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Full Version: Vihreä Lohikäärme (a Finnish Tolkien forum)
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Kontu is a Finnish site dedicated to the works of J. R. R. Tolkien as well as all the related stuff (movies, books, games etc.) – Vihreä Lohikäärme is the forum of the site. The site launched a year before Peter Jackson's movies began to come out: December 19th 2000. Fellowship premiered exactly one year later.

At the moment the new MyBB forum isn't yet in use, still being under testing & preparing. The contents will be selectively merged from a heavily modded phpBB2, so careful testing is required. This shouldn't prevent you from enjoying the results as the forum design and set of smilies are original [Image: smile.png]

http://keskustelu.kontu.info/index.php
(note: dropping index.php will redirect to the old forum)


Why MyBB?

This may be of interest to some people. As I can see it, MyBB is a forum software that is a more "proper" continuation to phpBB2 and follows the design philosophy far more phpBB3 does. If we look at phpBB3 it is huge, cluttered and the admin panel is a confusing one. I had a few looks at the CSS files and I think it is the worst nightmare for redesign. What I remember is it had a lot of massive CSS files and the HTML had lots of extra elements. My own style with HTML is very minimalistic and the complex stuff goes to CSS.

In the other hand MyBB's default template is clearly "from the old days". The syntax is limited a great deal by Internet Explorer 6. I also don't like the template & style editors in Admin CP, very buggy to use, so I copy stuff to text editor and then back to browser. Haven't spent time to figure out how I can get my hands into the real deal directly. Anyway, the good thing in MyBB is that it is much more quick to port it into a new style than phpBB3 is, atleast once you're familiar with the logic of the theme editor.

There is also SMF that I had a look at. While it is technically cleaner in the template side (and more powerful as well), it is all the other small details that I don't like. At this point it is a long time I last had a detailed look into the software so I can't go into very specific details; only what I remember on how it felt like, so I haven't given it a new chance recently.

As for the other forum software out there... any commercial software was ruled out (no vBulletin, no IPB) and the remaining open source or free software "just doesn't cut it" with features. In general I think MyBB offers a great deal with features & speed while also being open source and the only area it clearly struggles with other software is the default old school design [Image: grin.png]
Your design is excellent. Your use of color is exceptional and original. Your background graphics add balanced contrast and sophistication. Well done. One of the best I've seen.

The only problem I see is the default MyBB post status icons and primary control buttons clash with your colors. I hope you can find ones that are more suitable.
See here guys? This is a textbook example of a great forum all round excellent. Great design, content and a nice little niche.

A sincere well done and wish you success.
Thank you for the comments!

Andrew B. Wrote:The only problem I see is the default MyBB post status icons and primary control buttons clash with your colors. I hope you can find ones that are more suitable.
A limitation of time: I have to do the buttons first for the Finnish language pack (which retains the MyBB blue color) – in the other hand I've never understood why the graphical buttons must have text in them in the first place. It is a slap on the face of any localization effort, a lot of time wasted for little gain.

On the forum I'll just probably remove the graphical buttons from the template and replace with a simple link with a CSS class name. Then I have the control via CSS.
Your forum is closed...
At the moment, yes, as the final merge from phpBB2 is on it's way. It takes a long time to merge some 60 000+ posts Smile

And that is a selective amount, it would be 200 000 if inactive threads would be included.


Edit!
The new MyBB based forum is now live and I guess we're getting the most popular day of the year. And it's a slow Sunday!
Using CSS buttons sounds like a good idea. But I notice you made some buttons under the forum, and they look good too. I just don't know how they would look inside the forum.