So I have an ANCIENT BB running on Snitz (still) and I'm going to change to a new system - I don't want to port data, so that's not an issue. I'm trying to decide between phpBB and this one and while both look good MyBB does look a bit more "modern".
One of the main things I want is the ability for my users to upload images. Easily (these are all old people, and the images are their children/grandchildren/pets). In Snitz they have to host the image somewhere and embed the URL and... old people check out (and I'm old now as well). I see that phpBB has this built in (and my host would certainly allow images to be stored there). I only could see that I can embed video stored elsewhere in myBB (which is nice). How about images? I saw a plugin but my experience with plugins has been less than stellar (and, again, I'm old and want the installation to be as painless as possible).
And - any other reasons NOT to use phpBB? Not trying to start a fight, just trying to make this old man's life (what little there is left) easier.
MyBB allows to upload pictures as attachment, with a display as miniatures in threads, but I personnaly dislike to let users upload a lot of files.
I made a plugin to directly upload to imgur and display the picture on the forum (
https://community.mybb.com/mods.php?action=view&pid=386) and another one exists (
https://community.mybb.com/mods.php?action=view&pid=950).
the installation of mine (and the one from WhiteNeo) is really simple:
- Get an imgur ID
- Upload the plugin files (including subdirs) to your forum. Note that often, the plugin files are in a
upload directory
- Activate the plugin from ACP
- Go in the settings to fill your imgur ID and some other settings (if needed)
You're done
The latest version of MyBB allows simple drag and drop uploads.
I run a forum with about 400K attachments currently.
The only physical limit is hosting space.
Yes, the new drag and drop feature makes it easy for everyone to upload images.
You will, however, have to set the size limit - probably to a bigger size, since most older folks don't know how to resize images.
That means that you will see big file sizes being uploaded.
Even so, you will have the option of setting the "display" thumbnail size - this is a nice feature - because if you set the thumbnail size to a bigger size, then folks won't even have to click on the image to see detail.
But if they do click the thumbnail image, it will open a full sized detailed image in a new tab - and I like that feature.
MyBB is way better than Snitz (I switched years ago) in my opinion.
We use Shade's plugin - which the new MyBB image drag and drop feature is based on. The full plugin includes the Imgur anonymous upload API, which the builtin feature doesn't have. That plugin is no longer maintained - so might be a good idea to have a look at @Crazycat's plugin.
We use that too, and it works very well for us. Controls picture size and bandwidth used - by leveraging the Imgur thumbnail feature.
In an era of high default resolution cameras and phones, this is extremely useful.
Windows 10 photo viewer has a simple one-click photo resize feature.
Hopefully, us old geezers can learn to use it.
Hi, you could try the following plugin which sends all attachments to be stored on
BunnyCDN Edge Storage service :
https://ougc.network/entry?other-ougc-at...ud-storage
Setting it up could be more complex than expected for people with no experience on the topics but once implemented the saving on disk space could be worth it. Disk space is one of the most expensive aspects of hosting services.
Also, the following plugin could be used to reduce the space used by image attachments :
https://ougc.network/entry?other-ougc-image-optimizer
A free alternative to this last plugin could be the following :
https://community.mybb.com/thread-230646.html
Please note that the main difference between my plugin (from what I can see) is that my plugin can optimize images without resizing, whereas the free plugin seems to only resize images.
There might be additional alternatives, both free and non free apart from the ones mentioned above.
Regarding the main topic (comparison of MyBB - phpBB) I can't comment much. The last time I did try phpBB it was 10+ years ago, when I was a teenager, and as a "new-comer" MyBB was far easier than phpBB for me. But it is possible this is not the case, or perhaps it still is. Regardless, I can't comment more on it without being directly biased.
Thanks for all the replies. Yes, these are old people and even FB confuses them. So "drag and drop" it has to be (when I read about how easy it would be for them to host them elsewhere... sorry, I have to laugh. I help these folks out with tech and much of the time it's just "did you make sure it's plugged in?" Honestly, asking THEM to resize things would be like asking a caveman to design a rocket).
But that's a two-edged sword - I'm ALSO old, although much more tech minded. And I don't want to do a lot to set up another BB. When you measure your life left in years rather than decades you'd be amazed how precious even a few hours is.
And if we run out of space they will either have to pay for more (THEM, not me) or I'll delete stuff. Either way, no biggie (because, again, these folks are fairly sad and probably wouldn't notice if I deleted everything once a year).
I'm going to give installing this thing a shot. Hopefully it won't be as much work as Snitz was (from what I remember - that was a couple of decades ago and this old man can't remember what he had for breakfast :>).