Best Cms And Forum Combination

Why don't you try the FireBoard once, which I mentioned in my above post. No bridge needed for that. Just give it a try.
No bridge problems. If you don't like it, then switch to another.

In my opinion it Datalife Engine and DLE Forum it is simple the finest thing, but besides, there is this question, everyone cms and each forum on the are good and have the defects, and it is impossible to choose the best, because made in the world is not present.... To choose for the project cms and a forum, it will be necessary to solve at first under what category the project if it is a news portal is better wordpress and datalife engine for dle it is possible dle forum and for wordpress in my opinion for any of forums IPB vBulletin phpBB it already on the taste and desire, and site and forum integration is very easy for making. It personally my opinion

What a great topic. I have enjoyed all of your posts. And have been looking for a good combination myself. Considering that joomla/Fireboard doesn't need a bridge is impressive. Thanks for all of the great ideas!

I have used Joomla and SMf and wasn't really impressed.

The guys who developed the mod you use to link up the two are out of work and have since stopped developing it.

I agree with csp4.0 phpbb3 rocks! try it mate...

SMF is one of the powerful forum software but in my opinion it still lags behind phpbb3.

IPB is your other option but its quite expensive..if you have the money, its the best around in my opinion.

This post has been edited by africa: Dec 29 2008, 09:42 AM

I've messed around with some different combinations myself, and came up with a conclusion that attempting to mix the CMS and forums may not be the most efficient method. Instead, I have been finding it easier to just add a normal link to the forums(using html box or just adding a new link "Forums") and putting them in an easy to remember location(such as domain.com/forums). This keeps you from needing a bridge, or any other changes to your forums and/or site.

As for the dual login, I have found that a lot of people who visit the site don't use the forums anyways, so it wasn't a big issue.

This is just the case for me, and may or may not be a good choice in your situation as well.

I use Joomla and personally I don't integrate the forum with the website. I just have a link on the menu to a forum, which in turn leads to my phpBB3 forum.
In the past though I have used Joomla + Fireboard. Fireboard is actually pretty good, easy to install (just like a normal component through the joomla interface) and is quite customizable. However, I still prefer phpBB3 which is why I use it.

I'm testing out SMF now. So far, it seems better than phpBB3. I don't know if it's just that it's different, or that it's really better to me, but I seem to like it more.

As for my CMS choice, my host just got back up last night so I'm re-adding Joomla now. We'll see how it goes. Before, I had issues really figuring out how to customize it.

You will probably see that it is much easier to customize SMF than phpBB. In phpBB you have to do manual edits, and I have never figured out how to install a new theme. I'm glad you like it

Yeah, my two main reasons for trying out SMF over phpBB are that SMF has automatic "SEO" you can enable, whereas phpBB doesn't. I never could figure out how to get phpBB seo'd either, without adding new php pages that just read all the topics.

As for the other reason, it was about the themes. Don't get me wrong, phpBB has awesome themes, but just like you I had issues with getting everything customized. I know how to install the themes and all, but then when you want to add a new item, like a chat box ,you must edit each one...This is hard if you have ~15-20 themes. Not to mention you come out with bugs that are very bothersome, and it causes a headache in the end.

I haven't tried to add anything new to SMF, but to confirm, all add-ons will work on every theme without having to manually edit them?

I think that you should install Joomla, and phpbb3, and then wrap pbpbb3 in a wrapper, then bridge it. I could help you if you want. Fireboard forum is great, but it does lack some depth, because it is a very basic message board, and if you install a shout box or something wihich runs on Ajax it will stop running, adn then you have to somehow export everything to some oter place.

Personally I think that you should go with the Joomla and phpbb3 combo which I can help you with of course. Just pm me ore something if you need more advice,