bbPress has released version 2.0.1 which is considered a maintenance release. However, if you have anonymous posting enabled, you’ll want to upgrade as soon as possible as this release addresses an issue where anonymous posters could potentially be able to edit topics and replies. If upgrading from 2.0, try upgrading through the dashboard as you would with WordPress as 2.0 introduced easy upgrades.
bbPress 2.0.1 Released – Fixes Anonymous Security Bug
WPMods Relaunches Their Forums
Kevin Muldoon of WPMods.com has announced that he has relaunched the forum section of the site. The forums disappeared earlier this year due to spam and the stand alone version of bbPress not having a modern feature set. I thought Kevin would have given the newly released bbPress plugin a try when he relaunched but instead, he chose to use software that was created by former members of the vBulletin team. However, Kevin states that in a follow up post, he’ll explain why he chose not to use the bbPress plugin. ∞
WPWeekly Episode 117 – Chat With Kevinjohn Gallagher
In this episode, I give you the latest headlines of the week and end the show with a 40 minute conversation I had with Kevinjohn Gallagher who is a bbPress and WordPress end user to get his perspective on both platforms.
Stories Discussed:
WordPress Beta 2 Released
Chip Bennett Hits 1,000 Theme Reviews
Automattic Invests In OwnLocal
Automattic Hires Philip Arthur Moore On As A Theme Wrangler
Migrate From Drupal To WordPress
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Length Of Episode: 59 Minutes
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bbPress 2.0 Stable Now Available
After a long time in development, bbPress 2.0 stable has been given the green light. While new version releases are exciting, this particular one for bbPress is especially so as it is a total rethink of how bbPress runs, integrates, and functions as a forums plugin instead of stand-alone software. If you’re already using an established bbPress install, moving into the plugin version of bbPress is as simple as importing your content from one to the other. John James Jacoby describes the move as follows:
If you already have a previous version installed, updating to 2.0 is easy with the bbPress Importer. Move your bbPress 1.0 powered content into your new WordPress/bbPress installation and you’re ready to go. (There is already a migration plugin in the works for other forum software that promises to be pretty amazing, too!)
I’m particularly interested in seeing what the migration plugin will be like as I’m currently using vBulletin to handle the forum side of the Tavern. I really like what vBulletin offers out of the box and I’ve been pretty pleased with it since I began using it for the site. However, I’ve reached a point where I’d like to switch over just to see what it’s like while at the same time, offer me an opportunity to write about bbPress more often from an end user perspective. One of the best things about bbPress is the ease in which it takes to make it look similar if not exactly like the WordPress theme in use.
It’s encouraging to see that since the release of bbPress 2.0, there will be more work dedicated to the surrounding ecosystem such as the website, the addition of a bbPress focused Codex, and the official bbPress forum. While giving the 2.0 version a try, I noticed that you can’t browse the bbPress plugin repository and install plugins like you can with WordPress. I hope that at some point in the future, I can expect the same user experience out of bbPress that I currently get out of WordPress.
WPWeekly Episode 112 – Kickstarted
In this pre-recorded edition of WordPress Weekly, I get you caught up with the news that made the headlines this week. While I didn’t have time to go in-depth on any particular topic, this episode features two interviews. One with Tom McFarlin talking about the lessons he’s learned through commercial plugin development and the other with Scott Kingsley Clark who discusses why he decided to use Kickstarter to fund the development of Pods 2.0. While you enjoy the show, I’ll be prepping the yard and such for the party tomorrow.
One year ago on September 17th, my would be father-in-law passed away from prostate cancer. Fellas, if you’re over 30 or 40, better keep an eye on that thing as it’s taking men out left and right.
Stories Discussed:
Andrea Middleton Takes Over WordCamp Central
iWeb To WordPress Converter
An Update On Upcoming WordCamps
bbPress RC 5 Released
BuddyPress 1.5 RC 1 and BuddyPress 1.2.10 Released
Interview With Tom McFarlin Regarding His Lessons Learned So Far With Commercial Plugin Development
Interview With Scott Clark Discussing His Use Of Kickstarter.com To Fund Pods 2.0 Development
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Next Episode: Friday, September 23rd 9P.M. Eastern
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Length Of Episode: 42 Minutes
Download The Show: WordPressWeeklyEpisode112.mp3
Listen To Episode #112:
bbPress RC 5 Released
John James Jacoby has announced the availability of bbPRess RC5 for public consumption which brings the release one step closer to being labeled 2.0. In RC 5 you get improved theme compatibility, BuddyPress activity stream behaviour, subscription email sending, and API tweaks for plugin authors. ∞
BuddyPress And bbPress Are Getting A Divorce
John James Jacoby who is one of the core developers of BuddyPress has published a post on the BuddyPress development blog that talks about the future of bbPress and BuddyPress as he sees it. In fact, if you didn’t know it by now, John is leading the initiative in turning bbPress into a plugin versus stand-alone software.
Since BuddyPress 1.1, bbPress has come bundled in the package to help make the installation as smooth and easy as possible. Through a little bit of massaging we successfully integrated bbPress into a dedicated forum component to allow for group discussion, and we included a central discussion directory to help put all of these topics in one easy place. All of these ideas were great on paper but have had mixed feedback and results in practice. Making bbPress a standalone plugin will help allow for more customizable installations which is great news for anyone that’s currently using BuddyPress for the forum component, or has been holding off because of the complexity of it all.
Our goal with me giving some attention to the bbPress plugin project is to keep it tightly integrated with BuddyPress, but have them act totally independently or alone if necessary. This means in a future version of BuddyPress, bbPress will no longer come packaged in the download, and both plugins will be aware of each other being activated. When that happens, additional features will be available to you to help create the kind of community that you’d like to have, instead of forcing forums to be tucked away into BuddyPress discussion groups.
John ends the post by saying BuddyPress 1.2.6 is on its way out the door. It will contain a few bug fixes with perhaps an enhancement or two. As for BuddyPress 1.3, it should be shipped before the end of the year while bbPress 1.2 might be ready for testing around September 15th with a ship date of around the same time BuddyPress 1.3 is released.
The Future Of bbPress Lies Within WordPress
About a week ago, Matt Mullenweg published a post over on the newly designed bbPress blog that hints to the platforms future. The topic of discussion was WordPress integration, and what better way to do that than to build an awesome bbPress plugin?
One, it’s an embarrassing pain in the butt to do now. One of the most frequent questions here on our forums. You have to jump through endless loops, and end up with something worse than most of the WP plugins for forums.
Two, we get the benefit of all the WordPress plugins and themes, which vastly outnumber our current options. Want private messaging? Use the BuddyPress plugin for it. Want OpenID? Stats? Sitemaps? There’s a plugin for that. Social network and profile features, in particular, are useful to the future of discussion forums and it’d be silly of us to duplicate that effort.
One of the more interesting points addressed in the post was Matt’s admittance that having BackPress and bbPress together turned out to be a hindrance more than a convenience, not to mention a performance hit.
Full, seamless integration with WordPress is something I’ve discussed for years. (Remember my dream of having each comment section being a mini-bbPress forum, complete with threads?) We’ve just taken a number of unfortunate detours (BackPress) on the way there.
This is an exciting development and I’ll be looking forward to seeing how mini-bbPress forums within the comments actually pans out. I’ve always thought that blog posts are just like forum threads except that the blog author gets to control the initial conversation. Forums on the other hand allow the community to create conversations. So if Matt can find a way to balance the two together, more power to him!
By the way, there are a few vocal people within the bbPress community that are pretty upset by the news that bbPress will be turned into a plugin but I think the benefits outweigh the negatives, as outlined by Matt in the post. However, thanks to the license and the open source nature surrounding the software, anyone will be able to take the core of bbPress, rename it, and continue providing updates as stand alone software. However, Matt did post this within a forum thread that addresses bbPress the plugin and the stand alone product:
Non-plugin bbPress development is going to continue until we have a perfect importer so people will be able to bring their content out of the legacy codebase.
No need to freak out as it will take some time to create that importer. Just make sure if you’re using bbPress to keep an eye on the development blog along with the forums for updates.
WPWeekly Episode 104 – To P Or Not To p
In this episode of WordPress Weekly, we discussed a number of topics including the headlines of the week such as the release of BuddyPress 1.2.5.2, an A/B testing plugin in the works, WordPress milestones, and the hot story of the week, The Capital P Dangit Filter. I was joined on the show by Dremeda who heads up the awesome site Sucuri.net. Near the end of this episode, I made the announcement that I’ll be taking a summer vacation from producing the show. When I get back, I hope to have some new stuff to play around with and a renewed sense of energy to do the show. It’s not disappearing or anything, just going on a small hiatus. However, I will occasionally upload an interview or two as well as material I obtain from conferences I attend before the end of the year so you shouldn’t unsubscribe from the podcast feed.
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This episode of WordPress Weekly is brought to you by, the letter P. It’s the sixteenth letter in the alphabet and sits between the letters O and Q. The ASCII code for capital “P” is 80 and for lowercase “p” is 112; or in binary 01010000 and 01110000, respectively.
Stories Discussed:
BuddyPress 1.2.5.2 Released
A/B Testing Plugin In The Works
Ask Mark
July WordCamps
WordPress Milestones As a side note, some design changes have already started to occur on the WordPress.org domain such as the drop down menus when you hover over the word Extend.
WordPress Support Forums Upgraded
WordPress And PHP 5
The Capital P Dangit Filter
WPWeekly Meta:
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Length Of Episode: 57 Minutes
Download The Show: WordPressWeeklyEpisode104.mp3
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bbPress Website Gets A Fresh Coat Of Paint
Remember this image? It was grabbed from a couple of new design screenshots back in July of 2009 when Sam Bauers announced the site would be getting a face lift. It’s been awhile but the new design looks great. Asides from the missing bee in the header graphic, the design is pretty much the same with just a few minor tweaks. It’s good to see Sams work not put to waste.
The new design has sparked some life into the members of the forum and it’s also brought back a familiar face to the project, _ck_. I’m still not a fan of the huge Gravatars as I’d rather see them around the 75 Pixel mark instead of 132. Initial feedback and bug reporting appears to be centered in this thread. As Chip Bennett published in one of the recent threads:
At the very least, I take the bbpress.org refresh as a sign of new life, and in that sign, I choose to find hope of great things in the near future for bbPress itself.
Well said.