Integrating the Forum With Peercoin.net & Switching to Discourse

Sentinelrv 2015-02-15 05:15:18 UTC #1

This topic has been split off from this one...

Fuzzy, if you get SSL for the current forum, will that create any problems if you changed the forum software?

Fuzzybear 2015-02-15 05:20:40 UTC #2

no the ssl will work for the domain, it does not matter afaik what is on the domain

Fuzzybear

Sentinelrv 2015-02-15 05:22:26 UTC #3

Ok, I have something I want to post about changing forum software and integrating the forum with peercoin.net, but I'm not ready to talk about it yet. I was just wondering about this one issue.

DigiX 2015-02-16 03:53:27 UTC #4

Xenforo's Forum Software?

Sentinelrv 2015-02-16 06:02:41 UTC #5

No, we'll be moving to Discourse. It will pretty much be the same setup as NuBits.com and their forum.

peerchemist 2015-02-16 18:12:33 UTC #6

May I propose using NodeBB for forum software, it is modern forum software with a lot of advanced features like discourse while retaining familiarity of classic forum software. Also it is quite themeable and has large community.
I fear that discourse will distance some users as it is not familiar.

https://github.com/NodeBB/NodeBB

https://docs.nodebb.org/en/latest/

DigiX 2015-02-16 18:19:24 UTC #7

I suggest not going this route. Nubits (and Nushare) is basically our first (unofficial) peer partners. However, they are not part of our network (Peercoin and Peershares). Copying their forum to be our forum will be a wrong branding move for our community.

As stated above by Peerchemist, I also fear that new members will be thrown off with the unfamiliar forum design. That is why I suggest we use Xenforo --- a modern alternative to classic forums. Basically, what the Dark Coin Talk community is using. With this forum software, we could fully brand our community.

As we all know, a forum is an integral part of a community. Furthermore, it is an important aspect of the marketing plan I've devised. Using the A.I.D.A. model, I plan to utilize the forum as way for enthusiast to engage with our community once we pique their interest. Which means having our own identity is vital in this ever growing crypto currency universe.

peerchemist 2015-02-16 18:33:21 UTC #8

@digix

Xenoforo is closed-source software, and you need to pay for it.
I strongly advise against it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XenForo

DigiX 2015-02-16 18:47:36 UTC #9

I am fully aware of that.

But I believe the benefits of getting it outweighs the disadvantages.

Cybnate 2015-02-16 19:52:39 UTC #10

Not sure of that, it goes against tradition of PPC community. I'm sure Discourse can be themed in a way that it has a distinct Peercoin feel.
I would also be comfortable with NodeBB if that has advantages over Discourse.

DigiX 2015-02-16 20:12:31 UTC #11

Cybnate:

DigiX:

peerchemist:

@digix

Xenoforo is closed-source software, and you need to pay for it.
I strongly advise against it.

en.wikipedia.org

XenForo

XenForo is a commercial Internet forum software package written in the PHP programming language using the Zend Framework. The software is developed by former vBulletin lead developers Kier Darby and Mike Sullivan. The first public beta release of XenForo was released in October 2010. XenForo 1.0.0 Stable was released on March 8, 2011. XenForo has several SEO features built in. On November 12, 2014, Chris Deeming officially joined the development team. One of his products Xen Media Gallery, now Xe...

I am fully aware of that.

But I believe the benefits of getting it outweighs the disadvantages.

Not sure of that, it goes against tradition of PPC community. I'm sure Discourse can be themed in a way that it has a distinct Peercoin feel.
I would also be comfortable with NodeBB if that has advantages over Discourse.

I see, glad to know.

If that's the case, I'll rather go with Peerchemist's suggestion of NodeBB.

Sentinelrv 2015-02-16 21:33:30 UTC #12

There are several reasons why I suggested Discourse (Note: I have not yet looked at NodeBB) For one, it's open source. This is pretty much self explanatory.

We already discussed this before in a previous thread and it was suggested that we try out another forum software before committing to it. The NuBits team did this for us with Discourse. We already have people who are very familiar with how it works and can draw from their experience.

Both our communities share many of the same members. This means many people at PeercoinTalk are already familiar with Discourse and are currently using it. Why make them get used to yet another forum software? It seems to have been a success. In fact, the Discourse forum is many times more active than PeercoinTalk. Not only is this due to the excitement Nu has generated, but because it increases user engagement and keeps people far more connected through modern features like notifications, live updating, etc...

Because Nu and Peercoin are partners, we can share resources with each other. For example, the forum assistant bot created by woolly_sammoth can be ported and used to tip Peercoins on the forum itself. I'm sure the Nu team is working on many other forum upgrades that can also be shared with the Peercoin community. If we go with different software, we won't have the benefit of this resource sharing between the two communities. We'll be forced to make everything ourselves and we currently don't have the manpower to do this. Even the Peercoin tipbot on Reddit was setup and is run by the Nu team.

The forum branding can also fit with peercoin.net. Here is just a quick mockup I did. I'd like to see some darker gray in there as well somewhere, but this is just a quick concept to show what I mean. A lot of these categories will also have sub-categories, so don't think this is the final organization of the forum...

Edit: Also note I forgot to include the coin logo in the concept below. It should be there to the left of the text logo.

Full-Size: http://i.imgur.com/01lb5yQ.png

pillow 2015-02-16 21:58:19 UTC #13

I had no idea it could look so good with those awesome logos like sugar on top!

Kai_Zen 2015-02-16 22:16:06 UTC #14

Clear and intuitive. Peercoin in its nature is quite counterintuitive for a number of reasons. We surely need things as much as possible where we can to always be both intuitive and clear.

Thanks Guys... is gonna be useful

peerchemist 2015-02-16 22:47:15 UTC #15

Okay Sentinel, you got me. Let's roll with discourse.

Do we need designer? I know a guy

kschneezy 2015-02-16 22:50:23 UTC #16

For the reasons Sentinelrv listed I am in favor of Discourse

Thireus 2015-02-16 22:55:09 UTC #17

I'm in favor too. Although, maybe it would be more appropriate to create a separate topic for this with a poll.

emeth 2015-02-16 23:01:23 UTC #18

Sentinel - Very slick. I like it.

irritant 2015-02-16 23:03:52 UTC #19

i like the looks of discourse, the only problem i have with it, small things like when sharing a link it adds ?u=irritant maybe it could be disabled or something to leak less , make it more anonymous friendly, but idk.. maybe im just nagging about nothing, i do like the way it works

Sentinelrv 2015-02-16 23:14:10 UTC #20

I'm not sure who Super3 was talking to here, but we do already have the designer who created the new peercoin.net, TheWildHorse. He would be the obvious choice to make sure the forum and website are aligned.