Re: Need to add user logon to message forum on my site
Bravenet quite explicitly targets the market for open access forums while most providers concentrate on membership forums. A little time with Google will find you a service which will deliver what you want.
Re: Need to add user logon to message forum on my site
Hawk
Okay, so after I download the new forum and edit it to match my home page, then how to I create user logons?
who approves their logon permission? Also do I copy the entire .zip file or coy each file and create sub-directories?
Also I downloaded neosilver. How do I get it to work? Do I inport it as a zip file and run it or copy each file seprately building sub-directories?
So far this sounds like you have downloaded phpBB and a style named "neosilver". You need to first create the required data base, install the forum software, and then work through the configuration. As you go through the configuration you will find out how forum members are added and how you can manager their login accounts. phpBB also has the ability to define other administrators and moderators, so you can spread out the management duties. You, as the owner, have control over how much access each administrator/moderator has. They can manage the forum without having any real access to your web site.
Working with a forum like phpBB is not the same as dealing with a web template. You can't just open it up in the on-line editors and make it look the way you want. That is what the various styles are for. Once you understand the forum configuration, you can add the style. Installation instructions are available where you downloaded the style.
Most of the questions you are asking can be answered by reading the instructions. I have read them and they seem to be pretty straight forward. Some web hosts provide the ability to upload a ZIP file and then extract it on-line. Bravenet says they offer "gzip" compression, but that might not be useful. I can't find any information describing how to use it, so you will probably need to UnZip it on your PC and then upload it to your web site. You can upload from the Bravenet File Manager, but a FTP upload from your PC would be much easiest.
When you are uploading, make sure the directory structure is exactly the same on your web site and that none of the file names are changed. Some FTP tools have the tendency to change the case of some file names. Check the tool you use to make sure it does no file name modification. PCs usually don't care about character case but Bravenet's servers are running Linux, which is case sensitive.
I have been though a similar discussion last week. Try this link to a post by Roy on Forum registration and replies to posts. Overall, installation is simple, but once it's installed the configuration can be rather complicated. However, any configuration questions you might have can be answered on the phpBB forums.
