Some questions about xenForo

[Britney]

Hello!
I currently have a SMF forum and I have decided that I want to change to xenForo, but I have some questions before I purchase it.

First of all, is there any guide that explain step by step how to convert SMF to xenForo? I've done some research and I know that you have to convert SMF to myBB, PhpBB or something like that before going to xenForo, will you loose much information in this process?

How does it work if I want to add custom pages in the menu? Is there any addon or do I need to code it myself? How do you change the frontpage to an newspage?

I've experienced that the "link" (same goes for image, media etc) button lag when it appears, it takes like 3-4 seconds before it appears so that you can start writing the link. Not on all xenForo but some, is there some way to re-code this button to just appear in simple BBcode?

I currently have a application-form that basically requires you to be a members before you can go to the form (tells you that you need to be a member). When you fill the form and press send it goes to our adminforum were the admins can check out the form before accepting it. When they accept it the members automatically becomes a guildmember of our guild. Is there any built in feature that can do the same thing?

All answers are appreciated!

 

[Adam Howard]

Hello!
I currently have a SMF forum and I have decided that I want to change to xenForo, but I have some questions before I purchase it.

First of all, is there any guide that explain step by step how to convert SMF to xenForo? I've done some research and I know that you have to convert SMF to myBB, PhpBB or something like that before going to xenForo, will you loose much information in this process?

How does it work if I want to add custom pages in the menu? Is there any addon or do I need to code it myself? How do you change the frontpage to an newspage?

I've experienced that the "link" (same goes for image, media etc) button lag when it appears, it takes like 3-4 seconds before it appears so that you can start writing the link. Not on all xenForo but some, is there some way to re-code this button to just appear in simple BBcode?

I currently have a application-form that basically requires you to be a members before you can go to the form (tells you that you need to be a member). When you fill the form and press send it goes to our adminforum were the admins can check out the form before accepting it. When they accept it the members automatically becomes a guildmember of our guild. Is there any built in feature that can do the same thing?

All answers are appreciated!

Welcome to XenForo.com

You can indeed import from SMF to phpBB or myBB. Sometimes, not always, but sometimes I have notice the passwords are not kept. But your members will just use the recover password option and so it's not really an issue.

You have better odds using SMF to vBulletin to XenForo if you can find someone who can help you (such as myself).

As for your second question, you have options (lots of them)..... You can use an add-on, you can edit the menu, you create a page and redirect the path. A simple example would be a portal and there are add-ons for that as well. Tons of ways to change the homepage.

You can use an add-on to make up for some of the bb code, such as youtube. There are other re-directs you can also add to preserve old links.

Your last question.... There is an add-on that allows you to customize the built in user upgrade feature for moderator approval. So people who are already part of the forum would essentially need to request membership. This is also 2 social group add-ons. Additionally, if you want to make your whole forum moderator approve only, you can do that as well.

 

[Britney]

Alright, awesome! Thanks!

 

[dknife]

Just FYI I'm currently evaluating moving my board to XenForo and I'm running latest 2.x SMF and I successfully converted to phpBB3 today with everything intact. I was actually surprised by just how much it duplicated and passwords were all intact.

So hopefully that will mean a smooth conversion to XenForo.

 

[Britney]

Just FYI I'm currently evaluating moving my board to XenForo and I'm running latest 2.x SMF and I successfully converted to phpBB3 today with everything intact. I was actually surprised by just how much it duplicated and passwords were all intact.

So hopefully that will mean a smooth conversion to XenForo.

Alright, please let me know how it went

Your last question.... There is an add-on that allows you to customize the built in user upgrade feature for moderator approval. So people who are already part of the forum would essentially need to request membership. This is also 2 social group add-ons. Additionally, if you want to make your whole forum moderator approve only, you can do that as well.

Could you please link that add-on ?

 

[Mike]

Just something to be aware of: double imports rarely bring passwords across. We have to handle specific types of passwords (eg, phpBB 3's bcrypt-based passwords). When you import into phpBB, they may have handling for SMF's passwords but XenForo won't. (I don't know what SMF's password scheme is so I couldn't really say.)

 

[Adam Howard]

Just something to be aware of: double imports rarely bring passwords across. We have to handle specific types of passwords (eg, phpBB 3's bcrypt-based passwords). When you import into phpBB, they may have handling for SMF's passwords but XenForo won't. (I don't know what SMF's password scheme is so I couldn't really say.)

This is why I and others would really like to see an official SMF importer Mike (SMF > XenForo)

Sometimes the passwords keep and other times, not so well. I think the

SMF > vBulletin > XenForo

Path works best from my experience (in the mean time). Most times the passwords do keep this way, but not always.

 

[Britney]

Yes, that would be really great.

About the application system (my webmaster will eat me alive if we would downgrade from the current system that we use, he programmed it himself basically xD), I want a system were I could make different application forms for different membership-groups. Example:
Community member is the membergroup that you get when you join the forum. All comunity members can than apply to be a guildmember in one of our games.
If they apply for Wildstar for example, the application will come to a closed forum for all the Wildstar Officers so they can review the application and than either accept it or deny it.
If they (Wildstar Offciers) accept it community member will automatically become Member as maingroup and Wildstar member as secondary. It will also send a PM to the member saying he/she got accepted. If they deny the application the Community member will still be Community member. We also got a system in the applicationforum that made all the topics have a icon that would change after the application either was denied or accepted. Picture:

I know it's a lot to ask for. But is there any similar applicationsystem to what I just explained? If you don't get any of my explanation please ask

 

[Adam Howard]

Yes, that would be really great.

About the application system (my webmaster will eat me alive if we would downgrade from the current system that we use, he programmed it himself basically xD), I want a system were I could make different application forms for different membership-groups. Example:
Community member is the membergroup that you get when you join the forum. All comunity members can than apply to be a guildmember in one of our games.
If they apply for Wildstar for example, the application will come to a closed forum for all the Wildstar Officers so they can review the application and than either accept it or deny it.
If they (Wildstar Offciers) accept it community member will automatically become Member as maingroup and Wildstar member as secondary. It will also send a PM to the member saying he/she got accepted. If they deny the application the Community member will still be Community member. We also got a system in the applicationforum that made all the topics have a icon that would change after the application either was denied or accepted. Picture:

I know it's a lot to ask for. But is there any similar applicationsystem to what I just explained? If you don't get any of my explanation please ask

You're going to need an add-on for that (now that you've explained everything step by step). I'm unaware of any current add-on which will do exactly as you described

Both @sonnb and @xfrocks are skilled developers who could help you design something to do exactly that.

XenForo however is fairly easy to code and if your admin has the skills (as they did so before), then it would be something they could do themselves as well.

 

[dknife]

Just something to be aware of: double imports rarely bring passwords across. We have to handle specific types of passwords (eg, phpBB 3's bcrypt-based passwords). When you import into phpBB, they may have handling for SMF's passwords but XenForo won't. (I don't know what SMF's password scheme is so I couldn't really say.)

SMF encryption is simply this:

$hash = sha1(strtolower($username) . $password);