How to change BP forum topic page like a normal forum page?

1. WPMU 2.8.6, BP trunk, and bbpress installed via BP one/two click.

   I'd like to make the forum like this (or WP's or BP's) i.e. like a normal forum page, so that it's more intuitive for members to use based on their previous experiences with other numerous forums online.

   I know what the BP Group Forum is all about but I also listened to the test-users who are a bit more "techy" than the other prospective BP members, and knew without a doubt that I needed to adjust the interface accordingly before making site available to others.

   Responses in this page and this page are so vague, it doesn't give me a clue how to make it happen.

   Can I do this change with bbpress installed via BP or should I do the external bbpress install and then the integration with WPMU?

   As I see it, I have these options:
   1 - Using current BP's way of integrating Forums
   a. make sure the topic links go a page which looks like a real forum page users are used to OR
   b. change Forum slug to "Group Discussions" or something else so the users won't get confused.
   2 - Install bbpress externally, do the integration and theme it
   3 - Do 1b) above and install SimplePress Forum :-)

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   mercime
   

2. hi mercime
   In my opinion ,you should go with 1(b), but do not install SimplePress.
   Simplepress is easy to use but the code is too much cluttered.And It will become a difficult task to keep up with the changes later.

   As you said,I will advise changing the forums slug to group discussion and use an external install in conjunction with the internal install of bbpress.

   If you want a buddypress forum like this,or buddypress.org's forum or wp's
   Here are the steps
   1.You will need an external install of bbpress

   2.This external install and the internal installation may share same databases,we just need to change the settings in bb-config.php for the external install to make it point to the existing database for the internal install(If you want ,I will go into more details)

   3.Integration of bbpress to wordpress Mu is required,
   here is a plugin which does this bbpress -integration
   http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/bbpress-integration/
   Use it to integrate the external bbpress and the wordpress MU.
   4.Now we need to make the external bbpress forum look like the main template of the site.
   So,It involves creating of a new template for bbpress(or atleast custom header/footer)

   That's it .
   If you want,let me know,I will tell you in details ,how we have accompanied it here.

   Also,If you want,I will be glad to do it on your own server(except the template,as template depends on your theme and may require extra bit of attention)

   Thanks
   Brajesh

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   Brajesh Singh
   

3. Brajesh, thank you for your response! It all makes sense now. I will indeed go with 1b) and external bbpress. In fact, I already change the Forum slug :-)

   Thank you also for your offer re external bbpress install, that's very generous of you. At this time, I would like to do this - or TRY to - or else I'll never learn :-)

   I had been able to do the integration before in test installation using the tutorial at -
   http://theeasybutton.com/blog/2009/07/17/integrating-buddypress-wordpress-mu-and-bbpress/
   - with WPMU 2.8.4a + BuddyPress 1.0.3 + bbpress 1.0.2 to check if everything was working all right. And it was a successful integration.

   But when BP 1.1.1 came out, I decided to drop everything in DB, deleted the bb- and wp-config.php and .htaccess files in root and proceed with a clean install per my specs in my first post with the bbpress forum installed internally via BP.

   So now, before I install external bbpress, I see in DB that I have the wp_bb_forums, wp_bb_terms, etc. from the internal bbpress installed.

   1. Should I disable the Forums component in BP Admin, then drop the wp_bb_ tables, then delete the bb-config.php in root first
   before I install the new external bbpress or should I keep all of them there and do the install of external bbpress?

   2. If I keep the wp_bb tables, what are the settings in bb-config.php I need to make to share same databases and to point external to internal install. Yes please more details :-)

   3. Or, is it better to drop the wp_bb_ tables, delete the bb-config.php from the internal bbpress, THEN install external bbpress and do the integration with WPMU per theeasybutton.com tutorial above, THEN install the internal bbpress from BP Admin?

   As for bbpress theming, I'm not a guru, but I think I kinda figured that out mostly. Be sure I'll get back to these forums when I'm stumped :-)

   Thanks again.

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   mercime
   

4. hi mercime
   Sorry for getting back to you a little late ,there are so many changes on site we have been working on so could not keep track.Won't be the case in future.

   Now here for the integration.

   There is no need to disable the forum component.
   Since you have already changed the slug for forum directory ,so I assume, you are using /forums for your external forum.

   Here are the steps.
   1.make a copy of forums/bb-config-sample.php and rename it to bb-config.php
   2.Open forums/bb-config.php in a text editor
   3.Open your sites internal bbpress's config file,It is in the wpmu root directory,where wp-config.php file is.
   4.Copy all the fields(which are required in forums/bb-config.php) from the internal bbpress config to forums/bb-config.php
   and you are ready to go.

   5.Upload the modified bb-config.php to the forums/ and go to install screen.It should be almost ready to go.
   6.After you are done with this, Install bb-press integration plugin and see,if you need to change some values
   7.Login to /forums/bb-admin and map the wordpress roles with the bb-press roles.

   That should do it.

   and yeh,I look forward to your participation in forum,drop a line ,we will love to help !

   Thanks
   Brajesh

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   Brajesh Singh
   

5. Thank you for the run through. I understand how a multitude of things crop up when you're into a new project :-)

   I will implement the external forum later this weekend. With the change of slug from just "Forums" to "Group Forums," new batch of 3 test-users finally "got it" right away that they should go to a group area first before posting or replying to anything. What a relief.

   Some questions when external bbpress shares DB tables with internal bbpress:
   1. From your experience, will uploading plugins to external bbpress affect how my internal bbpress functions in any way?
   2. Focusing on how the interaction will be between internal and external bbpress - Are the posts in internal bbpress be automatically added in external bbpress or vice versa? Just curious :-)
   3. The steps that you listed above seem pretty straightforward and almost easy :-) So I don't have to go through theeasybutton.com's steps in the tutorial anymore?

   Thanks again, Brajesh.

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   mercime
   

6. Hi mercime
   Thanks for the message.

   It is good that the user are understanding the system well :)

   1.Uploading plugin to external bbpress will not affect the internal(until and unless it makes some modification in the original tables,which will not be the case most of the time)
   2.Because Internal and external install share same database so the topics will appear in both(but I don't remember ,if a topic is created in external forum it will appear in internal or not,I will check and confirm you later today).Internal created topics will appear in external forum though.
   3.yes,This should be simple enough and no need to go through the extensive steps.

   btw thanks for the message there.I have a programming background,an Can do almost everything with programming ,but may not do that with the marketing side of the things.Looking further to improve :)

   Thanks
   Brajesh

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   Brajesh Singh
   

7. Hi Brajesh. Looks like the developers heard the "voice" of the users re old Forums usability. http://testbp.org/forums for BP 1.2

   On the other hand, I have to add those new styles to my custom theme ...

   Cheers.

   Posted 2 years ago #

   

   mercime
   

RSS feed for this topic

Reply

You must log in to post.