From Phorum web site:
Phorum is a little different from the other web based message boards out there. It was designed to meet different needs of different web sites while not sacrificing performance or features.
High Performance
In an upcoming interview, Jay Pipes of MySQL.com says "The forums (http://forums.mysql.com) have grown substantially over the last year, and Phorum, the PHP software running the MySQL Forums, has kept pace with this growth admirably."
Flexibility
To satisfy the web master that needs every bell and whistle, or those that want to make their web site unique, the Phorum team created a very flexible hook & module system. These hooks allow a webmaster to create modules for using external authentication, altering message data before its stored, adding custom information about users or messages.
Phorum gives the web designers the power to rearrange the data in any shape, form or fashion. The templates are in pure HTML with simple to understand text commands embedded in them. You can use the provided templates as a starting point or start from scratch. The power is in your hands.
Community
Phorum has some of the most passionate users and developers. First time users are often surprised at how quickly they get a quality response in our chat room or support forums.
Many of the most common modules like avatars, spam prevention and more have already been written by Phorum's developers or its knowledgble community of users.
Review Updates
- March 20, 2009: This review has been updated using Phorum version 5.2.10.
Phorum is a typically LAMP software, which needs the Linux / MySQL / Apache / PHP technologies to work easily and without any problem.
PHP 4 is not really tested by the Phorum team, but should work without any problems.
The user groups are really interesting, because each users can ask to join the group he wants, and groups then will accept or not their requests. This is really useful is you want to have a forum with several communities, totally independent when they want to recruit new members.
The RSS integration is well implemented, and you can stay informed about creation and modification on the forum you are interested (but not on a specifical thread however).
The quick answer form in the bottom of each thread is useful for active members.