Hey thanks for the replies!
Brad - I appreciate your input. I figured it'd be different from vB...I haven't messed with IPB at all, but I have some personal grudges with them (luring people from iK to IB and saying it will always be free, and then pulling a bait-and-switch...but alas, that is not what I'm here to talk about). I'd pretty much have to re-learn any admincp I looked at...I seriously looked at cPanel the other day and felt like it was the first time I'd looked at it. That's half the fun, though!
Share your site link when you go live! I'd love to check it out. I'm browsing the sites people have posted and am pretty psyched about the software and it's abilities. I'm especially a fan of the Facebook-like alerts...I hate Facebook, but it's something that everyone can relate to.
I remember with vB spending WEEKS to get everything situated...hopefully it's as good as you say it is!
Oh trust me I remember the ikonboard days my friend, you're talking to a man that cut his teeth on UBB 5.x!
The admincp feels a bit like cpanel yes...if you use the "icons". There are also links in the left side bar, which reminds me of vBulletin, and all the options can be found there as well.
The main difference is everything is so....dynamic. Really, idle on this thread for about 3 minutes and watch how the times on the posts magically update. There is so much javascript (are they still calling it AJAX?) to get your head around, its kinda scary actually! Websites aren't supposed to respond so well! xD
I'm not saying you'll have everything done over night, there is a learning curve, but once you get going you'll notice things roll a long a lot faster than they did in the vBulletin days. The fact that XenForo is based on the Zend Framework is a big reason for this. You might find yourself lost at first because everything is coded in a MVC pattern, but once you learn it you'll realize how much better it is than the old days of everything begin stuffed into multiple php files and functions begin called from god knows where.
I don't know how deeply you get into the code though. Personally, I've done zero edits to the php files. Everything I've needed was able to be done from the admincp or via an add-on.
A lot of things are just so much better...one big example is the style manager. Remember how much of a pain in the ass it was to manage CSS in vBulletin? You won't have that problem with Xenforo, forget about having to memorize color codes for the CSS. I mean, you can do it manually if you want..but you don't have to. There is a really nice interface for choosing your color scheme. If you want to add extra CSS, there is a nice template provided for you.
Everything in the admincp is "dynamic" as well, its just not the front end that makes great use of javascript. Forget about having to constantly re-load pages in your admincp just for searches and what-not.
One feature I _really_ like is "test permissions". Basically that old problem of user permissions goes away. As an admin, you can "test" the permissions of any user and browse the forum using their permission set, so you see exactly what they would see. When your done, a simple click of the button in the header and you're back to your own permission set. Its really helpful when you're setting up private forums and what-not.
I've done some *slight* template edits, but not many. I actually prefer the simple style and the use of pop-ups for things like mini-userprofiles.
"SEO" or "pretty urls" is built right in assuming your server supports it (most all do these days). You can define paths for pages and everything...for example. My xenforo installation is in my root public_html directory, but my "forum" is at /forum/ while my "homepage node" is what loads if you put in our url.
I have not gotten into writing my own modifications yet, but from what I've seen, its a lot cleaner than the old vBulletin 3.5.x+ way of doing plug-ins. Instead of having a millions hooks spread around a millions php files everything can be added through a standard system of directories with a simple .xml file to define all the "rules" for the add-on. Obviously, I ain't done much yet lol. But from playing with it a little...I really like this way of doing things better. I'm not having to troll through thousands of lines of code to find out the best place to "hook" my code in anymore.
Basically, XenForo is like a forum reboot. That's what vBulletin needed...a complete re-write from the ground up because the old ways aren't cutting it anymore. Browsers support so much stuff now, its time to take advantage, and xenforo does exactly that.
I don't plan on running more than one forum anytime soon, but if I do decide to open another one, I'll be buying another license for sure.
I'll do you one better btw. I can't set you up tonight because I'm busy, but I'll send you a PM tomorrow (excuse me, "conversation") and give you a sneak peek at what we've been up to.
It isn't a big deal or anything, I haven't hacked the thing to death or made major alterations to the style, as I said I like the default style because its simple!
Also, I loath facebook too, but I had to make an account and finally give in. You don't _need_ a facebook account but I suggest you set one up and get yourself signed up to use their dev/app tools. This will give you two short strings that you input into the options area of the admincp and you're good to go as far as facebook is concerned.
I also suggest getting a twitter account set-up for your site as well.
Anyway, I'm obviously a very happy camper at the moment. I'm looking forward to what the future holds for xenforo, if 1.0 is this good I can't even imagine what 2.0 will be like!
