UBB.threads PHP Forum Software Community Forums General Suggestions and Feedback One board, multiple sites...

Can Threads be set up so that it looks like several web sites have their own bulletin board... but in fact it's just one huge, combined bb?

Would be great if several could have their own domain, their own look, but in the end the board would have one userbase with exactly the same topics showing up for all to see. Basically one board, but each site would think it's their own due to the domain name and visual aspect.

You would need a license per site, as what you are stating is against the License Agreement.

But yes, you could set it up, it would just take some customization.

A license per site? But in reality it would only be ONE board. It would only look different based on which link you used to get to it. Kind of like people using different skins, but each one would have a separate url (which of course leads to the same board).

You need one license per domain, see the license agreement.

I think you could set it up legally like this example without violating anything and depending on how your server is set up you could allow different owners of the site1 site2 and www subdomains.
main site www.example.com (which is licensed and owns the forums)
forums www.example.com/forums/
site 1 site1.example.com (with link to forums)
site 2 site2.example.com (with link to forums)
etc,

Grandfathered licenses allow UBB.Threads be installed multiple times per domain, where you could do exactly that Pappy.

But anyone with an Infopop license to run UBB.Threads can only install one copy of Threads on one Domain (plus a test/emergency backup copy if they deem necessary).

So even that is limited.

See Section 2 of the License.

The current license has no restrictions on the number of domains served - the domain limitation is a technical one due to cookie setting, etc.

Only the old Threads license is domain based.

The key phrase in the current license is "The ultimate result must be only one publicly accessible message board per license."

Hmmm...that one invokes a few questions!

I have a good ole WWWThreads license, and to my knowledge what that meant was that I could actually remove the 'Powered by' stuff at the bottom, AND I could run boards all over ONE domain if I so chose. In other words, I could have:

Car community = www.mydomain.com/cars/forum/

Gaming = www.mydomain.com/gaming/

Pool Cue Lovers = www.mydomain.com/cues/

Now as I understood it, the UBB.Threads license (a later variant after Infopop came on board) restricted the install to a one forum per domain. Meaning you could not have the PHP files installed in 5 different directories on your domain, all pointing toward separate MySQL db's.

So my two questions are (and for clarification purposes only!)....

With the current license (listed on this site) -

1. Can you have multiple php installs on ONE domain, all pointing toward one MySQL database?

2. Can you have multiple php installs on ONE domain, all pointing toward separate MySQL databases each?

I am still fairly certain that Conrad would need a license per domain for what he is intending, even if they are only sharing ONE MySQL database...but a solid clarification will help make this more understandable!

The license as listed on the site is for UBB.threads licenses sold by Infopop only.

Grandfathered WWWThreads licenses are permitted to run under their old conditions, including powered-by removal and multiple boards on one domain. Not all grandfathered licenses have the same terms. You should open a support ticket and ask for the exact terms that you are covered under if you have any questions.

So in your case, with your WWWThreads license, you can run mydomain/forum/, mydomain/gaming/, etc... however, if you wished to make a new installation on another domain, you would have to have an Infopop-provided license, and follow the terms it sets forth.

For the two questions you pointed out...

1) I see no reason why that would ever be needed - the intent of the license, and that line in particular, would basically require that each of the script installations point at the same exact content. There is no logical reason to have multiple installations in different locations pointing at the exact same data. (Except in case of load balancing, which I believe is expressly permitted elsewhere in the license.)

2) Only if each of those installs has a current license -OR- if that domain is covered by the grandfathered WWWThreads license terms.

For what Conrad wishes to do, each domain would need its own license - the intent of the license is to permit one board to run per license. Doing this, even with only one copy of the software and one database, with the intent to create the effect of multiple boards, would probably be viewed as a violation of the license.

hmm,
I see no reason why he can not run a single Ubb threads install under one domain with sub domains linking to the domain with the license for forums, setting up a general discussion area for ALL users and individual groups/ categories or what not for each of his sub domains. I think that would not fail the test of installation on a single domain... IE as I stated in my post

main site www.example.com (which is licensed and owns the forums)
forums www.example.com/forums/


site1.example.com and site2.example.com are only linking to the domain that holds a license and the forums that are there and they would not typically need to be within the sub domain. furthermore he could possible set up a third sub domain forums.example.com with the Installation and license on that domain ONLY with links from the other domains. I do not see how you can limit the number of Other sites out there to linking to a domain that holds threads (such as say google searches or Yahoo or other domains that he owns for that matter)

with the current license asa far as I can tell you may have ONE PHP install on ONE domain which is exactly what my example shows. Linking from another domain (not using a symbolic link mind you on the server side) should not violate the license.

Why would the other domains require a license Charles if they are not running threads???

That wouldn't work without modification though, as site1.yourdomain.com and site2.yourdomain.com won't read each others cookies. On one site, it would be impossible to login.

You can site the cookies domain-wide, so site1.example.com and site2.example.com can share their cookies without a problem.

Just set the cookie domain to ".example.com"

Remove the domain from the question, as it's causing confusion due to the grandfathered WWWThreads license terms.

Regardless of how it's accessed, the intent of the current license is to permit one installation to serve one board.

Let's say you're covered under the current license, and set up some mod_rewrite rules or somesuch as to create a folder for each category, i.e. mydomain.com/sports, mydomain.com/tv, etc. As long as no attempt is made to hide the fact that this is a single, unified board (for example, by removing navigation to the board index and taking steps to lock the user into a single subsection of the board based on how they are accessing it), I don't think that would be a problem at all.

However, that particular method would only really get you pretty URLs. On the other hand, pretty URLs are good. <img src="https://www.ubbcentral.com/boards/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

[]For what Conrad wishes to do, each domain would need its own license - the intent of the license is to permit one board to run per license. Doing this, even with only one copy of the software and one database, with the intent to create the effect of multiple boards, would probably be viewed as a violation of the license. [/]

This is a tricky one. I don't believe "creating the effect of running multiple boards" goes against the "one board per license rule", as in reality there would only be ONE board, not several.

Creating the effect of running multiple boards is certainly not the same as running multiple boards on a single license. It's merely an illusion, a different design (colours, etc.) depending on who accesses it, but the bottom line is that it's a single board, with one user group, exactly the same forums, messages. Basically just one board, period.

"...exactly the same forums" - this is a critical thing. If you're just skinning the board differently based on the domain, and leaving the entire content alone, then there's nothing wrong with that.

If you were to instead, say, hide all the forums but one based on the current domain, that would be considered trying to run different boards.

And I do want to add to Charles comments that Infopop has pretty much the same License limitations (or allowances if you will) that all other major forum systems have, so these answers are in fact VERY standard.

Thanks for the clarifications Charles.