What is the Future of phpBB?

[[Dimetrodon]]

I partially agree. There have been improvements.

You're right that there isn't much to discuss here, but if use hasn't went down over the years, I think we would still get hit with a lot more noob questions. Even questions that have been answered 1000 times before. General inquiries/interest, etc.

[GanstaZ]

There would be even less questions if some would not use unsupported 1-click installations, advanced update method, extensions in development/abandoned on production server & core modifications.

Something may change with next major release or with new style (what ever it may be).
It's like when we get/buy something new.. At first we spend a lot of time to inspect/learn/interact with it.. and after some time.. well.. i think i don't have to explain what comes next as it should be obvious)

If you mean development discussions (core, extensions or both).. then it's another topic.

[thecoalman]

And I doubt it is due to less people needing to ask for help as opposed to less people using the software.

Overall forum use has been declining since the late 2000's as people moved to Facebook services. The ones still doing well were established and have a niche. Getting one off the ground these days is going to be very difficult without a very good niche that isn't covered.

[DocSommer]

And I doubt it is due to less people needing to ask for help as opposed to less people using the software.

Overall forum use has been declining since the late 2000's as people moved to Facebook services. The ones still doing well were established and have a niche. Getting one off the ground these days is going to be very difficult without a very good niche that isn't covered.

That's true and kind of sad. At the same the online discussion-culture and attention-span wen't downhill. Phpbb's responsive design helped a little since most users probably visit forums via smartphones today. I'm also using a push-notification extention an notice that this does also helped to increase the number of visits and activities. Still, compared to 10 years ago the overall activity is pretty low.

[[Dimetrodon]]

And I doubt it is due to less people needing to ask for help as opposed to less people using the software.

Overall forum use has been declining since the late 2000's as people moved to Facebook services. The ones still doing well were established and have a niche. Getting one off the ground these days is going to be very difficult without a very good niche that isn't covered.

Sadly, any good niche can easily be covered by a new Facebook group/page.

[thecoalman]

Sadly, any good niche can easily be covered by a new Facebook group/page.

It can and it can't. The one big advantage you have over Facebook Groups is search engines. If your topic is in small enough niche you should not have problem showing up well in the SE's. It's bit of catch 22 because you need members posting but if you can get over that hurdle you'll be in good shape. Static content also goes a long way, the number one requested page on my site is not a forum page.

[[Dimetrodon]]

Static content also goes a long way, the number one requested page on my site is not a forum page.

For most users, that would mean taking full advantage of the Pages Extension. unless one wants to create their own files.

[thecoalman]

For most users, that would mean taking full advantage of the Pages Extension. unless one wants to create their own files.

I use Drupal, another option is Wordpress. Note they cannot be installed in same directory as phpBB,

[DocSommer]

Sadly, any good niche can easily be covered by a new Facebook group/page.

It can and it can't. The one big advantage you have over Facebook Groups is search engines. If your topic is in small enough niche you should not have problem showing up well in the SE's. It's bit of catch 22 because you need members posting but if you can get over that hurdle you'll be in good shape. Static content also goes a long way, the number one requested page on my site is not a forum page.

When I was active in Facebook I've never seen any revived topic/thread. For me it works like a stupid "pile of things" - new stuff get's posted on top of old stuff no matter if the topic has been disscussed before or not.

[danieltj]

phpBB and many other forum software are on life support so to speak. They're not imminently going to disappear, but they're hanging on due to the people that still want to use them. There's so many social media sites out there now where you can have instant interactions with other people, who wants to have analogue conversations where you have to wait and refresh the page to get a response when attention spans are already in the milliseconds?

phpBB has served a purpose but people are looking to other places now for conversation and that in turn means there's no real need or desire to innovate phpBB. It's why phpBB.com has stayed largely the exact same for over a decade. Look at the Wayback Machine (Web Archive) and the forum index (aside from changing forums due to updates etc) is basically the same.

There's no need to innovate anymore. This is phpBB for now and for perhaps until it does stop.

[DocSommer]

Some forums I know actually are still very successful but they seem to attract the right sort of people wo understand the benefits you find in forum discussion culture. Typical topics: Cars, Technical Stuff like RC hobbies...

[[Dimetrodon]]

phpBB has served a purpose but people are looking to other places now for conversation and that in turn means there's no real need or desire to innovate phpBB.

Extension developers want phpBB to innovate to take advantage of the new features in newer versions of Symphony and Twig, since phpBB currently uses an old version of both.

[Talk19Zehn]

who is the first person in this site?

Hello, according to my research:

theFinn - Joined: Tue Jul 03, 2001 7:58 pm,

psoTFX - Joined: Tue Jul 03, 2001 8:50 pm,

SHS` - Joined: Wed Jul 04, 2001 9:13 am,

dhn - Joined: Wed Jul 04, 2001 8:10 am

====

If you like read something more: phpBB®: A Brief History
https://www.phpbb.com/about/history/

====

However, it should be noted that the board here has been "switched" to phpBB-2.0, including the database, and previously the previous phpBB version was used according to the wayback-machine-engine (?). In this respect, it is not possible to clarify exactly who actually posted which starting post first. At least this is my impression, which is not necessarily correct.

Best regards

[axe70]

Hey guys! Hello to You all! (belli e brutti)
Lot of time away, and as returned, people i know that are running a community with phpBB, like to switch to Discourse.
S*it. I do not see anything better than on phpBB, there are only few things that can be easily accomplished also into phpBB.
To not speak about Ruby, rails, containers and all the company that come with him.
Do not know if i will follow with this dive into Ruby, nor i like Discourse at moment.
The way these "libraries" runs to create web apps really scare me, normally just using poor but native JS, MySQL and Php.
Wow, it is like a hell for me at moment.

So to make the long story short:
what Discourse can bring more than phpBB?
why it is trending?
lately tell me, why i should learn Ruby?

[halil16]

why it is trending?

I agree. The phpBB team may not be dealing with or comparing themselves to them (all social media and derivatives). However, it should switch to modern features to attract more people's attention. For example, it's not just about design. Simply put, PMs should be instant messaging, just like Instagram. Surveys could be more modern; hey, why shouldn't you be able to get a poll in every post on the topic? Some argue that phpBB should be able to work with minimal (very very minimal) resources; but why not always be an option for the better. For example, you shouldn't have to refresh the page to receive some notifications. Like why not infinite scroll? These are easy things to do for the phpBB team I believe. Many of them are reserved for future releases; such as push notifications. I think with phpBB 4 it should be released one by one with additional versions instead of considering everything "obsolete".

I know there are many people who think like me. Rather than a new design, features that modern applications can do are desired.