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Sites that really utilize the potential of Vanilla
I've always thought that Vanilla had enormous potential as a community platform but I've seen very few sites that actually realize this potential and are active. Off the top of my head I can think of two examples of great Vanilla forum sites:
Does anyone else know of sites that are active Vanilla forums with clever customization and/or design? I'm primarily interested in instances of the self-hosted version rather than the hosted versions by Vanilla (not that there is anything wrong with the hosted stuff, it's just that I've seen those sites already over at vanilla.com).
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I would think of these:
http://homebrewforums.net
http://www.devilgang.in/
Also, you might want to take a look at this thread: http://vanillaforums.org/discussion/20235
And maybe mine (it's in german though): http://www.raute.de/forum/index.php
Vanilla is integrated seamlessly into my WordPress setup here: http://lividtech.com/forum
There aren't any blog posts at the moment because we just started fresh with the website.
Add Pages to Vanilla with the Basic Pages app
@DirtyDog
Not being funny, but I have no idea what you mean by that.
What would be your criteria for 'community platform', and how would you judge when sites have 'realized this'?
Our forum at http://www.whu606.com is solely a community forum (by my criteria) since there is no 'other' website it is attached to.
Awesome.
@whu606 vanilla has potential to be much more than just a forum dues to it's flexible nature. It can be used in many ways to facilitate user interactions with other users (like traditional forums), but also user interactions directly with content. I've seen some examples of this with Vanilla's hosted forums.
Anyway I'm just looking for good examples of Vanilla forums, whether they be customized in structure or use modern design.
Nice site you have there.
Thanks @DirtyDog - though I wouldn't say ours is active as it could be, or was when it was before, but that's more to do with me flirting with half a dozen forum packages in a year before settling on Vanilla.
Now the site is stable and not moving from Vanilla, it's time to focus on building a community rather than tinkering with the site too much. We have a strong core of loyal members so hopefully that will set us in good stead.
There's lots of additional stuff i'd like to do with our site but i'm bringing out a new forum/website in the new year so will be able to try various things with that too.
Here is what I have done to make full use of vanilla -
1) In my WP home page I have placed a widget that displays recent posts from Vanilla
2) Replaced WP comments by Vanilla Comments
3) Made same theme for blog and forum
And the results are outstanding. Check yourself at http://www.gtricks.com/
From the users point of view, if he lands on homepage, he knows what discussions are currently going on. If he visits any individual blog post, and if he comments, the thread in discussions gets automatically updated where other people are motivated to comment more.
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That is some excellent work @aery!
@aery I notice you just updated your theme. I really like what you have done with the discussion view - very clean.
@DirtyDog You liked it? Its an old theme. My traditional style one was giving some problems. Please tell me should I keep old one or new one?
Here are the screenshots:
OLD -
NEW -
Other friends, you also please advice
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I prefer your traditional style (the one in the bottom two images) better in most aspects. The one thing that I prefer in your old style is that the post view utilizes space better. The traditional view has a lot of space wasted to achieve the quote effect with the user name and avatar. I also prefer the sidebar on the left like you have in your newer theme.
@kasperisager @422 and other members, may I have your view?
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Sure! Personally, I like the "old" version better. It just seems a wee bit more modern and clean than the new theme - no offense meant.
Kasper Kronborg Isager (kasperisager) | Freelance Developer @Vanilla | Hit me up: Google Mail or Vanilla Mail | Find me on GitHub
My http://www.babyforum.at is really productive source for community members and visitors. Also i integrate different other things into the site, so it's getting more and more portal with a community frontend. Interesting perspective i think because usually websites steer you to a "Forum" menuepoint to get in touch with the community.
You say you are interested in the self hosted sites yet it looks like Pinoy Australia is hosted - unless someone has cracked the badges for self hosted?
I've just set up a self hosted site embedded in WordPress but only just live so no activity yet; Swansea Wheelers
@phreak your site looks great! Can you tell me about your gallery? Did you create that as a Vanilla plugin?
@mhk1058 Pinoy is self hosted and doesn't have badges. Are you referring to the avatars?
Ah, silly me, no I was referring to the 'medals' which are obviously (now) awarded for number of posts. I was to eager to jump to conclusions having badges at the forefront of my mind - just installed a Vanilla forum over several other options believing it to have badges only to find it is only the hosted version that does. Overall a big lesson in reading things properly methinks!
Oh the crazy things I'd do on my sites if I wasn't so busy with the core software...
@DirtyDog: No, sorry to say. I run another CMS behind the forum in a folder and this gallery was a custom development based on that. I run different mechanics and fuctionalities in the background on several sites. That is also my problem with the Vanilla hosted service and the functionalities user are able to add to their forum there. I can't use it because i have different needs for those developments based on my other platforms.
@phreak I am a fan of the Vanilla hosted service, but like you it just wouldn't suit my needs.