I have tried on several occassions to get a rise out of Boonex about the deficiencies of Orca, but no one at Boonex seem to have any interest in opening up a discussion on the topic.  I see nothing in the D7 Trac that would indicate any plans to make Orca a viable forum solution that could even begin to compete feature-wise with commercial scripts like Invision Power Board or vBulletin

I have looked at the top three open source forum scripts including phpBB 3, SMF 2, and MyBB.  All of these forums, while sporting a lot more features than Orca, fall short in one way or other.  None of the top three have a wysiwyg editor, which is a major negative.  SMF promises a wysiwyg editor, but it doesn't exist yet, and SMF development progresses very slowly.  I think I can safely assume, that the vast majority of internet forum users, will not want to deal with a bunch of BB Code in their face when editing posts.... I know I don't.  While Orca uses a wysiwyg editor, you can't create sub-categories, and Orca forum administration and moderation is in it's infancy..... it looks like it will stay there.

That brings me to the reason I started this thread..... Dolphin 7 & Invision Power Board integration.  Before you tell me to list this in the job section, I will say that the job section makes no sense.  I listed this once, and discovered that I couldn't even post a comment in my own damn job listing, which made me wonder what genius came up with that system.  Don't tell me to post a job request on expertzzz.com either, because I refuse to take part in a site where con-jobbers are allowed to run rampant.

The bottom line here, is that I am looking for two things:

1. Other people that may want to use IPB as a forum solution with Dolphin 7, and share the development costs of an integration.  This is not going to be a job for beginners, and I am willing to, and expect to pay a premium rate for the coder(s) that take on this task.  That is why I would like to find others to share the development cost, and pay the coder(s) a good wage.

2. A coder or coders to complete this job in a timely fashion.  These coders should have verifiable references, and be able to provide real-life example of their work.  I want to use this integration as part of a serious site development commitment, and I want a coder that is dedicated to doing jobs right and sticking with it until everything is 100% bug-free.  I have no interest in dealing with anyone interested in making a quick buck.



The Invision Power Board license allows one active license, and one test installation.  For the devlopment of this integration, I can set up a test site with a full Dolphin 7 install and IPB install.  I will prepare a comprehensive integration requirements document, so that the coder(s) know exactly what the scope of work will be.  I will also stipulate within that document that any work performed by the coder(s) beyond the scope of the original proposal will not be expected without additional compensation.   In other words, I expect to be treated fairly, and the coder(s) can also be assured they will be treated fairly.  If anyone would like to know a little bit about me as far as buying and selling goes, I invite you to examine my ebay feedback record for the last 8 years: http://myworld.ebay.com/vasteq

Anyone interested in this project should either post to this thread or contact me via PM.

Well....... I see this is going to be a really hot topic!

I would rather see PHPBB3 or MYBB as the other option(s) for integration.

IPB has always been out of my reach sadly financially.  :(

I would have considered phpBB 3 or MyBB, if they had a wysiwyg editor for posts.  I know there are editor mods for those 2, but I read somewhere that they're full of bugs.  Of the top 3, I thought MyBB had the most intuitive back end.   SMF 2.0 promises a wysiwyg editor, but I'm not willing to wait around for it.  I found very good reasons not to use any of the top 3 open source forums.

In my opinion, IPB is a bargain at $150.  It has every feature you could possibly want in a forum, and there are many very good free mods to extend the functionality even further.  I especially like the arcade mod by ipbcoding.com ..... it is absolutely first-rate.

Today, for the first time, I'm installing IPB 3.0.0, the latest release of IPB.  Integration with Dolphin 7 may be easier than I thought because provisions for logging in using anexternal database is built into IPB 3.

 Houston, I already know that you can write code, but maybe you have just spent way to much time looking for a tree with that tequila bottle.  Now go get some shade man and look at what you just wrote.  Integrate the dang thing and show us it can be done, as far as good coders go, you know that mrpowless, AntonLV, DolphinMods and such are the best ones we have around here.  Sorry if I missed any of you great guys.  ShaneCampbell from Genesisgraphics might even be willing to kick in on this one, not sure if this is his forte or not, but I know he can design one heck of a layout for just about any site. 

Now go post this in the Jobs section.  Sorry, couldn't resist.  And just to chime in here, show me this can be done and I'll help you set the price, I'll gladly kick in $150 per integration on this, as I know he is right in IPB being at the top of the pile when it comes to forums, however phpBB3 remains the most integrateable for now.

I listed this in the job section once and it didn't get much attention. 

Today, I had my first look at IPB 3.0.0 admin, and integration may be easier than I thought.... much easier than IPB 2.3X.

See screenshot: http://houstonlively.com/uploads/ScreenShot008.jpg

Hell...... I might be able to figure this out all my myself!  I've always been a vBulletin user, but chose IPB for use with D7 because I really the the arcade mod for IPB over the one for VB.  I sure like what I've seen with IPB 3.0.0 so far..... it is one damn fine piece of work.  There's not a lot of mods and skins for it yet, since it was just released, but they''ll be there soon.

I've been working on integrating IPB 2.3.6 into Dolphin for awhile. Because the only integration mod I know of is an outdated Expertzzz one, I decided to take it into my own hands. If I ever make anything of it, I'll let you know.

Orca is nice, but it's lack of sub-categories and other features keeps me away from it.

Have you looked at IPB 3.0.0 & the screenshot url I posted above?

I have and it will defiantly make integrations from other databases easier. I've only been messing around with Dolphin and IPB on the same database. If I can get something out of a 2.3.6 install, I'll see what can be done about 3.0, but 3.0 has allot of changes over 2.3.6. I use IPBWI as a means to integrate IPB into Dolphin, so a 3.0 integration would most likely require an updated release of IPBWI, which I expect to come out soon.

I wish more people would take an interest in this.  IPB 3.0 is an outstanding forum solution.

I'm interested if you had a chance to integrate this? I saw your screen shot at http://houstonlively.com/uploads/ScreenShot008.jpg

Did it work?

Iamhere, you have quoted my somewhat lengthy post three time now, without a response of your own.  Do you need help using your computer?

IP.Board 3.0 got it working with d7 &d6

thx god no more orca forum :)

omg this is so cool yea i dont like the orca forum look so simple and how i can get this mod to i have power invision 3.8.3

Uh invision power board isn't even at 3.8x branch o_O  So I doubt that =P  However, I've been digging with this for a bit because I personally need this (as orca does kinda blow).  The only difficulities I come up with is the SALT code used for dolphin 7.  I had it working with dolphin 6 easy as pie with the external database but nooo they wanted to make it more difficult to hack passwords so now it's insane to link it without edits to the files :P

I am still working on this problem and I HOPE I can get it done soon.  Unless someone else has it done and wants to release it for free ^^  If/when I do if no one has given it out, I will for free.  It's not like it's insane code edits just changing where the mysql pulls and how it pulls info.

it's easy if you don't mind to login twice

login into site once then login into forum again you can use your dolphin user name and pass: to login into ipb

easy my butt :P  It requires modifying the mysql drivers in ipb to accept a new column which means you have to either create an entire new mysql class driver for it or alter the entire way ipb stores passwords.  Which in my case isn't TOO difficult but not something I'm wanting to do at the time.  With someone having expertise in php and how mysql interracts (along with ipb knowledge), yes it's very easy to make this happen.  In my case, not so much =P  As for the login twice thing that's easy to do, just alter the way one of them stores cookies ^^