Do You Need a Simple Wordpress Forum?
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In my Wordpress website development travels, I have often had the need to install and develop forums for myself or for others. In the past I have relied on various open source forum applications and installed them into a sub-domain or a sub-directory. I did this because the forums I found that were tagged as being integrated with Wordpress, were sometimes difficult to modify, and some were just downright buggy. Well, I think that search for the perfect Wordpress forum has ended, and I’m eager to get started with Simple Forum.
I learned of Simple Forum through comments on Justin Tadlock’s Structure theme page by Mr Papa (who helps out on the plugin development). Although I haven’t yet installed Simple Forum, I have read through the installation Docs (a separate download in a nice pdf format), and it’s straightforward and well laid out. I will be installing this forum plugin in the coming weeks to try it out.
What are your thoughts on Simple Forum for Wordpress?
This forum plugin for wp is really great. Before i found it i tried many others like bbpress, phpbb etc..
but this one fits best. quick and easy setup. easy to handle … great one
Can you share an example of this plugin in use?
Hi,
I tried the install @ http://www.jjmacey.net/blog without success. I deleted the plug-in from the wp-content/plugins directory, but still have the “Simple Forum” tab in my header.
Can you tell me how to get rid of it? I’ll then take another look @ the install.
A Forum added to my Blog would be a real plus!
Thanks in advance for your response.
JJMacey
Phoenix, Arizona
I guess you put the forum ON A PAGE … so have a look at your admin section: manage -> pages and look for the page and delete it
should be that simple …
all the best,
thomas | admin sharebrain
I do see that forum tab on your site. When you installed the plugin, did you also create a page called “Simple Forum”? It might be that your theme is dynamically creating that tab whenever you create a new page. Check to see if that’s the case, and if so, just delete that page and the tab should disappear.
Let us know if that does it. If not, I can help you look into it further by installing this plugin myself.
YOu MUST create a page when using the forum. And this page use a template called “forum”. So when you delete the page the problem is solved
sharebrain + WordPress Modder,
It does seem that a “Page” was created, I found it, then deleted it, and all is good. Cool!
WordPress Modder, if you want to help me install this plug-in that would be great.
A WP Forum plug-in would rock!
Thank for the response guys.
JJMacey
Phoenix, Arizona
I can take a look, but I’ll need some information from you. Please use the contact form here, or email me at:
info AT wordpressmodder DOT org
WordPress Modder,
I’ve sent you an e-mail. Should you not get it you can reach me @ jjmacey At jjmacey Dot Net.
Great to hear back from you.
JJMacey
Phoenix, Arizona
Thank You ! I’vebeen looking for a wordpress forum plugin/addon for a while.
I didn’t want to use vBulletin etc.
Thanks.
Forum Development Blog’s last blog post..Tips on Maintaining a Successful Forum
My problem with Simple Forum is that, while it’s simple to install, it itself is NOT a simple forum. I don’t need all these groups and forums and bells and whistles. Are there any forums for wordpress that are just a single forum of posts and replies?
I can understand your frustration, with any forum software or plugin I’ve ever installed, there was a learning curve because every one offered something a bit different in the way of “bells and whistles”, and of course each one’s Admin configuration was different too.
The simplest WordPress software I can think of is bbpress from the WordPress developers themselves. You can find it here http://bbpress.org/
The one reason I didn’t choose this as the WPM forum software is because it doesn’t offer email updates to topics, only RSS. Yes, I’m a web developer, and call me “old school”, but I prefer not to use RSS aggregation, I prefer everything to come to my inbox. However, this may work for you. There are options for adding email updates, but I’ll wait until it’s integrated into the core.
You can see bbpress in use at http://showinabox.tv/forum/ , and you’ll also notice they had to “add on” for email subscriptions.
Also, here’s a nice breakdown of some different forum software options… http://bloghelper.is-there.net/integrating-a-forum-with-wordpress/
The problem isn’t the learning curve, I just don’t need most of the features and I’d rather not have to cut out all sorts of code by hand. Even bbPress has too much to it, with multiple forums. My site isn’t big enough to justify splintering the discussions like that, and that sort of interface is unnecessarily awkward if you only have one forum. (Although the real reason I’m avoiding bbPress is that I want a true WordPress plugin so that integration isn’t a problem.) Admittedly I haven’t checked bbPress to see if there is an option to disable this, but it seems like multiple forums is unfortunately the standard in all forum software.
GP’s last blog post..That’s it for the important stuff
“My problem with Simple Forum is that, while it’s simple to install, it itself is NOT a simple forum. I don’t need all these groups and forums and bells and whistles. Are there any forums for wordpress that are just a single forum of posts and replies?”
You can always try Vanilla, by Lusumo which can be found @ getvanilla.com. Also, here’s a post I found written by the software’s developer (I think), which talks about how to integrate it seamlessly into wordpress. Be warned, it requires a bit of editing the source code for both wordpress and vanilla. (Not as intimidating as it sounds.)
http://lussumo.com/docs/doku.php?id=vanilla:integration:wordpress
Hope that helps!
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Ha. This is confusing, actually. Yes, it is very very very simple to install. Flawless and works perfectly, but there are sooo many options! which is great, just not simple
There was a very simple forum (pardon the pun) that I used to have that allowed 1 directory cateogires, but I forgot the name!
This Simple Forum seems good. There is another WordPress compatible forum software called bbPress which can be built into WordPress blog directly without a hassle. It works well with gravatars too meaning if you already have a gravatar account, using the same email address, your gravatar photo will appear in bbPress forum too. However, if I get the chance, I will try our Simple Forum too.
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I always wanted to add a forum to my wordpress blog, even though I have not really looked at many plugins, I am sure there a lot out there that would work well.
Polishbear’s last blog post..Wyatt Cenac Keeps Election Funny
For some reason I just don’t find the “simple forum” to be SIMPLE at all!
Really good add on for Wordpress. Nice work
Thanks for sharing this and the forum is simple and easy to install. Some forums I installed was too complicated and I couldn’t get it to work properly on my own. This plug in is by far the easiest plug in and it is just so easy to use.
Wow this is a really sweet plugin. I was looking a forum that could be easily integrated into my web hosting blog but I didnt want to install the standard VB or PHPBB because it would be a b..ch to install and modify my WP theme for
Glad I could help, and just an FYI. I have had zero issues with this plugin;)
I looked at your site, seems like some good deals. Do you offer Wildcard DNS service?
Thank you for sharing this WordPress plugin. Forums are a cool way to interact with our readers. I might actually use this for my fashion blog since there are a lot of comments.
Monica Boston’s last blog post..30 year mortgage interest rates remain unchanged
Although I am a noob with WP in relative terms (less than one year) I get excited with the possibility of the application of these sorts of things. i want to develop a online community so this is the perfect find for me. Thank you for making it easier for those of us in your dust.
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Doesn’t look to difficult to use, I will give it a try. I’ve been thinking about making a forum, and this looks like the perfect opportunity.
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Thank You ! Forums are a good, but very simple…
I use UseBB (usebb.net).
Thanks.
I think its a great forum though still not as good as phpbb. Does the job you want it to and it’s easy enough to use.
enjoy
Thanks for this. It’s a simple program. Gets the job done.
I like phpbb but this seems like an okay forum to use as well.
Clarence’s last blog post..ahhh politics
Nice forum, The bad thing is im already using PHPBB and i don’t want to take chances and mess everything up switching to SimpleForum lol.
This looks really interesting I am going to certainly have to check it out. I have been demoing BBPress on a couple of sites I manage, but I think I this would work a lot better, especially from an SEO point of view.
Bradley Hart’s last blog post..The Emmy Goes Too
Is there an easy way to transfer a phpbb forum into something else without loosing all the posts etc?