Considering UBB's price tag, you would guess it's the best product on the market, but I'm not seeing anything special.

I currently run a vBulletin forum, but I'm willing to look into UBB. I've posted on a few UBB boards, and as I'm sure they're outdated, this doesn't look too different.

No WYSIWYG editor, fewer editing options, and it's as clunky as can be. Is the ACP really that good? How is support? Currently my tickets at vBulletin are answered in under five minutes, is UBB faster?

Fairly common question, and I can give a completely biased answer since I'm the developer or just state that it's really personal preference.

I've answered in another thread, that yes, our base price is more expensive, however it has been reduced recently. However, as we add new major features we won't market them as a new product that you have to pay for. Invision offers a gallery addon, but you have to pay extra for it. We'll be adding blogs in our next version after 7.3 and this will be included in the base price, unlike vbulletin which charges extra for it.

It's a pretty common statement that our Control Panel is easier to use. However, again that's more than likely a personal preference and you're free to sign up for a demo so you can see for yourself.

Also sidebars are included with threads, whereas with VB they are a third party add-on for the forums.

I remember when UBB and Infopop were the King of message boards. Then came vBulletin.. What happened? There's still a chance to make a comeback - it would be nice to see it. What I see here doesn't look bad.

Some good stuff in this thread:
http://www.ubbcentral.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=190082#Post190082

Hey Sal! :wavey:

A lot happened... that was 8 years ago now Rick has made tremendous strides (and Charles before him). All forum scripts will have their good and bad points, but I think threads is on an equal footing with any message board now.

The next couple versions will change that and you'll see others trying to play catch up.

<snicker> vB admit's that their core was UBB, what does that say about who's king?

What is the largest forum in number of users you have regular feedback from on one of your forums?

I'm certain we're not so I'm sure others have similar issues.

You can find us at:
http://www.fishingminnesota.com/forum/ubbthreads.php

We've experienced all kinds of difficulty and frankly I dread upgrades because of the features lost, loss of control in other features and all of the re-linking needed because forum urls change (which causes lost visitors as well).

That being said I do like the upgrade so far. The forums are still painfully slow when we are busy, which is the reason we upgraded.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying vBulletin is any better.

here's how to beat vBulletin:
We need a fast forum that uses minimal server resources and allows admin max control over all of the features. You also need a super moderator feature that allows admin to give someone regular moderator privileges in ALL forums without making them an admin or having to list them as a moderator in all the forums.

Toss in focused timely service, an eye towards not changing forum urls and a seamless upgrade leaving ALL data as is without having to copy ANY headers and footers all over again. Sub-forum add-on ability would be nice. Then you have a winner in my book and WILL LEAD THE FIELD.

I know it's only a dream but that is allowed right?

We did our homework early on and you were THE BEST!

Hi,

Super Mods will be here in 7.3 - I think Rick said he was upgrading here this week.

As version 7 was virtually a new product, that is why the data had to be imported, as a result headers and footers had to be re-input. Any future upgrades should not have this issue, and should be fairly painless and hopefully seamless.

Forum URL's likewise should not alter, although you may have slight changes to allow more search engines to pick up the data and list them. (but this will remain optional)

Sub-forums are already here - so not sure what you mean by 'sub-forum add-on'

I think you should also find 7.3 faster - whilst features get added, code is also streamlined so that should benefit larger sites.

Hopefully your dream will quickly become reality

UBB.Classic, UBB.threads (Pre7), UBB.threads (7.x) are all seperate products, and should be treated as such, thus the URL's being differant. UBB.T7 is an IMPORT to a new product, not an upgrade to an existing one.

Super Moderators (Global Mods) are in 7.3.

Ian beat me, i was doing other thigns and didn't notice that i had been away for half an hour :X

I visit a LOT of boards using all types of software and I find that many are similar and as Rick says some of it is just plain personal preference. Some sites have neat features and some are just plain worse than others.

The fact that the actual person writing the software is here to listen and support you for FREE is amazing. On a couple of the major boards I've been too in the support area you only get other users and not actual programmers helping you.

phpBB has a nice feature where it checks for posts before comitting your new post and alerts and shows you the new post so that the above from Gizmo would not happen, or it could be modified to fit if needed.

But that is the nature of the beast and all software that has ongoing feature additions where one has something the other does not.

The 7.3 and 7.4 feature list looks fantastic compared to 7.2 which has many new features already, but as Gizmo says 7.x was a new version and there are still items being added or modified that users want and ask for.

I think in the long run UBBT will have more features at a cheaper cost than most of the other major boards, but that's (IMHO)

hence why we need a notice to warn of a new post

you know, I did see a forum that had this, and it was kind of nifty to be warned lol...

You mean as above 2 posts up? Yes I think that would be a nice feature to add to UBBT

Wow,
now that is very good news indeed. Hat's off to the team here!!!!!!

I have just uploaded a beta copy of my site - http://www.fansfocus.com/beta2/ if you would like to have a look.

I still have to fully configure the various bits and pieces before going live, but it should give you some idea of 7.3

I'm still on B1 at my Dev Forums, planning to upgrade this weekend at the latest.

Some of the things I have found as being elected Administer on several sites running various message board software is the lack of security. I have brought this up to Gizmo in the past here in the Classic area as a reason not to go with Threads.

I will admit that the staff and beta testers here at UBB are on top of it to the fullest extent and strive not only to have a popular, good working board with many features that users want, but also look at security of the board and database as leading factors while developing code.

I recently bought a new license to use Threads here even though I have 2 Licenses to run Classic. I just like to keep the ability to run more then one board at a time. A little background on me is that I am one of the cheapest tightest persons that ever walked. So if I have 3 licenses then it has to be really good compared to the rest of the systems out there.

Some of the other systems do have very neat features but this also takes a security to a back seat in some cases. The team here look at security in everything they do. It would really suck to wake up and find your board was hijacked by some spammer or something.

One thing I would add and a pretty important concept. ALL the free forums have software that gets hacked on a regular basis. Because this is not public domain software that is available for free, there is much less problems that result from hacking.

Having run a number of forums using a number of different forum software suites, we have had less problems with this one than any of the others. BY A LONG SHOT!!!!

New feature in Google code search found a bunch of install keys and full software installations for vBulletin recently.

Not sure if that could or would happen with UBBT but just in case it's not a good idea to store the installer or any of your install codes on a Website.

I'd still love to see a check on the main page that warns you to delete the install.php/upgrade.php file (or the entire install directory) on the CFRM in a big red box lol...

That's pretty much how phpBB works (IIRC), forums won't load until you remove the directory. Or maybe it was gallery....

In any case, yeah, big red box.

FWIW I have a number of forums from various vendors

My Swahili forum www.waadventista.com (SMF) people asked me last nite to switch over to UBBthreads as people do not want to join it as it is, as they say it is too complex. AND they like the ubbthreads way better..

(NOW if they thing I am going to great a language file in swahili, it was tough enough the first time developing on for them... )

Yeh, SMF can be way overkill...