Is it possible to have multiple independent bulletin boards within one website using miniBB with only one installation of the software?

I am the webmaster for a rather large community site which has quite a few areas of interest that are relatively independent.

Thanks,

- Henrik

PS I accidentally locked the last post. How do I unlock after locking?

Henrik, the problem is solved - the doubled topic is removed :) I hope that you don't object :) You can't unlock a topic (here), once you locked it. It's an option in setup_options.php, you have it, too:

$userUnlock=0;

If it's set to 1, you could.

As per the multiple boards - I'm afraid that no. In one board you can have as many forums as you like, but not many independent boards with one copy of the software. One board needs its own database (6), or at least separate tables (another 6 ones) in the same database - if your server has only 1 database. So, the same script cannot execute opposite tasks from different databases (or tables) in the same time :)

You can do what you want the following ways:

1. To use the "categories" feature of miniBB and to separate your forums in categories - with a supertitle. As the forums here (it's only an example):

http://www.clubpierrot.com/PIERROT/test_forum/index.php?

(Will be online after a couple of hours, because some server's Seagate HDDs had crashed this night, I've been said.)

2. To install another miniBB copy in a separate directory with a separate database.
3. To install another miniBB copy in a separate directory with other 6 tables in the same database. This 6 tables, in setup_options.php:

$Tf='minibbtable_forums';
$Tp='minibbtable_posts';
$Tt='minibbtable_topics';
$Tu='minibbtable_users';
$Ts='minibbtable_send_mails';
$Tb='minibbtable_banned';

respectively renamed for example:

$Tf='minibbtable1_forums';
$Tp='minibbtable1_posts';
$Tt='minibbtable1_topics';
$Tu='minibbtable1_users';
$Ts='minibbtable1_send_mails';
$Tb='minibbtable1_banned';

etc.

Henrik Bechmann
Actually, it depends on HOW you need to make that forums.

There are many things which you can do with one miniBB copy. We have multidomains solution, and hosting version.

It sounds like my request would be sort of a hosting solution, except I'm guessing that this requires a separate database per board...

Check out the pmWiki WikiFarm concept: I've just implemented it, and it's very simple and elegant. Reuires a farmconfig.php file to tell it that it's a farm, and an include command (to pull in the core php code) in a "field" file in a (specific wiki) directory. That's about it. The rest is handled through cascading applications of variables and arrays. Mind you it doesn't use a database, just a flat file system. Not insurmountable though, IMO.

I hope you will forgive my idle but no doubt naive speculation...

IAC, thanks for your responses, and

All the best,

- Henrik

What is pmwiki and where can I download it?

With miniBB, you may use A LOT of things concerning many forums on the main core. You need to have only ONE database, but DIFFERENT tables in it for each forum. Check out, for example, http://tokyo.keijiban.us/ and http://nagoya.keijiban.us/ (number of subdomains is unlimited) - they are using the same CORE scripts, at the time with Apache subdomains configuration, it looks like they have many copies. Thus, they are using ONE users table, so logged user is logged on all forums at the same time.

Given example are upcoming forums.

Cool! So it *is* possible!

Thanks again.

- Henrik

What I can tell is that these Japanese forums have very nice color design. I'll steal it right now :)

But it's reworked version, right?

Henrik Bechmann
Yes, it is possible, and it is necessary just to add little recognizing code in setup_options.php for each subdomain. Probably, we will sell this easy and effective solution for a couple of $$$ soon. I'll check the URL later, thanks.

Ivan
But it's reworked version, right - what do you mean by "reworked"? There is a default miniBB package. Nothing is re-worked except for options file. And... they have bought this design - I don't think that stealing the commercial design is the right thing for you :-)

Team, of course I won't steal it :) bit it's really elegant.

You may be remember one old talk, in which I asked about how to put one filled up old forum in the database (as archive, to be only for reading), and to open another one with the same structure in the same database. Back then the problem was exactly this - how to have another set of tables and how to service them.

Now I learn that you solved the thing and I, too, am interested in it. Put me in the list :)

Of course, that's simpler than Henrik needs, and my forum is not filled yet, but it's good to have the solution in advance :)

Greetings :)

Well, the theory is, that you should some way to control miniBB database tables, taking some variable from outside. Than you can program a little code, that changes table names accordingly to that variable (concatenating strings). In subdomains version, we are taking this variable from subdomain name. Do you get the idea? :-)

I think that yes, Team :) However, in this situation you economize more installations and (may be) databases. I only cannot see how, for example, index.php will execute two opposite quieries, if they appear in the same moment.

I thought... is it possible somehow to have some kind of universal section in setup_options.php for cases with one database and archived information, lets say:

$tableset0
[6 tables]

$tableset1
[6 tables]

etc., to be possible only to add them manually. Something like that. M?

And, I only use the post to avoid opening of new topic. There are more than enough :) So, yesterday night I tried some skin colors. All gone well, but in Caption 4 I used dark colors, and also dark links in the skin. And this was not visible:

Show email public?
Sort topics by:

I propose you to remove the links in the next revisionq to become normal text. Yes, I know that I can remove (or colorize) them in my copy, but I doubt that somebody uses them at all. And if one writes his own riles - surely not :) How do you think?

If the above could be solved, the forums may be not only archived, but working ones as well.

I saw this WikiFarm. Yes, I always liked the flat file engines, but two days ago the HDDs of my server crashed and the admin restored all from the backup. Very well, but what happened? I had to reinstall all scripts, that worked with flat files, because with copying from the backup all permissions were changed (Linux/UNIX). In the same time miniBB began to work instantly, because it uses a database :)

You should always design a skin that your HREF colors are visible on any another table. In any way, I will look into your suggestion more deeper in the future, when we will roll on skins.

As about table sets...

You have this:

$Tf='minibb_forums';
$Tp='minibb_posts';
$Tt='minibb_topics';
$Tu='minibb_users';
$Ts='minibb_send_mails';
$Tb='minibb_banned';

The prefix is coming from somewhere, and for example, the prefix is "archive2004", or "archive2005", so you'll have:

$Tf='archive2004_forums';
$Tp='archive2004_posts';
$Tt='archive2004_topics';
$Tu='archive2004_users';
$Ts='archive2004_send_mails';
$Tb='archive2004_banned';

and before that settings, you need to put simple PHP code, which will concatenate table variables. Not necessary to create different table sets.

because with copying from the backup all permissions were changed (Linux/Unix) - it depends on good backup only. Good backup could be done with file permissions (as I remember, TAR format stores them).