Is it possible to test migration and new feel with the old forum content?

[xsouku04]

Hello.
I have a phpBB 3.3.11 forum with 4812 threads and 41799 posts on phpbb. Is it possible to test out the porting and creating a forward links for old forum URLs before buying the license? As this is crucial.

PhpBB is not good for searching. I often can not find my own posts. Does the advance searching plugin supports fully different langues then English?

Also the spammers manage to register again and again. Hover it seems, it is a problem of XenForo too? Do you get spammer robots registered on XenForo with the default settings?


best regards Petr Soukup

 

[Paul B]

Is it possible to test out the porting and creating a forward links for old forum URLs before buying the license?

You would need to purchase a license to do an import.

Does the advance searching plugin supports fully different langues then English?

Yes.

Do you get spammer robots registered on XenForo with the default settings?

Spam is a problem for all software and sites.
The built in tools manage to catch most of it in the approval queue from where it can be dealt with.

 

[xsouku04]

I have fixed the problems regarding spam on phpBB by installing extensions, but xenforo still looks better from the typical user perspective. Buying the license (and the advance search license,, the license for similar threads view etc) and testing the migration and user experience seems a bit risky as I do not know how long it will take and what exactly will be the end results. If most users will like it and so. I ideal case it could be one day work, but it could be much longer. I will postpone the migration when I have more time.

 

[Dragonfruit]

I have fixed the problems regarding spam on phpBB by installing extensions, but xenforo still looks better from the typical user perspective. Buying the license (and the advance search license,, the license for similar threads view etc) and testing the migration and user experience seems a bit risky as I do not know how long it will take and what exactly will be the end results. If most users will like it and so. I ideal case it could be one day work, but it could be much longer. I will postpone the migration when I have more time.

I'll tell you it's a lot more work than one day.

I hate phpBB boards, because it feels prehistoric. XF has a much better feel and UI.

You also don't need the advanced search. You can try without it, if you feel you really need it, then add it on after.

What I'd suggest is, acquire a license so you can properly test a migration, and even use it as a Development board. Use it to create a style that'll be similar in look but with XF's flare, to suit your board. Work on replicating features and functions that your board cannot live without.

Once all this is done, then you can plan for a transfer day, where you would shut down the phpbb board, I'd recommend moving it to a sub domain, like phpbb.yourdomain.com, or oldboard.yourdomain.com, so you can continue to access it for your reference as needed.

Install a fresh copy of Xenforo onto the main domain, and use the importer on the phpbb database to import a copy into Xenforo. Once that is up, go to your Test/Development board, and export the custom Style you've created ahead of time, into the new live board.

Using the Development board as cross reference too, you can set up all the custom changes and addon/plugins you may have installed to replica the extra functions you had on phpbb.

That's how we minimized the transition to less than 1 day. We prepped everything on a test board, and you can't do that without a license.

 

[Ricsca]

I imported 2 old forums, I fixed all the old links in the posts by asking chatgpt to make a sql query to replace the old urls at https://www.myosite/threads/ID-TREAD

And always via chatgpt I had sql queries made to convert the phpbb bb code into the xf one which only interests QUOTE and IMG