Let's move to Discourse, before it's too late! :)

[LogicDaemon]

Look at http://www.discourse.org

IMO, it's magnitude more appealing platform for discussions than phpbb. A lot of reasons, I won't even start to list them.

It's from Jeff Atwood, you must know him.

My proposition is: let's move on to that engine before too much effort invested in phpbb, and engine change become miserable. It's even possible they will provide hosted no-hassle solution no, they don't, but even if not:

1. It is open source, we (you) can set up everything ourselves (yourself)
2. I can donate up to $100 if needed, so they set it up for us

Non-Profit
Community belongs to everyone. We'd be happy to set up Discourse for non-profit and educational organizations for a very low one time fee.

P.S. I hate BBCode, and love Markdown syntax!

[joedf]

oh nice! thx for sharing

[lexikos]

Looks very nice (in various ways), but I think the IE10+ requirement might be a problem for some of our users, who are stuck on XP. XP users can use Firefox/Chrome/Safari, but that's not always an option (e.g. when using someone else's computer) and unbelievable as it may be, some people prefer IE.

(I'm not against it, just playing devil's advocate.)

[timeFlies]

Not to mention Vista, which is stuck at IE9. (And yes, I am one of those people who prefers IE over the likes of Firefox or Chrome.)

[joedf]

hey chaz, why the name change?

[LogicDaemon]

Not to mention Vista, which is stuck at IE9. (And yes, I am one of those people who prefers IE over the likes of Firefox or Chrome.)

It will work in IE9, though with some limits. Yet those limits are nothing relatively to phpbb limits when compared to Discourse.

See, stack exchange does not support IE 9 also.
http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions ... -do-i-need

And I think, IE below 10 slowly becomes abandoned, and fewer and fewer sites support it already. You'll have to upgrade one way or another. Even google said it will only support two latest IE versions (in gmail and docs at least).

[lexikos]

So it works somewhat on IE9; what about IE8?

[LogicDaemon]

They have http://try.discourse.org. Can anyone test it in IE8?

--
meanwhile I've found IE8 to test. Nope, it does not work in it.


--

btw, IE9 is supported indeed, except for some visuals.

[joedf]

Atleast it has mobile support... But I really like phpBB, I wanna try that Mobile mod I posted before..

[tank]

legacy browser support at least for the mean while is critical. what about use with GESHI?
there are other modifications that are necessary that have to be considered. Who will do the work? who will be trusted by the forum leadership with bug fixes and changes. I know phpbb3 code but i have very little time. someone else would need to take over completely my role. I am happy to grant the necessary accesses if a consensus is reached on such a move as well as parties to support it. Otherwise i will continue my customizations with the current forum as i get time

[joedf]

Well for me i have lots of Time usually, but I say; just put your personal life first tank, you've done a lot.

[tank]

Just pointing out the obstacles. Trying to clearly communicate why or why not

[guest3456]

IMO, it's magnitude more appealing platform for discussions than phpbb. A lot of reasons, I won't even start to list them.

the sky is purple because i say so

why don't you list the reasons? otherwise there is no discussion, just an empty request.

[just me]

Well, I do not hate BBCode and I do not prefer MarkDown. And I do not use a mobile for programming.

try.discourse.org is looking very 'white' like the new old forum and other 'modern styled' sites (I hate the current MSDN appearance!).

Are there any more 'advantages'?

[timeFlies]

Should I switch to Discourse right now?
Maybe.

Discourse is no longer early beta software. We are approaching version 1.0. We can now generally recommend Discourse as a workable solution for most communities on the web. It is still beta software, of course, but late beta. A lot of the early kinks have been ironed out.

There is tremendous technical and sociological friction to change in any established community. Engage in discussions with your community about even the possibility of such a change well in advance. Consider carefully whether your community is willing to adopt such a big change.

We believe Discourse works best for new discussion communities. It is definitely possible to convert existing communities to Discourse, but there needs to be broad dissatisfaction with the status quo and strong support for change from the community leaders.

In short, switching has very little benefit.

[jballi]

I agree. Switching for no real added value is just a waste of time and resources. phpbb may not be the prettiest tool in the world but it an excellent choice for a programming forum. Yes, this is a programming forum. Switching to something designed more for discussion (Yes, a very important feature) rather than programming (more important) can lead to what AutoHotkey.com looks like now. I know everyone won't agree but IMHO, the AutoHotkey.com forum is a disaster. I get a sick feeling in my stomach every time I have to use it.

[LogicDaemon]

@just me, there is [theming system](https://meta.discourse.org/t/has-anybod ... ourse/7534). Otherwise, any forum differs by UX. And this is exactly what make you like or hate a forum, if admins are adequate. If UX is terrible, admins won't even be testified, because bad UX on forum they dwell speaks for them.

There are really tons of differences, and many visible right on main page. It's neither possible, nor reasonable to list them, because it's like comparing an apple with an orange.

Most appealing for me:

* Easy-to follow threads (link to original message in replies, clicking on it displays this message nearby w/o loosing scrolling location the page); writing replies without scrolling (and need to find last message read again)
* Easy attachments adding; auto-preview for attachments, including ahk files (now there will be no need to copy&paste script contents to the message, just drag and drop ahk file, or even multiple ones, to attach them; they are easily previewable without downloading as a file or leaving browser window)
* resonable use of avatars (like in Trello, Redbooth, StackExchange, or any other modern web UI) – not for users' self-bragging (like in phpBB), but for identification (instead of nick lists, which are much harder to read)
* easy-to use Karma system, high granularity for user permissions, automatically given permissions depending on user karma
* Cleaner discussion threads, auto-looking for similar threads
* Smart notifications (on mention), Realtime updates
* MarkDown

note that, though some (or all) of them may be indifferent for you, this is only tiny part of differences. Try to use it yourself, I don't know your values to highlight differences meaningful for you.

At least open http://www.discourse.org/ and read, most things I noted are there.

[LogicDaemon]

but IMHO, the AutoHotkey.com forum is a disaster

It is indeed, but IPB isn't much different from phpBB from UX point of view.
Here and there, phpBB is worse, though maybe this can be changed (by configuring).

First things I noticed when I opened http://ahkscript.org/boards/ is lack of subject of the last topic in the forum, hard to read information about last post time (full date instead of "days/hours ago"), uninformative graphics (icons).

[lexikos]

hard to read information about last post time (full date instead of "days/hours ago"),

Logged-in users can change this in the user control panel.

(link to original message in replies, clicking on it displays this message nearby w/o loosing scrolling location the page);

Also, links to replies in the original message, which is something I don't think I've seen before.