Thanks, Yams. I was wondering why Unne thought that the demo he linked to was anything close to vB, given that I couldn't seem to get to the usergroups functions. Still, even while looking at the actual admin CP itself...
One thing I really really like about this admin CP is it as the "Reason for ban" option. In fact, I've already asked for this option at vBulletin a few months or so ago, so that just goes to show how much I like the idea. So don't think I'm being completely bias - I always said I liked the look of the up and coming phpBB admin CP. It's still lacking the control of vB's but it's getting there. But that's not what I'm here to go on about, I'm here to point out what it doesn't have.
Manage Users gave me a blank page, so forgive me if that lead to any of the functions shown above - I'm not sure why I got the blank page. I'm guessing it's something Yams has set rather than phpBB.
Usergroup options. "Can send Private Messages" - but to how many people at a time? And how many PM's can they hold altogether? I like usergroups not because I can say "Yes/No" to things but more because I like to be able to set different limits. I like how you can easily set the usergroup colours but it doesn't seem to list a bold/italics option or anything similar. Are these determined purely by phpBB and/or mods? The amount of usergroup options that I can find easily is very low in comparison to vB. Let's compare.
Title - both have this.
Description - both have this.
User Title - both have this (Group Rank in phpBB)
Username HTML Markup - phpBB has colour only.
Password Expiry - vB only.
Password History - vB only.
Viewable on showgropus - vB only.
Birthdays viewable - vB only.
Viewable on the memberlist - vB only.
Allow users to have member goups - vB only (this has to do with secondary groups, which I don't believe
...okay, Unne, I know you can see both admin CP's so you should be able to see the rest. The difference on usergroups is massive and vB's is far, far superior when you're dealing with a place like EoFF, which currenly relies on a large amount of usergroups (including secondary groups). We could get by using just primary usergroups, too, but then we'd have even more seperate usergroups, I think... not sure on more, but you get the idea. Most of our usergroups wouldn't be possible using the phpBB admin CP that I was looking at on Yams' test dummy thingy.
I haven't gone through every area of the admin CP just yet but I don't think phpBB has:
Repair/Optimize Tables
Diagnostics (lovely feature, that)
I don't think I can find forum stats (ie registration etc), which I thought would be one of the things that would be default with any board. I might have missed it somewhere...?
Smilies Grouping
Subscriptions (this covers a large amount of things)
Advanced Custom User Profile Fields (more options as to whether a user has to select an option on a drop down menu or not, whether it can be searchable or is visible at all and other nitpicky things like that)
Automatic Promotions (user titles for those here for longer then 8 months etc), another usergroup problem - usergroups is the main problem that I can see, actually.
IP Search (see notes on forum stats, surely they have this...)
Create users (possibly something I can't see as it's under manage users, most likely)
Mailing lists
View Banned Users page
Referrals
PM Stats
Merge Users (something that we should probably take advantage of here at EoFF, but don't as of yet)
The OPTION to use db storage for attachments (although I don't know if there is any advantage to this at all)
Calendar (and therefore events etc, I think)
Who Voted
Strip Poll
FAQ Manager (although I've never really liked vB's version of it, at least it's there)
Announcements (I think?)
Phrase Manager (once I learned how it worked, I really liked it! I abused it heavily when playing with eyesoffff and it's good fun)
More (and better) forum-specific-options (although some in phpBB I'd like at vB, too, such as threads-per-page)
Inline template editor
As for what you said regarding the template editor, I agree - I use CuteHTML when editing templates at vB. However, it's a lot easier to copy/paste from the template editor than it is to download/upload files all day. The template editor is smooth and if you want to make a quick, simple change then it's easy as hell. You may as well think of it as an in-built FTP program designed for templates. It effectively downloads when you select it and uploads when you save it, right? Nothing wrong with it at all. Don't know what your problem is with it, but oh well.
And that's the phpBB 2.1.2 development admin CP? I've always said that I liked the look of the future release of phpBB. It looks promising. However I don't know if 2.1.2 is an official release yet. I don't know much about how that works... you said it's a development admin CP and I don't get what you mean by that. Either way, it's promising but I still think it couldn't run EoFF as it is now, java or not.
And yes, I know not all of those features I listed are used by EoFF, but a lot of them are. And I've said it dozens of times, if you like simplicity, then good for you, but just because you like simplicity doesn't mean much. "I could get this place to work just like it does now using phpBB, only it wouldn't have a lot of the features" is effectively saying "I couldn't get this place to work like it does now using phpBB." I don't care if you don't like the features - if you want to make a feature-lessened skin, go for it. I know there are some premade, actually - I use an 'imageless' skin at Aiyon, which loads bloody fast but still has all the features. Maybe my work's connection is just that great, I dunno. I use a lot of the features EoFF doesn't use at Aiyon, actually. It's possibly more customised than EoFF is.
Oh yeah. I just realised I didn't even check the vBulletin settings, which number in the hundreds. I can't be bothered, though. You can go see them for yourself if you haven't already.
For anyone who doesn't know the vB CP: http://www.vbulletin.com/admindemo.php 'tis sexy.
I could go on forever about the advantages vB has over phpBB but I think I'll give in to the fact that Unne just personally likes phpBB better for reasons involving simplicity and possibly a his normal manner of going for opensource material rather than pay material. Debating this kind of thing with someone who in my opinion is either blind or heavily bias towards his preference is probably a waste of time, with or without facts. If you admit that some of the things I'm saying are indeed true (hell, I've done it for you), then it would show you're at least being reasonable. I shouldn't have to name all those features because you can go see them for yourself whenever you want and I'm sure you know them already. I apologise profusely (I think that's the word) if most of the features are in phpBB but I didn't know how to find them or couldn't find them because they were inaccessable to me.
As for simplicity, it's a matter of preference. But I do know that vB gives you more control and more power without having to hack files. I'm talking about the default boards, not modded boards (EDIT: And if you want simplicity, you can get vB3 to be simple if you want, even more simple than phpBB, but going backwards is easy for any board
I think one of the vB admins said it best - if you don't want the features and don't have that kind of money to spend, then use a free board. When you have that kind of money available and you do want the features, they'll be there waiting for you. EoFF can afford the features and dammit, they're bloody good to us and some of the features are worth the money. If the only reason Cid would not go for vB was money I'd buy the vB for him. vB is the better board. The price is worth it only depending on how much you have to spend.
Big D - I'll try to get that fixed when I go home, I'll have to find the old files, not sure if I have them on my PC but I'm pretty sure they're up at Aiyon so I'll just steal them from there if I have to.
