IP.Board, also known as Invision Power Board, IPB or IP Board has been created in 2002, and was, at the beginning a free software. IP Board 1.3 was the latest free version of Invision Power Board, and it served as a base to create a new dedicated project called InvisionFree, that has strictly no affiliation with Invision Power company. In the mean time, IP.Board 2.0 was release in 2004, and the latest major version IP.Board 3.0 was officially announced in the middle of 2009. This 3.0 version was a good way to revamp the default theme and improve with actual technologies and trends the core system of IP.Board
IP.Board is mainly developed for MySQL and PHP 5.0, that is a solid base for implementing such kind of forum software.
Invision Power Services develops additional products that are totally compatible to IP.Board. IP.Board is actually a platform on which you can install additional products that Invision Power provides. The most known are IP.Blog - a blog system, IP.Gallery - a pictures and photos library, IP.Content - a CMS system, IP.Chat - a a web interface to discuss and IP.Downloads - a download manager.
If you do not want to install and upgrade your own Invision Power Board software, you can use the Hosted Communities service, that provides you a ready-to-use IP.Board. For classic usage, you have the following prices:
- Standard $175 - renewal for 6 months $25.00
- 30 days free phone support, 2 business days ticket response, 5 day major version upgrade turnaround
- Business $299.00 - renewal for 6 months $50.00
- 6 months toll free phone support, 1 business day ticket response, 3 day major version upgrade turnaround, 3 day minor version upgrade
- Hosted Communities service
-
See Hosted Communities Services Prices available here.
Review Updates:
- March 9, 2011: Update Hosting Plans according to IPS Post.
- February 3, 2011: Features updates.
- January 14, 2011: Update Hosting Plans.
- April 12, 2010: First Review.
(and supports smaller communities perfectly as well.)
Server & Client Requirements
Note that per default, only the MySQL database driver is included the IP.Board package. The MS SQL Server driver is optional and costs additional $75.
The recommended PHP 5.2 is a really good choice, as it is a reliable platform for web development, and the IP.Board source code is particularly well designed. As usual, since PHP is needed, you have the choice of the server platform, among the classical Linux, Windows, MacOS Server,...
Tapatalk - Favorites: Bookmark your favorite topics
|
Tapatalk - Latest Topics: Latest Topics Page
|
Tapatalk - Online Users: List of connected users
|
- Most Smartphones Operating Systems are supported with the most used Tapatalk application, available on most stores (iPhone one is not free). The only downside is that the user will have to download a specific application for that purpose, and an information message will popup the first time he will connect to the forum.
Forum Threads & Posts
Forum Threads / Topics |
Forum Style
|
Flat/Threaded |
Forum Organization
|
- Forum Categories
- URL Redirection Forum
- Sub Sections
- Trashcan Forum
|
Thread Icons
|
Yes |
Topic Tags
|
Yes |
Hot Topics
|
Yes |
Unread Topics
|
Yes |
Hidden Topics
|
Yes |
Sticky Threads
|
Yes |
Related Threads
|
No |
Detect Duplicate Threads
|
No |
Announcements
|
Yes |
|
Posting Messages / Answers |
Message Editing Form
How to Post Messages.
|
- Rich Text Editor
- Formatting Buttons
- Preview Button
|
Post Editing Format
Supported Markup Language (HTML, Wiki, BBCode,...).
|
|
Spell Checker
Checks typos on posts and topics.
|
No |
Image Attachment
How Images can be Attached and Displayed in Message Posts.
|
-
Upload via Classic Attachments.
Images are all at the end of the post.
-
Upload via Advanced Attachments.
Images can be placed in the flow of message text.
-
Use BBCode or HTML.
Need to type the URL of an already hosted image.
|
Embedded Videos
Videos and Media Websites Supported in Message Posts.
|
|
You can select between the classic posting form that will generate BB code, or directly the Rich Editor, that will help users design and format their messages.
Facebook Connect is provided by default and is really easy to use: just configure several settings, and it's ready. Twitter support is expected to be announced with IP.Board 3.1, that is, obviously a really good news to increase traffic and exchange with this famous social network.
The Topic Tag is really smart, as it just requires the user to prefix it's topic title with either a predefined list of tags, or by freely defining its own tag. More information on this IP.Board Blog Entry.
Additional & Technical Features
Additional Forum Features |
Poll Creation
|
Yes |
Private Messages
Users Can Communicate using an Internal Messaging System.
|
Yes |
Instant Messaging
Discuss with Visitors and Members in a Chat Window.
|
Plugin |
Calendar
Topic, Member Birthdays, Events are available from the perspective of a calendar.
|
Yes |
Online Users List
Connected User List (Often Found in the Forum Footer).
|
Yes |
Members List
Search and Consult the List of Members.
|
Yes |
Technical Features |
Bundled Software
Additional Software Available with the Forum.
|
- Portal
- CMS
- Pictures Album Manager
- Downloads Manager
|
RSS/Atom Syndication
Posts and Threads Exported to Feeds Aggregators  .
|
No. |
Friendly URLs
URLs are clear and contain information about the topic (title, message,...).
Highly recommended for SEO purposes.
|
Yes |
Post by Email
Post Directly From your Email Box.
|
Yes |
Remote Control
Remote Control from External Software/Websites.
|
|
Cache System
Cache pages to optimize bandwidth and load times.
|
Yes |
Template Engine
It is easier to theme a forum using a known template engine (more docs & examples,...).
|
|
Friendly URL is one of the new features brought by IP.Board 3.0. Private Messages are really well designed, as they use the same tree discussion that GMail supports. It it therefore really easy to discuss without losing the thread.
Note that only the Portal is present by default in the IP.Board default package. You will have to pay more to get the other products like the Gallery, Blog and Chat. IP.Chat is however free for 6 months. The Calendar is also bundled by default, you just need to enable it from Applications Modules menu in the Administration Dashboard.
RSS Import is a really nice feature, because it allows you providing additional source of information to your community, by adding feeds from external websites.
We were looking and were losing hope about a remote interface, but IP.Board has finally make us hope again. It indeed supports an XML-RPC interface, to let administrator modify and moderate their forum from a third party tool.
User Profiles & Options
Some details about IP.Board features regarding members.
Member Options & Features |
Bookmark Threads
User Profiles Keep a List of Followed Posts and Topics.
|
Yes |
Email Notifications
Receive Emails When New Messages are Posted in Followed Threads.
|
Yes |
Export private messages
Private Messages can be Downloaded by Users.
|
Yes |
Payment Subscriptions
Paying Membership Subscription.
|
Plugin |
User Profiles |
User Profile
User Information and Settings.
|
Yes |
Avatars
Pictures of Members, Useful to Easily Identify their Posts.
|
Yes |
Signature
Signatures Added at the Bottom of Each Message.
|
Yes |
Ranks
Tags and Labels Identifying the Members, based on specific criteria (Total Posts Count, Credits, Moderation Level...)
|
Yes |
The Payment Subscription is provided as a plugin, called IP.Subscriptions. It is really complete and helps you defining the price to register to your community forum.
Note that in IP.Board, you can have two different pictures: your classic avatar image, and a picture of yourself, if you want to.
Moderation & Users Management
Moderation & Threads Management |
Moderation
|
Pre-Moderation
In pre-moderation, every post needs to be validated by a moderator before being published.
Post-Moderation
The moderation is done afterwards, if an administrator notices a problem or if a member reports something wrong. Each message is therefore directly published.
Reactive Moderation
By reporting any problems, members are reactive against moderation problems.
Moderators' main objective is to regularly check user reports, without having to follow each threads.
Distributed Moderation
By organizing the forum around moderators, who are usually power and experienced users, moderation is self-powered and only depends on the community.
|
Moderator per section
|
Yes |
Global Moderator
|
Yes |
Move Threads
Move Threads from Topics
|
Yes |
Shadow Topics
When a thread is moved, the previous position is kept in order to inform users of this modification.
|
Yes |
Close/Lock Threads
Close/Lock Problematic Threads
|
Yes |
Users Management |
User Groups
Organize and define groups of users, and apply different actions and settings on them.
Common Groups: Guests, Members, Moderators, Administrators,...
|
Yes |
User Registration
|
- Free Registration
- Registration needs Approval
- Invitation Only
- User Account created by Administrator
- Confirmation sent by email for validation
|
Limit Features For New Users
Features are limited if a user has created a small number of posts.
|
Yes |
Guest Posting
|
Yes |
Multiple Administrators
|
Yes |
Send Warnings to Users
Inform users by email or PM that they infringe the board rules, and could be excluded for such behavior.
|
Yes |
Forum/Section Restricted Access
ACL could be use to determine if a user or a group of users can access (in read only, post message) to some sections
and topics.
|
Yes |
User Banishment
|
Yes |
Administration & Support
The Administration of a forum software has never been as easy as it is now with the IP.Board Administration Dashboard. It is simple, powerful and clear. You will not be lost in thousand of options dispatched everywhere. Everything is organized by main tabs, and finding what you are looking for is really easy and ergonomic.
This is a really important step compared to the more complicated vBulletin administration dashboard.
Database Management |
Backup Database
Backup forum datas that you could store somewhere else.
|
Yes |
Prune Database
Remove old and unused datas from your forum.
|
Yes |
Restore Database
Restore a backup of your database if the previous install crashed.
|
Yes |
Installation & Upgrading |
Installation Method
How this forum software could be installed.
|
Installation Wizard |
Upgrading Method
How this forum software could be upgraded.
|
Upgrade Wizard |
Updates Notifications
The Admin Panel informs you when a new version is released.
|
Yes |
Forum Migration
Convert an existing forum to IP.Board.
|
Yes.
|
The Administration Tools are really complete, and the Statistics module is really important to follow trends and power users. Obviously, IP.Board provides a log viewer (organized by categories (error, warning, user log-ins,...)) and a task scheduler.
IP.Board provides an additional tool to convert your previous forum software to the Invision Power product. It is called IP.Board Database Conversion and can convert to Invision Power Board the following installations:
If you forum software is not in the list the IPB team can do the job for you for $60.
Security & Spam Protection
Security & Spam Protection |
CAPTCHA
Captcha protects your forum against spam bots.
e.g.,
|
Yes
|
Abnormal Behavior Detection
Detect users or request strange behaviors, and try to process proactive actions.
|
No |
Words Filtering
Offensing Words are automatically replaced.
|
Yes |
User Blacklist
Prevent specific user accounts to register (based on email address, name,...) and disable potentially harmful members.
|
Yes |
IP Blocking
Prevent access to spam robots and other scripts that could attempt
DDOS or Brute Force attacks on your forum.
|
Yes |
The CAPTCHA protection is based on the reCaptcha technology, that is really powerful to identify and prevent spammer to invade your forum with advertisement and useless messages.
IP.Board provides a Security Center, that centralizes into the same place all information about the potential security problem, detection of weird behavior, tracing of administrator log-ins.
Vulnerabilities Advisories Criticality
Secunia Advisories severity affecting IP.Board.
Vulnerabilities Impact
Secunia Advisories impact affecting IP.Board.
Vulnerabilities are provided by the Secunia website.
Use the
Forum Software Reviews RSS Feed
to be informed about new vulnerabilities. You could also get more information about known advisories here:
Customization & Social Networks
Customization |
Plugins
Add new features to your forum installation.
|
Yes.
|
Themes
Modify the style of your forum easily.
|
Yes.
~90 Available Themes. |
Custom BBCodes
|
Yes |
Smiley Packs
|
Yes |
Custom Thread Icons
|
Yes |
Additional User Profile Fields
Ask more about your members with custom fields.
|
Yes |
It is really rare to see a forum software supporting custom profile fields by default, but IP.Board does it! The classic MSN, AIM, Yahoo contacts field are actually optional and could be directly removed. Those fields are generally not used at all but you find them in almost every forum softwares. That's a good decision for IP.Board. The cache system is really powerful, and a Performance Mode could be enabled if your forum slows down.
We were really impressed by the list of default user accounts plugins. IP.Board supports by default OpenId, LDAP and Windows Live (limited to Microsoft OS) connections. And if this is not sufficient, the IP.Converge product will help you integrating your own user database. Note that this tool is also used to create bridge to existing softwares, like Wordpress or Joomla. See additional IP.Converge Modules here.
We cannot forget the Hook System that allows adding your own features or trigger specific event when a post is created, a new topic is written,... You won't have, for this time, to directly modify the IP.Board source code, the architecture is already ready for this. It will therefore make the upgrading more simple and smooth, because you will not have to remodify each files where you put additional updates.
W3C Norms & Accessibility
Norms & Accessibility |
HTML / XHTML Markup
|
XHTML 1.0 Strict.
Click to see if it respects HTML norms.
|
CSS Stylesheets
|
CSS 2.
Click to see if it respects CSS norms.
|
Accessibility (WAI)
Web Accessibility ensures that the forum is usable by people of all abilities and disabilities.
|
Conformance to AA level.
|
UTF-8 Support
Default encoding used to support all locales and countries.
|
Yes |
Conformance to W3C Norms
Does IP.Board correctly follow (X)HTML and CSS norms?
|
Yes. |
IP.Board is particularly great when you talk about themes. The default theme is compatible with most modern browsers (even Internet Explorer 6) and respects XHTML 1.0 Strict norms. This is rare but really decent.
It also provides an additional XML mode, that allows advanced usage and exportation of the forum datas.
Recommended Books
Unique Features
Key points and major differences that make IP.Board unique:
- Report Center: allows the generation of reports on specific criteria
- Security Center: centralizes in the same place all information related to the forum security
- XML-RPC API: controls remotely your forum
- Hook System: integrates additional features to IP.Board
Final Words
Outstanding!
Reviewing a forum software of a such high quality is one of the rare moment when you feel IT problems can all be fixed in a simple manner. IP.Board, and its eight years of lifespan demonstrates what the future of forum software should be: complete, but really easy to understand. Obviously, it is proprietary, and you will have to spend money to have additional features (gallery, blog,...) and this is clearly not the primary objective of a small community, but this time, the value-added is clearly present.
To conclude, there is nothing you cannot do with IP.Board, neither with another really good forum software, like vBulletin or Simple Machines, but IP.Board will do most of the job for you.
We cannot end this review without discussing about new features that IP.Board 3.1 will provide, because they are really attractive: Twitter integration, Status Update, Link Sharing, Skin Upgrader, Notification System,... That's a really great perspective!
Additional Resources:
Comments (30)
Wow Really Expensive Hosted
Wow
Really Expensive Hosted Price
I prefer to buy simple one rather than limited features for huge price
hey
by the way where can i suggest to review a forum ?
i will be really appreciated if you review Woltlab Burning Board
Best Regards
Best Regards
Sadaoui "SAFAD" Abderrahim - Lead Developer AEF Group
You can leave a comment with
You can leave a comment with your suggested review here: Next Reviews.
Note that Burning Board is already planned.
FSR Admin - Vote for 2012.
not sure how it can be
not sure how it can be expensive as hosted starts from $4.99
Highly energetic article, I
Highly energetic article, I enjoyed that bit. Will there be a part 2?
The hosting comes fully
The hosting comes fully featured with all of their additional programs including IP.Content, Downloads, Gallery, and blog so the price is amazing for what they are offering as all of the programs combined cost around 400 dollars for a license to host it on your own.
I've been using this software for about 3 years now and it is by far the best out there and the staff is great! They are always helpful and even when they can't fix the problem they try and point you in the right direction.
Get a Demo of your own for 24 hours on their site.
Hai everyone join for some
Hai everyone join for some gaming clans and amazing modding
I don't rate it 10 cos I
I don't rate it 10 cos I think there are many more plataforms that are just better in my site, as I use mybb
If anyone is interested, I am
If anyone is interested, I am selling the entire suite of ipBoard cheap.
info@fplaonline.
com
I have used this software for
I have used this software for over 6 years & was very happy with them until the new release of 3.2
with the latest release a lot of new functionality was introduced which is great however a lot of old features which were widely utilised by my community were removed without so much as a reason why except that Members didn't use these features. I requested where this info came from as no one asked me & recieve very poor responce for the high support prices paid.
basically Avatars were removed & now personal photos are your avatars, you can no longer have external links to photohosting accounts for your avatars & the avatar galleries have been removed.
Topic descriptions were also removed & the answer I received for this was that I could code the skin to see them but couldn't add anymore
some of the features which I as well as my community had grown to love over the past 6+ years were simply removed with no explanation & now the mods & developers can't even be bothered answering the reason for doing so in their own forum
support for this forum has gone downhill & basically they have driven me into searching for another. very disappointing to have a software company after so many years of paying good money for upgrades & support to simply slap their members in the face with what they think we should use rather than giving us the option to Enable or Disable past features through Admin
I regret that I upgraded to 3.2 as although there are some great new features that my community love, there were definately some poor decisions by the developers which have upset my community
Does anyone know if
Does anyone know if [table][/table] works with ip board? Because I know that some boards do not support tables anymore...
It doesn't specifically have
It doesn't specifically have the BBCode but you can add custom BBCode for tables although I don't know how well they'd do with the new editor (being that they are using one not custom built by IPB)
Yea I wouldn't rate it a full
Yea I wouldn't rate it a full 10 I would give it a 7 or 8. For my site I think there are better options out there.
I don't think that it will
I don't think that it will work best for my site.........................good day
Get in check for the best Drupal site web development services.
How do I install in
How do I install in subdomain? I heard that there is new version though.
I am planning to apply for my site minneapolis web design with forum support. I will give it a try.
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Well, any updates of this
Well, any updates of this version yet? Please let me know. Thanks.
-----------
Currently working on project http://cureforherpes2015.com/ website-based theme.
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IPB is quite pretty to look
IPB is quite pretty to look at.
On the other hand...
the documentation is shoddy and sparse, and the tech support is surly and gnomic.
Go through their support forum, and you'll see tons of questions that never get proper answers, and the answers they do give are frequently vague and sometimes flat-out wrong.
Before buying, I asked specifically whether there was a Feature X. Oh yes, there was, I was assured. (You can guess how that turned out.)
I actually sort of miss vBulletin, which I used about five years ago and apparently didn't fully appreciate...
"Post by Email Post Directly
"Post by Email
Post Directly From your Email Box. "
Can I do this? How?
As far as I know, it's not
As far as I know, it's not bundled with IP.Board but a plugin seems to exist for supporting this feature. Basically, behind the scene, it's a simple mailbox that is regularly checked by a IP.Board script, and parse mails in order to detect the original thread to post the answer to.
FSR Admin - Vote for 2012.
I agree with the Anonymous
I agree with the Anonymous poster above who described their tech support as surly. That is an absolute fact. The latest major upgrade broke all sorts of stuff and when I submitted bug reports, they were brushed aside as "not a bug". We're talking about things as simple as the Back button not taking you back to the previous page. Then if they do agree to listen to your "enhancement request" they will prioritize it behind all the other things they're still in the process of breaking. So my advice is to avoid IPB and find something else.
Price is increased to 175$
Price is increased to 175$
Thanks, it's updated
Thanks, it's updated
FSR Admin - Vote for 2012.
definitely the best forum
definitely the best forum software we have tested.
the forums are easy to design, navigate and post in. customizing stuff is also straightforward
gallery functionality and image attachments work good. internal reputation functionality is good, like, don't like, negative rep, postive rep etc. bbcode can be customised.
there is a marketplace where you can get free and commercial hooks to tweak you ipb.
since we started using ipb our community grows by 60 to 80 people per day.
8/10
very good software.
IPB is good but not as good
IPB is good but not as good as xenforo.
It is good to test these
It is good to test these versions. Make sure this works out well for sure.
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Well, I tested this version,
Well, I tested this version, and it looks quite great with the functions.
---------
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Well, I totally agreed with
Well, I totally agreed with you about this version. Since I will test and apply for my case. Thanks.
-----
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I love IPB. Awesome software!
I love IPB. Awesome software!
IPB is quite good.
IPB is quite good.
I own a small business, it's for laptop batteries
Ya ! IPb Is Good Forum
Ya ! IPb Is Good Forum Software Because It's Have >>
Invision Power Services Inc
Invision Power Services Inc (IPS) who develops IP Board (IPB) will easily take your money and run... I speak from both my own opinion and my own experience. Should you openly give your opinion and should that opinion be disliked by IPB / IPS, you have very good odds of having them revoking your copy of IPB and keeping your money.
This has happen HERE on this site as forum-software.org has discovered
http://www.forum-software.org/news/09102012-ipboard-demo-license-key-rev...
Free speech is not something (in my opinion) that IPB (IPS) encourages.