Presale Questions

[atom0s]

I'm looking to move away from free forum systems because they lack some important features that I use on various sites of mine. However, I do want to make sure of things before I make the move to any other forum system. This is more or less a generic post I plan on posting on other forum software sites as well to get feedback on each to compare and make a decision.

1. Is the editor that the forum uses changeable (if yes, how easy and does it cost extra)?
Sorry but from the sites I've been part of that use Xenforo, the editor is less than desirable. It has annoying mess ups, incorrect styling at random times, editing posts becomes a HUGE headache.

2. Does Xenforo have a payment system built in?
A few sites of mine make use of Paypal to allow subscriptions as well as purchases of things. This is a must if I do plan to switch forum systems. This comes with some sub-questions as well if Xenforo does include this:

• Does the payment system have time based subscriptions?
• Does the payment system adjust users groups automatically?
  • Upon paying, does the users group change to a specified one?
  • Upon a 'x' amount of time subscription, does their group change back from the subscription group?
• Does the payment system include one-time purchases?
  • I have some products that users only have to pay once to gain access to. Does Xenforo offer the ability to give users access to a section of the forum indefinitely after that one purchase?
• Does the payment system support multiple payments/groups based access?
  • ie. if a user makes a 1 time payment to gain access to 1 thing then makes another payment for something else, will they be given access to both things or will the payment system only manage one?
• Does the payment system handle charge-backs? At times there are those that pay for something to get it then charge back to keep said item as well as get their money back. Does Xenforo handle this?

3. Does Xenforo have soft-topic deleting?
Can I delete a topic and eventually restore it at a later date?

4. Does Xenforo have a ticket system built in? Allowing topics to be marked as various things such as:

• Issue / Bug Report
• Feature Request
• Resolved / Fixed
• etc.

5. How much of a pain is it to get forum data from external sources?
In some situations, I pull posts from a specific section of the forum as news posts for a front page that is not attached to the forum software itself. How difficult is this with Xenofo? (Posts need to be formatted properly of their bbcode/extension codes, etc.)

With this in mind, I am not looking to pay micro-transactions for features. $140 for forum software is enough as it is. I'm not interested in also paying $20 for 'x' feature.

 

[Paul B]

1. It would require custom development.

2. The only payment system built in is for user upgrades - https://xenforo.com/help/user-upgrades/ User group promotions and demotions are automatic for the duration of the upgrade.

3. Yes, content can be soft deleted.

4. There is no ticket system. Thread prefixes can be used to mark threads in that manner.

5. That would require custom development, or you could use the forum RSS feed.

 

[atom0s]

Can you go into a little more detail about my sub-questions?

 

[TDUBS]

• Does the payment system have time based subscriptions?
  Yes. As stated above, usergroup promotions and demotions are automatic for the duration of the upgrade.
• Does the payment system adjust users groups automatically?
  Yes. Once user makes a purchase of the said purchasable user upgrade, their usergroup will be upgraded to said user upgrade.
  • Upon paying, does the users group change to a specified one?
    Yes. If you have a user upgrade set to have a users usergroup changed to a different usergroup, it will automatically change to desired usergroup once purchase is complete.
  • Upon a 'x' amount of time subscription, does their group change back from the subscription group?
    Yes. Once the subscription has expired, the users usergroup will change back to its original usergroup of registered user.
• Does the payment system include one-time purchases?
  Yes. You have the ability to set it for a certain amount of time or permanent.
  • I have some products that users only have to pay once to gain access to. Does Xenforo offer the ability to give users access to a section of the forum indefinitely after that one purchase?
    Yes. This could fall under the category of the XenForo Resource Manager which XenForo uses for addon authors to manage their addon releases.
• Does the payment system support multiple payments/groups based access?
  • ie. if a user makes a 1 time payment to gain access to 1 thing then makes another payment for something else, will they be given access to both things or will the payment system only manage one?
    Again, this could fall under the category of the XenForo Resource Manager which XenForo uses for addon authors to manage their addon releases.
• Does the payment system handle charge-backs? At times there are those that pay for something to get it then charge back to keep said item as well as get their money back. Does Xenforo handle this?
  No. The payment system is merely built within XenForo and is not managed through/by payment gateways. You would have to handle those on your own through said payment gateway (ie. PayPal).

As far as what you mentioned about $140 already being enough as it is, that is true and understandable. However, that $140 is well worth money spent and to get the extra features that xenforo does not offer at standalone, you're going to pay that occasional $10 for an addon because that's additional time put into development for said addons. Believe it or not, there are tons of addons in which are free as well. But at times during you running your forum, spending the occasional $10 won't be a problem because at the end of the day you will know it's going towards a good cause and/or could be made back.