Discussion Boards: Invision Power Board

[Lee Deeming]

I would consider myself to almost specialize in forum/bulletin board software. My personal preference happens to be phpBB2. However when searching for some alternatives, for a user within this forum, here I stumbled upon Invision Power Board. Obviously claiming I 'specialize' in these scripts (particularly open-source) I have visied/tested/used this specific board, previously, but I was unaware that they had started charging new customers.

I would in no way object to small charges for PHP scripts and programs, but how can it be justified that a fee of 569$ USD be charged, for what I assume to be a very similar product to what I could have previously obtained for 0$ USD! :/

I am aware that this happens frequently - changing from open-source to a commercial product, with the intent of making a living from what you enjoy, but do you think that this change is a good one?

[ronniethedodger]

I think it is the support that they offer for IB. I do not use it, so I cannot comment on how good it is. But it is the first thing I noticed on their home page.

That support (if good) may be what people are looking for. You know what it can be like at the phpBB site trying to get an answer to a question -- if it is busy, your post is buried very quickly and by the next day it is two or three pages back.

Still, I would probably not pay for it. I am with you. There are a number of boards out there that are OpenSource, and with a little work, can be made to do whatever IB can do.

Personally, I can't wait for phpBB 2.2 to come out. Have you checked out what they have done already? Last check, they were about half-way thru with it and are sitting at 2.1 MS2 right now.

[Lee Deeming]

Yeah, phpBB 2.2 looks as if it will turn out to be so much better than the previous version, which is already more than adequate.

Regarding the support at Invision, I couldn't see how the charges I mentioned can justify support, especially as it would not even be required by the vast majority of users. Would you not agree?

[ronniethedodger]

For you or me. Not. But that is you and me. I would suppose for the average person that does not have everyday experience with products like this, it may have it's advantages, although I agree that it is overpriced.

It would be curious to see how many they sell at that kind of price. MovableType just upped their license fees recently, and that raised a big stink. They backed down (slightly) because of the uproar. I have not heard any rumblings of about this in regards to IB though.

[davebarnes]

Lee,

I am confused. You wrote $569 USD.
From the Invision Power website: "The software features pricing of $69.95 per year or $199.00 one time."

I have purchased two IPB licences for my clients and find that $200 is very reasonable. IP has also provided excellent service.

I much prefer IPB to a "free" alternative because I want tech support and am willing to pay for it.

I think IPB is a great product and recommend it highly.

,dave

[cyanide]

Yeah, I was kinda wondering where that $569 came from too. Dave has the asnwer as far as pricing.

There actually is a free version available too.

I used to be an avid phpbb user also, but recently found Invision Board and like it alot. I find it much faster with some nice built-in features.

You can see it in action here http://forum.webdevcom.net

[ronniethedodger]

Dave's reasoning for buying the tech support is a sound one. He is doing it for his customers, and that is a lot cheaper than putting your own time into it (and maybe not knowing the answer). $200 is dirt cheap ... and a good point.

I would have to disagree that one forum software is any better than the other. They have their own unique qualities.

What counts is what you put into it in the form of modifications. Boards out of the box are notorious for being bloated in code and not too spider freindly. I think phpBB is one of the faster loading boards out of the box though -- because it does not have all of the bells and whistles.

This has an upside, it is easier to spider -- for all those bells and whistles dilute the content of the board. That content is the meat of the search index and it is clouded in birthday calendars, fancy drop down menus on every post, and a ton of other non-essential garbage.

The WDC forum has been open since January. I know, I was at Matauris New Year Chat Bash which a lot of us watched the clock turn midnight more than once -- followed it from the east to the west til we were all snockered. I was signed up then.

But the IPB board does not spider well. This phpBB board has been modded and has 2100 pages in Google and receives about 50 hits from them a day http://www.bandofgonzos.com/phpbb/ all from mid-March.

It has been stripped down, much like WPW is. No frills here. What goes on behind the scenes though is another matter. There is bot tracking, search term hit tracking and all the stats and admin utilities have been plugged into it. All readily available from the phpBB community.

[matauri]

The WDC was only launched in mid April '04 (not having got it's own domain until mid May). Ronnie you joined a test forum I was setting up for my business, which I scrapped & we retained the db later for the WDC. It has also never been listed with SE's. It is getting spidered/crawled from external links, with up to 7 bots spidering at a time lately.

The one great thing that I like about IPB, is that I havent needed the 'support' yet. Everything is easily labelled and adaptable. It is a very 'user friendly' board as far as addons & mods. No running to forums every five minutes you want to try something different.

I run stock standard phpbb boards (admittedly older versions), and have found IPB a lot quicker to run with a heavier db & template. It's admin functions & documentation far exceed phpbb for administering a board. Everything is at your fingertips.

Those cute little extras such as calendars,etc are user bonuses, they arent just for birthdays (which can be a nice personal touch), they are great for conference updates, tutorials (such as ones run by Macromedia, etc) and for announcing public holidays (when board activity can be slow). They add another phase of interactivity to the board.

Functions such as 'report a post' cut down on modding/admin time. The note book I find fantastic, as I can copy & paste information from posts & later export to my editor. Members can archive their PM's for external use. PM's are also able to be sorted much like normal email, with an address book. Members last logon date/time is recorded, instead of just the last time they posted (so you can see who is still reading even if not posting). Fast reply on each thread prevents having to load a new page to post each time. Sub-categories also enable you to make the forum more compact.

If you dont want to run around collecting & installing mods, then IPB is the way to go. You can chose to use the bells & whistles, or you can chose not to.

There is only one function that I dont like. That is that each forum has to have an individual 'rules/guidelines' file. Make a change to the rule, and you have to make the change on all the files for all the boards.

I'd also like to see it able to be annexed to some CMS applications. I've seen a hack to do it, but would prefer it was more integrated as phpbb is with CMS's such as postnuke, etc.

After having used phpbb, vbulletin and now IPB... I would definately reach for IPB when building another board.

[ronniethedodger]

I stand corrected on the launch date Matauri. I was not aware that it changed domains.

The new version of phpBB (2.2) when it comes out, will have an API that will allow it to interface more easier with CMS such as Mambo and Drupal. They also have a portal project on the side they are working on.

[Lee Deeming]

Regarding the pricing structure at Invision, I quoted the sum of 569$ USD for the following reasons;

• $199.00 Lifetime license - who wants to pay for a forum, and not be entitled to use it for however long they choose?
• $275.00 IPB Copyright Removal - I am aware that this is not an essential purchase, and for that sum, I would be forced not to surcumb to my irrational aversion to copyright notices.
• $95.00 Invision Power Chat I would have thought this was available as a free modification, elsewhere. Although, I have always been one to take the official route, where possible.

As a result of further research the Invision Power Chat module may be a little cheaper, if purchased with the Lifetime License, but it is not clear, for definate if this is the case - or not.

cyanide, I was not aware there was a free version of Invision, but, since you mentioned it, I searched a little deeper, and found this free version. The reason I didn't notice it, at first, was the link read; [ Free Trial Version Information ]. In my opinion, a free trial means that there is an expiration date, meaning the software will not function after a certain period. I have known other script writers to have placed expiry dates on their software, forcing users to purchase licensed copied, later. As a result of this I looked no further.

For those of us with a little too much time on our hands; adding modifications to forums is part of the fun in owning and maintaing open-source forums. Or, perhaps that is just me. Does anyone agree with me?

[ronniethedodger]

Originally Posted by Lee Deeming

For those of us with a little too much time on our hands; adding modifications to forums is part of the fun in owning and maintaing open-source forums. Or, perhaps that is just me. Does anyone agree with me?

Well said. It is a lot of fun. That is one of the nice things about phpBB, it is easy to work with. The template engine is pretty damn good and the backend is very modular -- not much that you cannot do with it to tell you the truth.

vBulletin, I hear, is a pain to modify. I am tempted to fire one up just to see what all is involved (for second-hand knowledge of course).

This month (hopefully) we will have some exciting stuff rolling out on a phpBB board that will knock your socks off. Can't say much right now, but you will hear about it. ;0)

[matauri]

$199.00 Lifetime license - who wants to pay for a forum, and not be entitled to use it for however long they choose?

$275.00 IPB Copyright Removal - I am aware that this is not an essential purchase, and for that sum, I would be forced not to surcumb to my irrational aversion to copyright notices.

$95.00 Invision Power Chat I would have thought this was available as a free modification, elsewhere. Although, I have always been one to take the official route, where possible.

1. To my knowledge, the lifetime licence gives you access to support & the ability to add the chat & I think the editorial addons. No expiration date that I have heard of for what they call the 'trial version'. There are still many forums that can provide support, and the IPB forum still offers limited support for extras.

2. Copyright removal - phpbb requires that you keep all copyright notices in tact.

3. I use phpmychat and not their chat. I find it light weight, quick, and able to be fully customised with very little effort. And its free.

If your lucky enough to have too much time on your hands, then yes it's fun to have a stock standard php forum to play with. However, for those that dont have the excess time to make the mods, and for those that dont have the time to learn how to make the mods, then IPB is a better alternative. There are still many mods out there to play with for IPB, I have disabled a couple of the existing features for outside mods I found to be better.

[ronniethedodger]

I have no problem with Copyrights being kept in tact with a product. Copyrights still have to be kept in tact for the Free versions of any forum software in general, including IPB and vBulletin.

If the purpose of a Forum is for support of your services or a product and you do not have the time or the need to explore the possibilities because the forum is not the prime element of said service or product, then maybe IPB would be a good choice. Other than that, then the Forum is going to be exactly what you decide to put into it. It is no different than the any other page that will be contained and maintained on your website.

So far we have been discussing the stock out-of-the-box versions of Forum software. One thing about the Open Source community is there is an outpouring of good contributions to a product that they dedicate their own spare time to. Once the package gets commercialized, then you lose some of those unique contributions and get locked into a product that has the same look and feel from one site to the next.

At one extreme, there is vBulletin which is so hard to effect any front end presentation changes due to all these so-called "features" integrated into it ... that they become a liability more than an asset. If you think paying for a forum software is the easy way out, because you do not have the time to do this yourself ... well you will be paying more money down the line if your want the forum to perform to your expectations (or you want a different look or layout) in the form of redesigner fees.

phpBB truly has the best templating engine than any of the forum software out there, bar none. That is a fact. If you are used to doing simple changes with your own web pages using any editor of your choice and are comfortable with it, then you too can whip out a new template with little effort and change the whole look of your forum in less than a couple of days time (or in your "spare" time). The templates look like normal everday Html pages. Heck, phpBB has a configuration file for your forum images which define the width and height of the "sets" of buttons and icons. This alone stops that herky-jerky display when your page loads which is a real annoying in vBulletin -- you would think if you are paying good money that they would have thought about properly dimensioning of images in their Html.

phpBB is simplistic, and it is basic for a purpose. Not all people need or want all of the crap that goes into some of these forums. The premise is that you can take the software, and "build it your way". One new addition to phpBB was the creation of EasyMod. Mods are strictly compliant to specified format in which EasyMod will auto-install those modifications. No experience is required -- it will handle the database schema changes (if applicable), php script changes, and the template changes.

As your board grows, then certain thing may be needed. "Report this Post" was mentioned. If the moderation becomes unruly or the members for that matter become unruly ... EasyMod in the so-called "Yellow Card" mod. This is a little more elaborate than the run of the mill post reporting, yellow carding is for regular members to report bad posts. It also allows Moderators to "Blue Card" certain troublesome members. The blue card is only seen by the Moderators to inform other Moderators of these troublesome members. Then the dreaded Red Card is for those special few, and you do not want to know (or recieve) one of these. ;0)

One thing that has not been discussed is different offshoots of phpBB. These are pre-modified packages of phpBB which offer different flavors of phpBB. The Minerva Project (which includes EzyPortal) comes to mind. Another is phpBB Plus ver. 1.2 which is fairly parallel to Invision and includes the Event Calendar too. The calendar comes in the form of a nifty collapsible view that tucks away when you need it. These are all out of the box Open Source packages and there are more than several of them out there, if you take the time to look for them.

Now the bigger news. phpBB ver. 2.2 is going to be a complete departure from 2.0.x versions. It is a complete rewrite of phpBB from the ground up. Most notably will be their modular approach in the design and the phpBB API which comes with it. The simple forum will still be there ... but if you want an Event Calendar, then you just drop it into your Module folder and you are done. No muss no fuss.

Controlling the forum via the API is going to be a big key factor. Plugging the forum into popular CMS such as Mambo or Drupal will be easy to effect and control within those CMS. Quite frankly, this will more than probably propel phpBB into a super-stardom class of a forum software that will be unrivaled.

Oh well, I have ranted on enough about this for one day. Turning back to you Mat! ;0)

[matauri]

I was actually going to leave this as it stood, (unless IPB paid me for promoting their board!) but you provided me with a tool in Site Design to compare the speeds.

Originally Posted by Ronnie

I think phpBB is one of the faster loading boards out of the box though -- because it does not have all of the bells and whistles.

Comparison:

WDC - IPB Board with 21 posts
HTML: 8924 (bytes)
Images: 30678 (bytes)
javascript: 0 (bytes)
CSS: 0 (bytes)
Multimedia: 0 (bytes)
Other: 0 (bytes)

Connection Rate Download Time
14.4K - 30.69 seconds
28.8K - 15.35 seconds
33.6K - 13.15 seconds
56K - 7.89 seconds
ISDN 128K - 2.42 seconds
T1 1.44Mbps - 0.21 seconds


Gonzos - phpbb Board with 21 posts
HTML: 29906 (bytes)
Images: 14414 (bytes)
javascript: 0 (bytes)
CSS: 7690 (bytes)
Multimedia: 0 (bytes)
Other: 0

Connection Rate Download Time
14.4K - 40.51 seconds
28.8K - 20.36 seconds
33.6K - 17.48 seconds
56K - 10.57 seconds
ISDN 128K - 3.37 seconds
T1 1.44Mbps - 0.48 seconds

Now I dont find those tools very accurate anyway in download times. But, it shows a pretty big difference at slower connections, especially considering the IPB board had larger image files. I'd be interested to see the comparison though if you enabled HTTP compression.

A couple of things I did find on the weekend that I didnt know were there (I decided to get to know my admin functions a bit better).
1. I was wrong about the help files, I did find a central command post for that (kicks herself).
2. There is a function for deciding if you want your site spidered or not, with configs as to how you want it spidered. I had it on the default setting of not spidering 'into' the forum (kicks herself again), I have since changed it, so be interested to see how far they do spider in now (before I had only tracked them into the sub-categories). I think this function is handy if you 'dont' want your forum spidered (a private forum), or want to dictate how you want it spidered & by who.

(BTW...good comparitive discussion about the 2 boards! lol..would have been better on our own boards tho!)

[Lee Deeming]

Originally Posted by matauri

Copyright removal - phpbb requires that you keep all copyright notices in tact.

matauri, in fact, this is not the case. Contained within phpBB's Knowledge Base there is an article titled phpBB Licensing & Copyright.

Originally Posted by The phpBB Group

The default version of phpBB made available by phpBB Group includes copyright notice in the footer of the default subSilver styles. This includes the version number and a link back to phpBB.com. There is some question over whether this notice can be required to be retained or duplicated in other styles. Therefore phpBB Group allow its alteration or removal. However be aware that removing the notice will result in the loss of support at www.phpbb.com and most if not all other phpBB support sites. This is explained in the Rules & Regulations

I understand, that I can't take credit for the authoring of phpBB, and would still include all copyright notices, in full, within a seperate 'credits' page. I understand that this is not a substitute, in any way, and will still result in my forfeiting my right to support at most phpBB support sites.

Originally Posted by psoTFX, the Development Team Leader also

If you do not even include this copyright notice (which includes moving the notice to a separate credits page) we will not be able to offer support (the same stance has been taken by most if not all other phpBB related sites).

matauri, the pre-modified packages that ronniethedodger speaks of are available from sites such as phpBBhacks.com.

[ronniethedodger]

Originally Posted by matauri

I was actually going to leave this as it stood ...

Comparison:

WDC - IPB Board with 21 posts
HTML: 8924 (bytes)
Images: 30678 (bytes)
javascript: 0 (bytes)
CSS: 0 (bytes)Multimedia: 0 (bytes)
Other: 0 (bytes)

Gonzos - phpbb Board with 21 posts
HTML: 29906 (bytes)
Images: 14414 (bytes)
javascript: 0 (bytes)
CSS: 7690 (bytes)
Multimedia: 0 (bytes)
Other: 0

I can't believe you went off of a post count to do comparisons with. As you are aware, we have members that are (well...hehehe) very long winded. Post sizes vary.

Plus the total page sizes were different. Yours was 39k, ours was 52k (7k cache-able). The question is how much content was in that 52k compared to the 39k. I can roughly guess that ours was about 32k and yours was roughly 14k (these are rough estimates).

That aside, I find it very hard to believe that the total size for a 21 post page on your site is coming in under 9k. Considering that you have 5k of CSS styling in the HEAD section on each one of your pages. That would only leave 4k to handle the rest of the pages code and the content.... something is not adding up there. (out of curiosity, why don't you have a stylesheet?)

IPB has an overhead of 30k without a single post being made. This is a fact Mat. I have not done too much analysis on IPB, but I don't have to after some quick glances at the stock front end and what is spits out. If it is any consolation though, vBulletin is the worst of the lot.

I have however done extensive studies on phpBB. If you are interested in it, you can view it at the phpBB Hacks site set up for the BoG. There are other valuable tidbits of info in there for anyone who is interested in it. As you will see, we took the dial-uppers into consideration (had to, half of our Admin are dial-uppers and they carry a big stick! ;0)

Originally Posted by matauri

(BTW...good comparitive discussion about the 2 boards! lol..would have been better on our own boards tho!)

You bet! I am thinking about setting up a matrix that will outline the key differences, and it would be nice to get some input from you. I think it will a great resource for everyone. There is the CMS Matrix which handles the systems such as Drupal, Mambo etc. but I have not seen any detailed info on just straight forum software.

There is however a great resource on forums in general. A lot of these discussions are taking place right now from various forum owners. Visit the The Forum Zone if you are interested. It is one of them (ugh) vBulletin sites though, and I cannot help myself in reminding the owner that it sucks. ;0)

[davebarnes]

I would not pay to have the copyright removed even if it only cost $2.

I want the copyright notice on my client's fora for this reason: If someone comes to a forum and is thinking about using one for their website, I want them to chose the same one that I did in order to ensure the success of the product I spent my money on.

[Larke]

Hello there,

I have used IPB for years and provide 'unofficial' support on one of the largest resource sites for IPB.

I just wanted to say that there IS an unlimited trial version of the software. As mentioned in a previous post in this thread, finding it on the main IPS (Invision Power Services) site is a bit confusing. I suspect they mean it to be that way. But it is available for free download.

IPS has recently added a stable release (with upgrade from previous versions) to their newest version 2.0. Which has many new (and highly requested) features. With this newest version release they have changed the unlimited trial version installs of the software to say (trial) in the copyright at the bottom of every board page. This has lead many to believe that IPS is now forcing people to buy the software.

This is not true. All version installations remain an unlimited trial version until/unless you purchase a liscense. The (trail) text is then removed from the copyright at the bottom of each board page.

The unlimited trial version is no different than the paid liscense version. By purchasing the liscense you get official support from IPS. Add ons available at the main Invision Power Board site do indeed cost extra, as far as I know.

The chat software add on used by IPS is by Sigma Chat. You can get a free version that works on any trial IPB install.

As far as forum software goes, I have tried most of them. To-date I find IPB the most highly supported with the most modifications available. The modifications are easy to install and require very little php or html knowledge. 'Skinning' IPB is also very easy. Moreso now with the latest 2.0 release (which has many new features than previous ones).

Anyway, sorry to ramble on, but I saw the post and had to jump in.

Regards,
Larke
Invisionize Community Team Admin
http://invisionize.com