I’ve been trying to figure out a method for integrating a forum and membership options with the site for some time, as the last forum was flawed due to insufficient upgrades for the integration with the site; in other words I couldn’t upgrade WordPress without screwing up the bridge to PHPBB. Additionally, it was more complex than necessary, and had abysmal spam protection, which made it more effort than it was worth. It was a decent idea, but it simply wasn’t a good fit for the site.
Fortunately, I found something that ought to work well: bbpress. As it was created by the founders of WordPress, it will integrate very well, and should handle upgrades without a hitch. It’s also pretty simple, which is fine for our purposes here, and it has akismet spam protection. And, even better, I’ve found some more software that will allow me to restrict it to members only (among other features). What I’ll do is give all previously registered members (about 800, but it’s been a while) some time to decide whether they want to stay onboard. The forum will not be open to all comers, and I intend to keep it that way; it’s going to be more of a private club. The blog and blog comments will remain unaffected, so those who aren’t interested in the forum needn’t worry about it.
I’ve been working on this for some time, and it’s taken longer than I thought it would to come up with the right combination of software that will suit the needs of the site. The reason for this is that there are a lot of different kinds of forums, and there’s a lot of membership software, but not all work with each other, and not all work with WordPress. Finding three programs that will integrate seamlessly (hopefully) with each other was tricky, but I’m pretty sure I finally got it right. Now it’s simply a matter of putting the pieces together without causing a meltdown.
As I check all the details and do some more testing, I’d be happy to hear any feedback, suggestions or advice, and answer questions (if I can) before I go live with the new features.
