[tbilisimakerspace] Re: Oxwall vs Buddypress vs phpBB (was: Re: Oxwall vs Buddypress)
- From: Sebastian Henschel <sebastian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: tbilisimakerspace@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 23 Mar 2012 18:11:29 +0400
alrighty....
the poll is coming to a close. if you want to have a look at the
current standings, you have to look in the archive of this list to
find the details to be able to login to our shared gmail account (as
far as i have understood this poll thing, there is no other way than
that or actually voting).
anyway, there is a huge majority voting for oxwall (only 1 vote for
phpbb / buddypress). would anybody not be happy with using oxwall?
all platforms have their shortcomings, but we should choose something
that is better than this mailing-list rather sooner than later. the
decision on this platform is not forever, although we would most
likely stick with it for quite a while.
bye now,
Sebastian
On 17 March 2012 20:36, Sebastian Henschel <sebastian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> gamarjobat!
>
> On 17 March 2012 14:20, Giorgi Kandelaki <kandelakig@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> OK, one more annoying mail from me:
>
> i find it informative rather than annoying. :)
>
> thanks for all the research you have done, i was too lazy for that.
> from a technical point of view i agree with all of what you said.
> Wordpress and phpBB have been around for a very long time and they
> ought to be more mature.
> but the most mature platform is not worth much if the users don't like
> to work it - i'd put the users' (superficial) preference before the
> admins', although it might be to their disadvantage in the long run. i
> fear we cannot really know what features we might need in the future.
> we only have an idea what we need now, and we might discover later
> that the platform chosen is still not flexible enough to do _easily_
> what we want (given the proper incentive, anything can be implemented,
> of course).
>
> having said that, there doesn't seem to be a huge interest on side of
> the users, Giorgi and i are by far the most active in this discussion.
> it's your chance to speak up now! :)
>
> btw, my no-return departure means my future part in administration
> shall be as little as possible. that means if it's only Giorgi as the
> other admin and nobody speaks against it, we should go for phpBB (i'm
> fine with it).
>
> maybe a few interested people can have a meat space chat tomorrow
> after the governance meeting?
>
>
>
>
>> I talked too much about how we should evaluate our alternatives. Now it's
>> time to say about my preferences.
>>
>> For me, most important thing is, how easy it will be (for me) to build a
>> custom theme for each engine, cause we will need it for sure.
>>
>> As I have no experience, first I looked at is official documentation pages:
>>
>> Oxwall
>>
>> http://docs.oxwall.org/ - Handfull of unfinished articles like this one
>> http://docs.oxwall.org/design:how-to-create-customize-themes-for-beginners
>>
>> Wordpress
>>
>> http://codex.wordpress.org/ - Much bigger documentation portal, with
>> getting-started-guides, WordPress-lessons, References, etc.
>>
>> phpBB
>>
>> http://www.phpbb.com/support/documentation/3.0/ - User and administration
>> guide organized like at book
>> http://wiki.phpbb.com/ - Development wiki
>>
>> Then I had a look at their forums:
>>
>> Oxwall
>>
>> http://www.oxwall.org/forum/ - up to ten thousand posts and replays
>>
>> Wordpress
>>
>> http://wordpress.org/support/ - 1,011,201 posts in biggest forum
>> (How-ToandTroubleshooting), there are 10 more like that
>>
>> phpBB
>>
>> http://www.phpbb.com/community/index.php - Up to million posts in forums
>> and 2,207,742 posts in archive
>>
>> Now let's check already available themes and plugins:
>>
>> Oxwall
>>
>> http://www.oxwall.org/store/themes - 60 themes, approximately half of them
>> are free
>> http://www.oxwall.org/store - 80 plugins, also only part of them are free
>>
>> Wordpress
>>
>> empty search for themes (from admin dashboard) gives 662 items
>> empty search for themes (from admin dashboard) gives 18,786 items
>>
>> phpBB
>>
>> http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/styles-2 - 164 Board Styles
>> http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/modifications-1 - 810 Modification
>>
>>
>> Congratulations to me! I proved that Wordpress and phpBB are much more
>> mature and mainstream platforms then Oxwall! Everybody knew it without me
>> already…
>> I agree, that this is not enough criteria to say that Oxwall sucks. And
>> actually I like experimental stuff myself.
>>
>> But then I digged a little in administrators panels of BuddyPress and
>> Oxwall. Have to say that Wordpress dashboard look much more advanced then
>> Oxwall Admin Area.
>> (In Oxwall)
>>
>> I could not find how to manage forums or blog posts there. (I found after
>> that i can manage them directly from Forum and Blogs menus, but still I
>> think it's bit cluttered)
>> Management of pages is awkward and editing is much less comfortable (in tiny
>> textarea)
>> I could not find how can I change layout (not only styling). For example can
>> I place menu somewhere on the side-panel, not on the header?
>>
>> (In Buddypress)
>>
>> On the other hand is quite huge and may be it makes it little bit
>> over-complicated?
>>
>>
>> Conclusion
>> ------------------
>>
>> I would definitely NOT pick Oxwall.
>> Wen choosing between Buddypress and phpBB, we need to consider that phpBB is
>> only a forum so we will have to build some static site with blog
>> ourselves. Though, it sounds little bit difficult, but personally I would
>> choose this option,
>>
>> cause we will get powerful forum for communication and build our own static
>> site, which is not as hard, and will be absolutely custom and original
>> but, on other hand Buddypress is also good option
>>
>> So my votes are:
>>
>> phpBB
>> Buddypress
>> Oxwal
>>
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>> and sorry for big mail
>>
>> --
>> Giorgi Kandelaki
>> Sent with Sparrow
>>
>> On Saturday, March 17, 2012 at 12:52 PM, Giorgi Kandelaki wrote:
>>
>> Hi Sebastian, hi all,
>>
>> Thanks for making me admin (btw how you did it?).
>>
>> Guys, you know... I'm afraid we are doing it wrong:
>> People are choosing between alternatives, just by it's default appearances,
>> and by features they see on main menu.
>> But appearance will (must) change and all our alternatives have tons of
>> other features which are not listed by default.
>> I believe that we can achieve our goal with each of this alternatives, more,
>> if we try hard enough, we can make websites on buddypress and oxwall which
>> will be undistinguishable. Question is, how easy it will be?
>> So, I think that we should make decision according to this criteria:
>>
>> Major criteria:
>>
>> how simple is to maintain (administrate) it
>> how simple is to customize it
>>
>> appearance
>>
>> choose good theme
>> make your own custom theme
>>
>> functionality
>>
>> get necessary plugin
>> make you own plugin
>>
>> Minor criteria:
>>
>> how active is it's developer community
>> how well documented is it
>> any known problems
>> etc.
>>
>> Thus, one should not vote, until (s)he checks at least the admin-panel of
>> each platform. That's why I asked you to make me admin.
>>
>> And at last, I think, decision must be made not by overall consensus (or
>> voting), but by them who will work on customization and maintenance of the
>> site. All other people can just list their priorities and needed features,
>> so the tech-guys can then decide which platform is more suitable for their
>> particular means.
>>
>> Sebastian, so far, it looks like you are that "tech-guy". I can try to help
>> in everything, but I'm database programer, I'm not strong in "web". Know
>> some HTML+CSS and Javascript, but no PHP. And had never built sites on
>> engines like Wordpress.
>>
>>
>> --
>> Giorgi Kandelaki
>> Sent with Sparrow
>>
>> On Saturday, March 17, 2012 at 11:20 AM, Sebastian Henschel wrote:
>>
>> hola todo el mundo...
>>
>> On 15 March 2012 15:56, ericnbarrett@xxxxxxxxx <ericnbarrett@xxxxxxxxx>
>> wrote:
>>
>> I like oxwall the best. It is really easy to use. Provides different venues
>> to share content. Easy to interact with and engage in others' content.
>> Models real world socializing and communication than bb and the wordpress
>> alternatives. It is fun. Makes it easy to jump into a group, or create a new
>> one.
>>
>>
>> so, any other 'test results'?
>>
>> the way i see it, most people have spoken for Oxwall, one for Buddypress,
>> none for phpBB.
>> if that should remain until the evening, would you mind using Oxwall, Giorgi
>> (i made you admin, btw)? or do you guys need more time to evaluate /
>> discuss?
>>
>> hasta luego,
>> Sebastian
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Mar 15, 2012 at 15:10, Dato Gogishvili <dato@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> I'm available tomorrow and will buy domain.
>>
>> dato
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 5:42 PM, Sebastian Henschel
>> <sebastian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> hello Giorgi et al...
>>
>> On 13 March 2012 17:13, Giorgi Kandelaki <kandelakig@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>
>>> Looked at it, and wrote to you there.
>>>
>>> With the first look I liked buddypress more. But it also has some good
>>> features.
>>>
>>> But, overall, I think both are overkill for our purposes. We don't need
>>> this
>>> huge social-network-like sites, with all it's cool gadgets.
>>
>> hey, you are talking to generation facebook here. :) personally i'm
>> fine with this mailing-list, but a few people wanted a few more
>> features (for good reasons).
>>
>>
>>> I think, we need just two simple things:
>>>
>>> Web site - for promotional purpose
>>> With information about TOL. News (something like blog). Contact
>>> information.
>>
>>> Communication tool - alternative to this mailing list, cause folks don't
>>> like it
>>> For me, something like Google Groups would be perfect, but I understand
>>> your
>>> concerns about "data liberation"
>>
>> one complaint some people had was too much traffic. a forum would
>> compartmentalise the communication and you can subscribe to/read the
>> boards you are most interested in.
>>
>>
>>> BTW, if I suggest the way to export content from Google Groups, would you
>>> consider it as an alternative?
>>
>> that would be good. what about identity? i know that TI Georgia is
>> using gmail, but the domain used is transparency.ge - would something
>> similar be possible for TOL?
>>
>> afaik Google Groups is a fancy-looking mailing-list, as long as you
>> are not part of the googleverse. it wouldn't help against the
>> perception of too much traffic. unless you decide to have several
>> lists, but that might be too much separation already.
>>
>>
>>> Or may be we can install only standalone forum? like phpBB or something
>>> similar?
>>
>> i'm glad you asked for it, because that would have been my non-social
>> network suggestion:
>> http://tbilisimakerspace.kodeaffe.de/phpBB3/
>>
>>
>> i guess that should suffice for alternatives: we should choose one of
>> these three, unless somebody has an urgent desire to propose something
>> else.
>> frankly, i have no preference: all three of them are working - the
>> bane of consumerism. :)
>> the integration of bbpress (forum) into buddypress seems a bit dodgy.
>> otherwise it looks a bit less cluttered / overwhelming than oxwall.
>> phpBB will probably be the most advanced in offering forum features,
>> while the others might make things look more vibrant, with activity
>> streams, walls, etc.
>>
>> a few people have signed up to buddypress / oxwall, i haven't heard
>> much negative feedback on either of them. we will see how many will be
>> interested in having a look at phpbb.
>>
>> i propose to reach a decision until saturday eve and maybe the domain
>> tbilisiopenlabs.ge will be ready until then. Dato?
>>
>> David, do you want to create a poll like the one you had made for the
>> name? i guess just the three choices 'buddypress', 'oxwall', 'phpbb'
>> would suffice, nothing more sophisticated.
>>
>>> On Tue, Mar 13, 2012 at 4:31 PM, Sebastian Henschel
>>> <sebastian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>> i installed oxwall on the server, to play and test:
>>>> http://tbilisimakerspace.kodeaffe.de/oxwall/
>>>>
>>>> (as a reminder, buddypress is here:
>>>> http://tbilisimakerspace.kodeaffe.de/buddypress/)
--
Sebastian Henschel
Lead Developer
Transparency International Georgia
„საერთაშორისო გამჭვირვალობა - საქართველო“
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