MyBB Community Forums

I left MyBB plugin developing as 1.6 didn't attract me that much from a developer perspective at the time and community wasn't that attracted in my plugins.

But for personal reasons i must be involved in forum "business" so i should pick a board where i can study, experiment and develop over.

I'm considering different forum boards (i would like to pick MyBB as i started modding forums with it when i was younger and it was a very nice experience cause i had fun in developing plugins).

I'm looking for MyBB 2.0 and i hope it will attract me but i don't see mockups, a roadmap, decisions about structure of the entire code, the features that is supposed to have.

Do you think some "detailed" info in technical fields will be out soon (a blog post describing all of this would be nice)?

Not soon, but at some point eventually. There are a few dozen of threads about MyBB 2.0's features though, MyBB 2.0 Suggestions for example, where developers and other staff members release information.

One thing is for sure: it will be freaking awesome!

If I think back, 1.2 -> 1.4 took around 1 / 2 years - and that wasn't a full rewrite. So we're a bit away from anything solid just yet.

Some more information about 2.0 will be available soon, but until then there's lots around you can read up on as faviouz points out. The most important points are that it is a full rewrite, written within a MVC framework and features a new theme.

Just an update though, but don't tell anyone - Justin's work on the new theme means that we practically have a full HTML version of what 2.0's front end will look like. That doesn't mean we won't be tinkering with it and it definitely isn't finished, but yes, it is awesome.

I need to hack into all your machines and find this new theme.

I second the opinion that a roadmap is urgently needed. If MyBB wants to stay successfull, it needs to give more signals out there, where it will be heading to.

Competition is changing fast. Xebforo is out now with a stable release and they make a very good impression so far in the way how they are committed to give a longterm perspective.

I am running several vb forums. And I can assure you that many vb-owners are looking now for alternatives. It is up to you how you want to pull them over to myBB. If you do nothing, they will all end up in Xenforo.

Look at vb 3.86 and all the features it offers. This is the benchmark in the industry (vb4 is crap). The number 1 target for every forum-software should be to keep up with those features. This is enough for 99% of all users.

Everybody who is considering to switch to a different forum-software will check first, whethere the new software (i.e. myBB) is able to keep up in moderation easiness, features for end-users, Plugin and Hack centralisation etc.

Without a roadmap, you are risking to be sorted out in the same league like phpBB3. You will not get any piece of the "ex vb-owners-cake".

The more time you waste with not making a clear and tight roadmap, the more you will loose this potenial business to Xenforo and IPB. Once they are big enough, you will end up as a niche player.

Most forum owners own only 1 licence of software. So at the end of the day, they do not care whether they have to pay 150 USD for a forum, as long as it gets them what they always wanted and what makes their life easier. So beeing for free does not help in the long run to be able to survive in this very competitive market

I just started digging into myBB. So far I like it a lot. But if it would turn out, that there is no serious committment for professional development (and a roadmap is one of the criterias for this), me and many others would be forced to go somewhere else...

Just my 2 cents...

But, MyBB isn't a business...

You only keep mentioning paid software and where the money is going to go. While it's great to see MyBB compared to paid software it's kind of unfair in some respects. Personally I hope MyBB doesn't have as many features out of the box as vb 3.86, ever. As a lot of them are features I would never use.

I don't know why it's all about features offered over features needed? In all honesty it would still probably be cheap to use MyBB and pay for a few plugins to make it match the features than buy a license.

Edit: Just looked at Xenforo as well. While they have reached a stable release it looks like they wasted to much time on looks over function. They don't even have a warning system built in yet. Hell more than half the things planned for 1.1 are included in MyBB.

I agree with Alex. Most of the MyBB users use it because its simple and has all features needed for a Forum.
When someone wants a simpler forum, they can't easily use VB, as its not so easy to strip down the features. On contrary, if a person needs any extran features that MyBB doesn't provide, they can easily attain through plugins.

I agree that a road map will be good. But considering that MyBB developers aren't doing it on a full time basis, it would be hard to make a definite roadmap.

(2011-05-27, 05:08 PM)Alex Smith Wrote: [ -> ]But, MyBB isn't a business...

But the people who want to use myBB have a business in 99% of the cases - even if they do not know it consciously. Everybody wants to cover the costs (bandwith, server, mods, domainname and somtines also working hours) in "his" community. That means for some the busniss is covering 100 USD/year, for others it is more $$.

(2011-05-27, 05:08 PM)Alex Smith Wrote: [ -> ]...

I don't know why it's all about features offered over features needed? In all honesty it would still probably be cheap to use MyBB and pay for a few plugins to make it match the features than buy a license.
...

That depends on how you see it. Everybody has different needs for different features. For me personally features should be part of the core, as soon as they save time in moderating/maintenance of a forum and to earn money= cover the costs. Bulk move of postings from one thread into another thread for example. I read about the lack of this feature here in the forum. Inline moderation would be also a time-saver. PayPal Integration etc. pp.

I agree that some of this you can get through hacks. But with this argument, you do not need to develop anything anymore. The sex-appeal of a software is also how easy it is to offer a really good forum out of the box without mods.

But please do not misunderstand me. I am quite impressed of myBB. I like the handling so far (I test it since today) a lot. Although different, it looks very familiar to an vb-user. So I feel kind of "home", when entering the ACP.

But that does not mean that there can not still something be improved. And people who have used many different software are helpful for ideas on what would be a good idea to add in the future (I am not a coder, only a community provider).

With a small effort, myBB could blow away 99% of the forum market. It has the potential. It is already so good so far, that it is relative easy to make this step. But a roadmap is needed to engage more developers into it as you can read in the first posting here. And I have the same opinion.

(2011-05-27, 05:08 PM)Alex Smith Wrote: [ -> ]...
Edit: Just looked at Xenforo as well. While they have reached a stable release it looks like they wasted to much time on looks over function. They don't even have a warning system built in yet. Hell more than half the things planned for 1.1 are included in MyBB.

Xenforo is totally new. Vbulletin tries to sue them (they are ex-vbuelltin coders). So not the easiest way to start from scratch

But for the short time they have invested in, it is really impressive what they achieved so far. And they draw a lot of attention from old vbulletin users and coders to them. Do not underestimate the power of an enthusiastic hacker-community. IMHO Xenforo is one of the reasons, why vbulletin will never be what it used to be. And Internet Brands knows this. This is why they try to stop them.

Of course myBB offers more at the moment. But what is in one year from now? If you are planning to start and to manage a community successfully, you have to plan your own roadmap for the next 3-5 years.

You can not switch every 2 years your forum software or constantly search for new plugins. That kills you. You have to focus on different things to grow your community. Not the technical part of your forum software. So you have to trust the developers of the forum software of your choice, that they are also in 2 years committed to be on the leading edge, add features in a timely manner or improve "only" code etc., so that you can concentrate yourself on other stuff to grow your community.

And the best way to get a feeling where the developers are planning to go is to look at their roadmap, on which kind of feature they spend most of their time etc.

I.E. with vbulletin you knew from the first second that the good times are over not because of their new prices and licence policy. You knew it because of their new target to offer suddenly a CMS and other stuff parallel to their forum software. This was the clear signal for vb-forum owners, that they now have the wrong priorities for future improvements of the forum software.

(2011-05-27, 05:08 PM)Alex Smith Wrote: [ -> ]Edit: Just looked at Xenforo as well. While they have reached a stable release it looks like they wasted to much time on looks over function. They don't even have a warning system built in yet. Hell more than half the things planned for 1.1 are included in MyBB.

A lot of things they actually didn't need. A lack of Post Subject is another example. There are ways to deal around with malicious members and infractions don't seem to work these days.

While the developers are probably in a better position to answer your concerns, I'm going to chime in with my thoughts in the meantime.

I understand your need for seeing a roadmap so that you can see which direction a software is headed in but IMO its a little premature at the moment to have a roadmap for 2.0
As it is, 2.0 is still in its planning stages and as such details change often, while the devs have an overall picture of what they want to do, until a final plan is decided on with all its intricate details and coding begins it would be cumbersome to release a roadmap and have it change everyday.

It has been mentioned a number of times that 2.0 is still a while away and in the meantime 1.6 is actively being worked on as can be seen on the dev site: dev.mybb.com

I agree with you that MyBB does have some often requested features, such as seamlessly moving bulk posts from one thread to another, that you mentioned and I'm sure the devs are taking notes to help them to perfect 2.0 from the ground up.