A couple of pre-sales questions ......

[TechBill]

Our forums at http://www.findmall.com are currently using Phorum which is an awesome forum but developers seem to have moved on to something else. We are the largest metal detecting and treasure hunting forums.

We are checking around to see about maybe moving to a different paid forum to have a continuing support when we needed it and also Phorum is not really mobile or tablet friendly.

We have a couple of questions ....

• Is there a convert script for Phorum to XF? This is a must because we have over 18 years worth of data including 20+ gigabytes of photos to transfer over.

• Does XF have threaded view or is it a standard flat view? Our members love threaded view since we first started our forum back in 1995 on a WebBBS before we moved to Phorum which also have threaded view.

• Is XF mobile or tablet friendly and does XF support upload images for smartphone or tablet? Do you offer apps or does the taptalk support XF?

• Does XF hooks or support custom modules? With Phorum we create custom modules and plug it into Phorum so we never need to hack the Phorum itself but use the hooks within the Phorum code.

• Does XF have auto image resize after uploading? Our members know how to resize the image before uploading but we notice more and more newer members doesn't know and they are coming from other fourm that does the resize for them when they upload images.

• How do we acquire a demo script and how it is set up? We have a production server and a test server which is a copy of a production server, we would like to try the demo out on our test server to see how it handle our large database. Back in the years all other forum script would choke on it and Phorum were the only one that could handle it with ease and speed.

Thank you
Bill

 

[Chris D]

1. There is no importer from Phorum that I am aware of. This may be possible if you commissioned someone to do a custom importer. @Jake Bunce has done some custom imports before, he may be able to advise if this is possible.
2. Just standard flat view, and to the best of my knowledge at the moment there are no plans to deviate from the current view.
3. It is very mobile friendly, easiest way to test this is by resizing your browser window. XF implements a Responsive Design rather than a dedicated mobile style. Mobile uploads are supported where the mobile phones support it (so that's a yes for all of the major ones in their most recent OS versions).
4. XenForo is very extendable. Possibly a slightly different concept and there is a learning curve, but you can see from the Resources section people have no problem extending it
5. Yes, you can set a maximum width/height for uploaded images. The images are resized accordingly, automatically.
6. Unfortunately a demo with those terms isn't available. The demo is here: https://xenforo.com/demo/ It's quite restrictive in terms of it won't really support installing add-ons or styles, or importing. As I'm sure you can appreciate with a downloadable piece of software, providing a trial version is tricky. The License Agreement is worth reading: https://xenforo.com/license-agreement/

 

[Dan Hawkins]

Hey,

Suggestion on the importing, why don't you go Phorum > PhpBB and then PhpBB > XenForo?

Phorum > PhpBB
https://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtopic.php?f=65&t=2120945

PhpBB > XenForo
http://xenforo.com/community/forums/third-party-services.42/

Importing is not offered as an official service, only basic installation.

There are some third parties which do offer that, they are not affiliated with XenForo though.
http://xenforo.com/community/forums/third-party-services.42/

Importing is fairly straightforward, you can always try it yourself and then contract someone else to do it if necessary.
http://xenforo.com/help/importing/

 

[TPerry]

Be aware that a two step conversion like that will typically cause loss of passwords... just something to be aware of to check about.

 

[Alteran Ancient]

How do we acquire a demo script and how it is set up? We have a production server and a test server which is a copy of a production server, we would like to try the demo out on our test server to see how it handle our large database. Back in the years all other forum script would choke on it and Phorum were the only one that could handle it with ease and speed.

In regards to this specifically, the Demo should permit you to test the software's de-facto features. If you're curious as to whether your server supports it, you can upload the Xenforo Requirements Test script - that'll advise you if there is anything your server is missing that would prevent you from installing the software.

 

[cellarius]

Regarding the size of your forum: You seem to have a bit over 2 million posts, if I'm correct. That is a big forum, for sure, but there are some real heavyweights that run xenForo - up to about 35 million posts. Just have a look at this thread: https://xenforo.com/community/threads/the-large-xenforo-forums-list.87974/