Simple Machines Forum Review

Install: Positive

(Easy) — Admin: Positive

(Easy)

Use:

(Easy) — Themes: Yes

Yes

Our Opinion :

— Users :

(Rate it)

Review
SMF

— Thu, 2006-05-04 11:21 — lastnico

Quick Guide

Installation : Positive

(Easy)

Administration : Positive

(Easy)

Forum Use : Positive

(Easy)

Themes : Yes

Yes

Our Opinion :

Users :

(Rate it)

Released under : Custom License

Current version : 1.1.rc3 (August 19, 2006).

Demonstration : Simple Machines Forum Demo

Sponsored By : Lewis Media.

From Simple Machines web site : Simple Machines Forum - SMF in short - is a free, professional grade software package that allows you to set up your own online community within minutes. Its powerful custom made template engine puts you in full control of the lay-out of your forum and with our unique SSI - or Server Side Includes - function you can let your forum and your website interact with each other. SMF is written in the popular language PHP and uses a MySQL database. It is designed to provide you with all the features you need while having an absolute minimal impact on the resources of the server. SMF is the next generation of forum software, and best of all it is and will always remain completely free! Please note that Simple Machines Forum was also known as YaBB SE which was initially a PHP port of YaBB Forum (originally in Perl).

Official web site : http://simplemachines.org/

Download Link : Download this forum software here : Simple Machines Forum.

Server Architecture

Features	Details
Operating Systems Systems supporting this software.	Linux Windows Server 2003
Web Server Web Servers control the communication between the forum and the users.	Apache 1.3 Apache 2.0/2.2 Microsoft IIS
Languages Main development language.	PHP 4 PHP 5
Databases Applications which store forum datas.	MySQL

This software is a classical PHP/MySQL Bulletin Board. It will be installed easily in most dedicated servers and website hosting solutions, Linux distributions and even EasyPHP installation.

Technical Features

Technical Features	Details
CMS / Blog softwares integration Web publishing tools which can be integrated with this software.	Joomla / Mambo
User base integration This feature is useful when you would like to integrate your forum with an existing solution.	None
Template Engine With known template engines, it is generally easier to customize forum and create new themes.	None
Webservices / XML-RPC management Generally allow remote control from other softwares than browsers (program, etc...)	No

Simple Machines has been developed to one goal : provide a forum with PHP/MySQL technologies. Some Joomla plugins have integrate it directly to this famous CMS. For existing SMF installation, a bridge can be also installed between the forum and the CMS. Unfortunately, it is not possible to integrate userbase to another existing system without big hack directly in the source code, this feature is unfortunately really uncommon in such software.