me quite happy you know. :-)
Do you remember that a few months ago you fought svn usage for the site as if your live depended on it.
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AF
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Post by AF »

SVN is useful for application development and maintenance. For a creative exercise such as a websites design I'm not so sure. It raises the bar a little too high for most web developers to contribute for free here and there when coupled with any processes.
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SwiftSpear
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Post by SwiftSpear »

My 2 cents is that I'm more comfortable with PHPBB, the way our current BB is set up on THIS particular forum is pretty patchy, but with plugins and lovin PHPBB forums are quite capable of meeting the need for a project like this.

I'd give Tim the final call, most of the work is being done by him and he should get to work with whatever standard he feels best.

Tim: didn't mean to imply that we shouldn't be working with the PHPBB source, just that I didn't know anyone had even touched it in the slightest. TBH I didn't even know it was an OS project..
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clericvash
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Post by clericvash »

I have never used SVN before and i worked with 2 people in creating a forum, i will just never really see a true proper point in it.
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Tim Blokdijk
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Post by Tim Blokdijk »

You will once you start using svn.
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Erom
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Post by Erom »

Truth. Even if you are the _only_ person working on a project, SVN rocks. It just makes things so much easier.
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