SMF vs Vanilla any thoughts ?

bugsmi0

am using SMF which I consider one of the good ones but then I find Vanilla unique and simple i'm having decisions issues and need to hear what others have to say :) has anyone converted from SMF ? pros n cons ?

erissiva

I actually used to be an SMF contributer. Used the software for a while, before realizing that I didn't need every single feature on the block. It was too slow for me, and too bulky. So I switched to punBB. Very light, crisp, and fast. However, I found that it hindered concepts and conversations by complicating this natural process.

That's when I found Vanilla. All pros, if that's what you're asking. No cons.

But you have to realize that Vanilla is different than the normal discussion board software. It's more of a framework that you can customize infinitely using addons. And it makes the little things that much simpler. I would say, install a test version, install some addons, and take it for a whirl.

Thomas Heath

I too switched to Vanilla from PunBB, and from PhpBB to PunBB before that. I'm lovin Vanilla, and the fast pace at which its progressing. EDIT: Used Invision too, didn't like it.

strawberries

across the years i have used most of them - yabb, yabbse, phpbb, smf, invision, etc and vanilla is by far the best that i have used.

bugsmi0

It appears that V removed the standard way of displaying board names, will take some getting use to discussions appear be like topics and comments as posts is there a way to make it so discussions are sorted by category and match the actual category order ?

Minisweeper

Sorting discussions by category would only work if you had less than 30 discussions on your forum surely? Unless you just took the top 5 from each one, which i believe someone did for some part of their site if you search around on here a bit.

bugsmi0

wow seems like importing all SMF board topics, posts, etc to Vanilla would be an almost impossible mission are there any how to's on accomplishing this ? seeing how the db tables are wired different i'm almost dreading it lol

prince_of_oreon

I've used vBulletin, punBB, SMF, and phpBB for a very long stint. I returned to the phpBB today to round out my post count to 4700. But I'll never go back.

In its simplicity Vanilla encourages discussion by removing the natural barriers that other forum software establishes. It is also infinitely upgradable, and simple enough so that anyone with imagination and a little know-how can convert it into whatever they want it to be. In the truest sense Vanilla is not forum software as much as it is the infrastructure for an interactive community.

One of the major differences between Vanilla and other forum software, is in the engine, and the ability of Vanilla to easily modify user accounts for use site-wide. Try doing that with phpBB it is a lot more difficult, and all the hacks have very limited and specific applications.

Another big difference, is in the focus of the development team. All the other makers of forum software are watching each other for direction. All the other forum software groups could combine into a mega group and no one would miss a beat. Not so for Vanilla. To me that uniqueness, and the ability to question the usefulness and application of features on their own merit, rather than on what everyone else is doing, is what makes Vanilla great.

tthmaz

Seems like there are only good words about Vanilla currently. I too, have used SMF for a while and find that their extensions are hard to maintain and to be used. Each extension search for codes in only the "default template" and if you are using other templates, you will have to figure how to make things work/appear in it. Besides, SMF uses tables for their display, whereas Vanilla uses CSS. Table designs are too restrictive to me. Just have a look at wordpress and MT and tons of other open source projects, CSS is the way to go these days.

prince_of_oreon

And of course a big hooray for no Smarty templating! Could you imagine a Vanilla flavored Smarty? ick.

bugsmi0

my biggest issue is going to be importing all SMF data into vanilla not sure how one would even begin such a task, would be cool if vanilla DB tables were such that we could just import topics, posts, etc but since they are different it will probablly require some serious editing and I imagine the post count doesn't match either so major headaches

Steve

Hi bugsmi0, I've been working on a SMF to Vanilla script today, I'm in the process of doing the same move on my site. The script is working but give me a day or two to find some time to tidy it up and make it more usable before I post it up for public consumption. Most stuff goes across fairly nicely, although the terminlogy is different - i.e. smf_members -> LUM_User smf_topics -> LUM_Discussion smf_forums -> LUM_Category smf_posts -> LUM_Comment Some considerations for the conversion are: Passwords are hashed differently - I've hacked together an extension which allows users to login with passwords hashed by either SMF or Vanilla. I'll post this up too for you to use or You'll need to get your users to reset their passwords. Vanilla uses Icons (32x32) and Pictures (280x200) instead of Avatars - I've got my SMF Avatars going across to both - I figured having them cropped down really small was better than nothing! Users can update it once I make the move on our production server.

bugsmi0

Looking forward to it, will make converting from SMF so much easier curious what will this migrator do with SMF board names or category names ? I imagine one would get tossed but then you might lose the order of where everything was at since Vanilla does not have these items, SMF board categories, board names, topics, posts Vanilla categories, discussions, comments

mis-one

Any update on this script or a conversion solution for SMF? I have a large forum backed up I could test it on.

SlashedZero

I'd be pretty interested in this script too. I just can't stand SMF and its dozen of useless complex features anymore since I discovered Vanilla.

mis-one

I'm in the same boat. Ever since discovering Vanilla, and after being a long time phpBB user and before that UBB, I want to switch over ASAP! hah

bugsmi0

come on now SMF is not complexed its one of the most simple forums on the planet, it just has a ton of code and tables in it that makes it bulky, i made use of most of its features which can easily be turned off and on.

but I too am waiting for the SMF migrration tool to Vanilla, the creator may need some $motivation lol

mis-one

I'd be willing to donate to a working product. At this point, anything to migrate my topics and users would be fantastic.

SlashedZero

Well the only thing i'll regret with SMF is the awesome amount of highly detailed statistics. Totally useless, but damn cool for a geeky admin who loves staring at increasing numbers (yeah, I do...)

It's slow, themes are painfully long to create, the permission system is almost worst than phpBB's, and, well, I just don't understand what the word "simple" has to do with it.

I guess it's because I'm definitely not a techie, but SMF just seems unfriendly to me, even after 6 months of use.

Steve

Hi guys, I forgot about this thread and I haven't had time to tidy up the code but I'll post it up right now in its current form. The conversion script: http://cz.kicks-ass.net/smf-to-v.tar.gz I took David 'Chacmool' Djurbäck's SMF to PunBB conversion script as a basis for this and its more or less a dirty bastardisation of his code, use at your own risk modify settings.php with your database details then hit forums.php, topics.php, posts.php, and users.php This just ports forums/topics/posts and users - You will need to reassign the respective permissions. I used this to port my community of around 600 users 4000 discussions, 60000 comments - If you have alot more you may need to look at increasing timeouts etc for the run of the script SMF Password Hash Extension http://cz.kicks-ass.net/SMFPasswordHash.tar.gz SMF Password hashes are salted using the users own username, so you cannot port them directly across from Vanilla - this extension once loaded will overwrite the normal People.Class.Authenticator with one that also accepts passwords in their SMF salted form. Things to note about this are: if a user updates their password, it will then be saved in the normal vanilla manner (which is fine) and the users should not be allowed to change usernames or they will need to reset their passwords also. Again please use at your own risk :) Also this extension will update your vanilla config as soon as it is enabled - to disable the extension you will need to unload it and remove the AUTHENTICATION_MODULE line from conf/settings.php Any questions just yell out - I will get around to tidying up the code its just a matter of finding the time!

mis-one

Awesome! Everything worked perfect except for posts.php (it just loads a blank page, no errors). A review of the code in formatting.php has some text mixed in, like : "smf-to-v/settings.php0000700000175000001440000000115210474317356015406 0ustar steveusers00000000000000" . Also noticed some references to Pun tables. I couldn't get the user passwords to work either. This is a great start though, thanks Steve! This was closer than I invisioned getting.