Can someone please help program a forum for us?

[Tension]

Suprised this thread hasn't mysteriously vanished.

[Karlos]

Suprised this thread hasn't mysteriously vanished.

Really, why is that?

[persia]

What makes you think it hasn't?

Suprised this thread hasn't mysteriously vanished.

[Argo]

@Argo

The PHP5 problems wouldn't be so bad if they could get hosting on a dedicated server somewhere, but that'll be expensive.

I figured cost would be an issue and dedicated server hosting would not be an option. Which is why I recommended the host I use.
One time $50 for lifetime hosting.

[Karlos]

So, is it a figment of our imagination that it's still here?

@Cammy

Developing a new forum from scratch would be pretty time consuming. Creating a non-css template for an existing forum engine would seem to be a more sensible idea. Alas, that can also be a bit feature-restrictive. CSS isn't just used for presentation but in conjunction with javascript is used to implement a lot of features that you might take for granted.

[Karlos]

I figured cost would be an issue and dedicated server hosting would not be an option. Which is why I recommended the host I use.
One time $50 for lifetime hosting.

It's real a long shot, but I wonder if the powers that be at amigaworld.net would let them have a subdomain on their dedicated box (or at least last time I checked they were using a virtual server) ? Then they can use an older version of xoops that's nice and ibrowse-friendly.

Not much to lose by asking; they can only say no, at the end of the day.

[Argo]

Cammy,
  Are you talking about this site?
http://www.underground-arcade.com/index.php

[DiskDoctor]

@Cammy

I talked over similar idea just after I joined, a year ago plus.  I mean making this very site fully compliant with AWeb/IBrowse etc.  I can dig it out if you want.

Anyway my advice to you would be, as I already pointed at that time:

- use some CMS that fits your needs (well most should do)
- also a CMS that matches hosting technologies including version compatibility
- but pick the CMS that supports mobile
- then define AWeb, IBrowse and others as some cell phones in terms of content they can accept
- then enter AWeb user agent(s)

Voila!

This is tricky but while it's done, it fits all needs I suppose.

[Cammy]

Thank you for the suggestions, guys! I have tested out these forums in IBrowse, and while they do seem to work, there is no colour anywhere because I guess the CSS would add that.

I hope you will forgive my unfamiliarity with forum software, I have had no experience with this kind of programming before, I only know basic HTML. I understand that starting a new forum isn't the most basic task, and I was hoping that someone who reads this and already knows how to program one might offer to help. Although I could probably take the time to learn PHP and those other things myself, it could take me months and to be honest I would prefer to continue to learn Amiga programming and hopefully rely on someone else to program the forum for us. I hope you don't think this is selfish, I'm not used to asking for help. I'm certainly not asking for help from anyone who doesn't have the time, or anyone who thinks I am a scab. I'm just hoping someone out there who can program a suitable forum and wants to help the entire Amiga community by setting one up for us might offer to do it for us so we can continue with our Amiga programming.

One of our fellow Amiga game developers registered the Underground Arcade domain and set up a basic website on it for us a couple of years ago. Unfortunately it doesn't display right on Amiga browsers, and we hoped to replace it with a new website that I would probably code myself from HTML for maximum compatibility if I ever got around to it. Hopefully if we can arange hosting for the new site and forum, we'll be able to transfer the domain name over, but as you can see there is no forum on the old site at the moment.

The forum we want needs to have avatar support and coloured tables that work in Amiga browsers. Here is a website forum which works perfectly in IBrowse and looks the same as it does through OWB/Opera/Firefox - http://totalchaoseng.dbv.pl
If we could get something like this set up, that's all we'd need! I emailed the webmaster a few months ago to ask if he was interested in helping out but never got a reply.

[Karlos]

@Cammy

Most CMS use template based systems. The templates are small bits of code in separate files that represent the actual structure of the pages and the content (from your database, image files etc) is inserted into it to generate the final HTML, which is then sent to your browser.

A complete set of templates usually comprises a theme. It ought to be possible to create one which uses old HTML attributes in the template markup to set colours and such and strip out as much of the CSS as possible. You don't need to rewrite the whole CMS, thankfully.

[tone007]

http://totalchaoseng.dbv.pl
If we could get something like this set up, that's all we'd need!

Looks like you can get that forum software here: http://www.php-fusion.co.uk/downloads.php

Since it's already written and free, getting it running shouldn't be a big deal (been years since I ran a forum myself, good old YaBB...)

[DiskDoctor]

@Cammy

A complete set of templates usually comprises a theme. It ought to be possible to create one which uses old HTML attributes in the template markup to set colours and such and strip out as much of the CSS as possible. You don't need to rewrite the whole CMS, thankfully.

My point is, when you use a CMS that supports mobile, you merely create anything like template.  You only force content to some compact form (i.e. HTML only) by picking proper cellphone "generation" (there's just several of them and all should be defined).  And then you bind it with an ambiguous user agent that can of course, be other browser.

[Karlos]

My point is, when you use a CMS that supports mobile, you merely create anything like template.  You only force content to some compact form (i.e. HTML only) by picking proper cellphone "generation" (there's just several of them and all should be defined).  And then you bind it with an ambiguous user agent that can of course, be other browser.

No, I got that. However, most of those templates aren't necessarily that great for fullscreen browsing and they usually contain "clean" (or cleanish) HTML, free from the old HTML2/3 formatting stuff that iBrowse and the like actually use for presentation.

Either way, you are going to have to do some customisation by hand, whether you choose a mobile template to start with or not.

[Karlos]

Or you could just install vbulletin and I'll give you a copy of the proxy code :-)

Slight issue with that being that vbulletin isn't free and the proxy is, well, incomplete to say the least.

[yssing]

I can do it. Would love to do something for the amiga gaming community.
I can do it in php, asp, .NET what ever..

Mail me if you are still looking

[B00tDisk]

Why not just set up a telnet bbs with a "message door"?