Creating and setting up forums
Forums are the sections where topics are stored. Without forums, your users would have nowhere to post! Creating forums is very easy.
Firstly, make sure you are logged in. Find the [ Administration Control Panel ] link at the bottom of the page, and click it. You should be in the Administration Index. You can administer your board here.
There are tabs at the top for the Administration Control Panel that will guide you to each category. You must get to the Forum Administration section to create a forum, so click the Forums tab.
The Forum Administration Index is where you can manage forums on your site. Along with being able to create forums, you are also able to create subforums. Subforums are forums that are located in a parent forum in a hierachy. For more information about subforums, see the administration guide on subforums.
Find the Create new forum button on the right side of the page. Type in the name of the forum you wish in the textbox located directly to the left of this button. For example, if the forum name was to be Test, in the text box put Test. Once you are done, click the Create new forum button create the forum.
You should see a page headed with the text "Create new forum :: Test". You can change options for your forum; for example you can set what forum image the forum can use, if it's a category, or what forum rules text will belong to the forum. You should type up a brief description for the forum as users will be able to figure out what the forum is for.
Figure 1.5. Creating a new forum
The default settings are usually good enough to get your new forum up and running; however, you may change them to suit your needs. But there are three key forum settings that you should pay attention to. The Parent Forum setting allows you to choose which forum your new forum will belong to. Be careful to what level you want your forum to be in. (The Parent Forum setting is important when creating subforums. For more information on subforums, continue reading to the section on creating subforums) The "Copy Permissions" setting allows you to copy the permissions from an existing forum to your new forum. Use this if you want to keep permissions constant. The forum style setting allows you to set which style your new forum will display. Your new forum can show a different style to another. For more information on each forum setting, see the Section 3.3, “Forum Admin”
Once you're done configuring the settings of your new forum, scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Submit button to create your forum and it's settings. If your new forum was created successfully, the screen will show you a success message.
If you wish to set permissions for the forum (or if you do not click on anything), you will see the forum permissions screen. If you do not want to (and want to use the default permissions for your new forum), click on the Back to previous page link. Otherwise, continue and set each setting to what you wish. Once you are done, click the Apply all Permissions button at the bottom of the page. You will see the successful forum permissions updated screen if it worked.
Important
If you do not set any permissions on this forum it will not be accessible to anyone (including yourself).
You have successfully updated your forum permissions and set up your new forum. To create more forums, follow this general procedure again.
For more information on setting permissions, see Section 1.5, “Setting permissions”
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