Forum Software Update Question

[Kestryll]

We've been running vBulletin 3.8.x for a long time and it's getting to be very long in the tooth.
In fact vB 3.x.x has been EOL (End Of Life) for a while now and updates are no longer coming.

I'm looking at upgrades or conversions and the three that seem the most viable are vBulletin 4, Xenforo and SMF.

vB4 is the next step up from 3.x.x but not the newest which is vB5. vB5 is a resource hog and frankly kind of ugly if you ask me. vB4 is better but it lost something when vB was bought out and the designers and coders of vB3 left the company.

Xenforo is the work of a two of the original developers of vBulletin after they left vB and the buy out.

SMF is an open source software that has been around for a long time and is regularly updated. It's the lightest of the three in terms of server resources and load.

I want to hear from the community which they think looks/feels best, most familiar and easiest to use.
Below are samples of each to look at and poke around on.


Xenforo: https://xenforo.com/community/

vBulletin 4: http://www.gunrightsmedia.com/?styleid=10

SMF: http://www.calguns.org/forum/index.php

[Deedle]

IMO they all look decent, I like SMF the best, but if I was the board operator ease of transition would weigh in a lot.

[Kestryll]

IMO they all look decent, I like SMF the best, but if I was the board operator ease of transition would weigh in a lot.

With the size of Calguns (threads, posts and members) any transition is going to be a pain in the butt so that comparison is a wash.

[jessdigs]

I think 4 looks the best, easiest to navigate at first glance, but it may just because most of the forums I surf use VB.

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[ten888]

I would lean towards SMF. Is portability of the itrader system still a factor at this point?


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[Cokebottle]

I like the current format.
Not sure what is what... I don't like the interfaces on Apneaboard (MyBB) or the Fender users support forum (unknown).

So whatever is closest to this format, or the format used by ToyotaNation/Rav4World is my preference.

[SkyHawk]

I must be getting old, I don't like the look of any of those proposed in the OP.

Maybe if VB4 bolded unread thread titles and in a larger font, like VB3. But the VB4 example above is very lame. You have to really look to pick out the thread title from the poster name and other misc info on the 2nd line. The two lines are exactly the same size and the top line is not bolded.

To me, scrolling a page of thread listings in a subforum on the VB4 example looks like a giant wall of unreadable text. Very sad.

And the second line of every thread listing is 75% useless. Here is an example:

'Started by JTHunter, September 19th, 2016 09:57 PM'

Do I need to know the day and time every single thread in the list was started? No I do not. If I want to know, I can look in the thread in question. And isn't 'Started by' implied? Does it really need to be said? No. That excessive info alone is junk noise, and contributes significantly to the unreadable look of a subforum thread list.

Maybe some of that is tunable. But if it was, why aren't site ops getting rid of that junk and tuning the bolding and second line font size? I could b-slap the programmer who thinks that is a friendly, usable thread list. It is not inviting, instead it is a huge turn off. Aint nobody got time for it.

[2shotjoe]

Just get the current version of vb board.

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[Marauder2003]

The opening page of SMF is a lot of white space. That and the normal CG banner ads means there will be no message sections shown on the first page.

V4 feels familiar and comfortable.

Xenforo is OK.

[BBot12]

I vote for VB4!

[HPBrowningMK3]

My choice for a user friendly easy upgrade is VB4.

But my questions to you are: Where do you want to Calguns? What is your plan? What capability do you need?

[Deedle]

With the size of Calguns (threads, posts and members) any transition is going to be a pain in the butt so that comparison is a wash.

Fair, and lol.

The fact that SMF is open source would also lean me to favor it, even if I didn't like the way it looked. Popular open source projects are generally nice to work with or use IME.

[Dr Pete]

I vote for smf since open source and it looks clean.
Other than that wtf do I know?
Can you or would you need support?
I like the fact it's updated regularly but that could be a problem also if they break something?

P.S. I am guy #11 posting but only 4 people voted

[freonr22]

How much data will be lost?

[Cokebottle]

How much data will be lost?