About phpBB Group

October 11th, 2003, 11:49 pm

Hi there,

Just wondering... is it alright to find someone to host and to use phpBB for that? I mean... will it affect the reliability of the forum? Do we need to maintain the forum often? For instance, broken links, missing smileys..... etc... Will it happen? If so, is it alright to use public hosting?

Okay... let me give a scenario... Assume that I registered with Geocities hosting which provide php language... then, I upload this phpBB into my website and... is that okay? Or is it a must to have my own server to host a forum? Do I need to maintain them?

Please help. Thank you in advance....

October 12th, 2003, 12:12 am

Well geocities sucks, and I am pretty sure they don't have PHP.

I don't use phpBB so my advice will be limited, but here are the requirements...

PHP and at least 1 mySQL database.

If you have those you are pretty much set to install.

However, think of bandwidth. Forums will eat up that bandwidth superfast so if you don't have a lot (or unlimited) bandwidth, kiss that forum goodbye.

[Bigwebmaster]

October 12th, 2003, 12:53 am

For me the forum really does not use a ton of bandwidth because I do not allow people to upload images and other things to the server (except avatars). Everything else has to be pretty much loaded externally from another host. What I notice with forums is that the biggest issue for me is the amount of resources they consume on the server, such as CPU and memory. They are real resource eaters especially when the forum is busy and google is around indexing tons of pages.

You can see the bandwidth Ozzu uses here:

http://www.ozzu.com/mrtg/www.ozzu.com.html

I think that is about 15-20 gigs a month currently. It is continuing to increase though as the forum gets larger.

October 12th, 2003, 1:23 am

So... coming back to my question... do you need to maintain the forum often? Will there be a lot of maintainence to be perform? Do I need to hired several programmers to maintain them?

^_^

[Bigwebmaster]

October 12th, 2003, 1:29 am

Not really if you know what you are doing. Usually what forum owners do is appoint several moderators like I do here at Ozzu who help maintain things, such as deleting spam, and keeping the forum in order by moving posts to correct categories, etc. The biggest challenge to a forum is getting it up and going, and getting members there.

October 12th, 2003, 2:30 am

It depends on what you want to use the site for and how much traffic it is going to recieve, if your looking for a cheap solution you could use an existing free provider like http://www.hostboard.com/

I used to have a board with them which had a fair amount of traffic, it was a tad slow but otherwise quite easy to customise and add your own graphics etc.

October 12th, 2003, 2:50 am

Geee... nice link, dude.. Thanks... So, does that mean... as long as I build a stable php forum and build it up in a superb hosting capabilites service and high bandwidth allocation, I will be able to have a nice forum as this? How about advertising? How do you attract advertising and sponsors to your forum? Do ozzu have sponsors? Will getting more hits and post makes sponsors to offer us the contract?

^_^

October 24th, 2003, 2:06 am

Hi guys... continuing about the phpBB... just wondering.... how do we set up a forum like this? I never learn php or MySQL before... is it possible to set up my own forum? I downloaded the phpBB but, don't know what to do... Read the support, but... it doesn't mention much on what to do.... Can anyone give me a step-by-step outline on what to do? What database do I need? Do I just upload all the phpBB file to the host, and that's it? And do I need to do something to link the database to the php files? And, how do I create topics? I'm totally new here... please teach me....

October 30th, 2003, 8:07 am

might try reading the install....just a thought

October 30th, 2003, 9:18 am

your best bet is to go to their web sites and read. Nothing like getting the right info the
first time, and straight from the horse's mouth.

October 30th, 2003, 9:19 am

good plan.

October 30th, 2003, 4:20 pm

Done... wow.. you guys are right.... it's easy when you know how...

October 30th, 2003, 5:48 pm

hehe