SMF or Vanilla

HI,

I’m looking for some opinions on what kind of forum solution should I use in my next project.
The project will run Revo and one forum based on Vanilla or SMF.

Thanks

It depends on the type of forum structure you really need. If you just want a big bucket of discussions (or really a smooth integration with MODX), then go with Vanilla. If you want a bunch of organized topics, go with SMF. XenForo (http://xenforo.com) is also looking really interesting and a contender for an SMF replacement at MODX.

I only know SMF so I am not sure what you mean by "big bucket of discussions". I still need Boards and similar functionality to SMF or phpBB. I know Susan did a sort of bridge between Vanilla and MODx; I might have to check that out.

Xenforo seems too expensive for a beta

I guess I have to install Vanilla to see how it compares to SMF.

Thanks Ryan

I don’t think Vanilla supports creating multiple categories in which to post; in other words, it’s a single-topic forum software. Of course, I could be very wrong.

Vanilla has "categories", within these are "discussions".

Their latest version has some very interesting API functions for interacting with external applications...

http://vanillaforums.org/page/api

The "bridge" I posted about is just an implementation of Vanilla’s ProxyConnect plugin.

http://vanillaforums.org/addon/proxyconnect-plugin

Could you create a structure similar to the MODX forums in Vanilla? If so, add another one to the list of contenders.

Quote from: rthrash at Nov 26, 2010, 01:58 PM

Could you create a structure similar to the MODX forums in Vanilla? If so, add another one to the list of contenders.

Let’s not forget Discuss.

I’d prefer to use Discuss, but having dealt with thousands upon thousands of spammers recently, it’d be very hard to not have robust, tested moderation and anti-spam tools in place and proven. That said, I think it’d be great scope out the requirements and give it a whirl.