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What is your forum software bringing compared to Discourse ? I actually hate Discourse, for me, this is not the way a forum should be, and from my quick glance

by Gmo 11y ago

What is your forum software bringing compared to Discourse ? I actually hate Discourse, for me, this is not the way a forum should be, and from my quick glance at your website, it seems that you go in a very similar direction (which makes me sad :( )

tobyzerner 11y ago
Can I ask specifically what you don't like about the direction Discourse/Flarum are taking? I can't hope to compete with Discourse on features (yet!), but I think Flarum's elegance sets it apart. Out of the box, it's pretty, fast, easy to use, and works beautifully on mobile. And it's written in PHP, so is super easy to install – any low-end shared host will do.
- TuringTest 11y ago
  I like the fact that Flarum has an html-only version for browsers with disabled javascript, but it seems to be an alternate implementation, not the same content with less interactivity as it would be expected - it shows much less information and doesn't seem to have feature parity with the interactive version. This means that the software will only be usable from interactive sessions on "standard" mainstream browsers, and won't be easy to integrate with batch-processing tools (like web scrappers or data warehousing) or non-standard environments (anything enabled for the semantic web or developers creating handcrafted personal scripts to enhance their workflows). Classic "static" forums don't suffer from such limitations, being based on simple html and having predictable navigation structures.
  - tobyzerner 11y ago
    On the other hand, Flarum has a fully-functional JSON API which can fulfill some of those use cases. See http://flarum.org/docs/api http://flarum.org/docs/api for more info - and you can see it in action at http://discuss.flarum.org/api/discussions http://discuss.flarum.org/api/discussions.
    - TuringTest 11y ago
      Ok - I see how it solves the automation problem. But it means that humans and bots are accessing different web resources to get the same content - it abandons the original idea of the World Wide Web where a single content resource was expected to be used by humans and computers alike using a unified, simple syntax.
      - Gigablah 11y ago
        Are you talking about content negotiation? I don't think a "single content resource" really makes sense. When humans access a page, they aren't just looking at a single resource, they're looking at a blend of disparate resources (e.g. all the content in the navigation, sidebar, footer, peripheral sections, etc). Hence the need for a dedicated API that returns pristine data.
      - vruiz 11y ago
        > it abandons the original idea of the World Wide Web where a single content resource was expected to be used by humans and computers alike using a unified, simple syntax. I believe we are long past that idea, it's just too much of a restriction for the web in order to compete for audience with other technologies (meaning apps).
  - reitoei 11y ago
    > This means that the software will only be usable from interactive sessions on "standard" mainstream browsers a.k.a 99.99% of the target audience. I'm sure syndication tools could be easily built into it to provide static views to scrapers etc.
- Gmo 11y ago
  Sorry for the late response, I think this comment by babatong has the gist of what I don't like about Discourse : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10131932 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10131932 Everything is "fluid" and flat (as in hierarchy flat). I like the more traditional hierarchical type of forum. On top of that, with Discourse, you're never too sure if/when there is a new message and if you didn't miss anything.
jbrooksuk 11y ago
I setup Discourse for a couple of days and absolutely hated everything about it. - It actually ok to setup, following instructions. - The UI is awful. - Changing the sub domain didn't work until I executed some commands. - The admin panel was awful, just a mess. - The frontend didn't really guide the user through what they were doing.
- voltagex_ 11y ago
  Plus it takes 1+GB of RAM to run properly.
- tzumby 11y ago
  It just depends what framework/language you are familiar with. Discourse makes sense if you work with Rails (you'll have an easier time both deploying and customizing the UI). If you work with PHP then Flarum would be a better choice.
- sanderjd 11y ago
  I think a lot of the issues with deploying and managing Discourse are probably spot-on, but as a user rather than an administrator, it's by far my favorite forum UI of the many I've come across through the years. YMMV I suppose.

by Gmo 11y ago

tobyzerner 11y ago

Can I ask specifically what you don't like about the direction Discourse/Flarum are taking? I can't hope to compete with Discourse on features (yet!), but I think Flarum's elegance sets it apart. Out of the box, it's pretty, fast, easy to use, and works beautifully on mobile. And it's written in PHP, so is super easy to install – any low-end shared host will do.

TuringTest 11y ago
I like the fact that Flarum has an html-only version for browsers with disabled javascript, but it seems to be an alternate implementation, not the same content with less interactivity as it would be expected - it shows much less information and doesn't seem to have feature parity with the interactive version. This means that the software will only be usable from interactive sessions on "standard" mainstream browsers, and won't be easy to integrate with batch-processing tools (like web scrappers or data warehousing) or non-standard environments (anything enabled for the semantic web or developers creating handcrafted personal scripts to enhance their workflows). Classic "static" forums don't suffer from such limitations, being based on simple html and having predictable navigation structures.
- tobyzerner 11y ago
  On the other hand, Flarum has a fully-functional JSON API which can fulfill some of those use cases. See http://flarum.org/docs/api http://flarum.org/docs/api for more info - and you can see it in action at http://discuss.flarum.org/api/discussions http://discuss.flarum.org/api/discussions.
  - TuringTest 11y ago
    Ok - I see how it solves the automation problem. But it means that humans and bots are accessing different web resources to get the same content - it abandons the original idea of the World Wide Web where a single content resource was expected to be used by humans and computers alike using a unified, simple syntax.
    - Gigablah 11y ago
      Are you talking about content negotiation? I don't think a "single content resource" really makes sense. When humans access a page, they aren't just looking at a single resource, they're looking at a blend of disparate resources (e.g. all the content in the navigation, sidebar, footer, peripheral sections, etc). Hence the need for a dedicated API that returns pristine data.
    - vruiz 11y ago
      > it abandons the original idea of the World Wide Web where a single content resource was expected to be used by humans and computers alike using a unified, simple syntax. I believe we are long past that idea, it's just too much of a restriction for the web in order to compete for audience with other technologies (meaning apps).
- reitoei 11y ago
  > This means that the software will only be usable from interactive sessions on "standard" mainstream browsers a.k.a 99.99% of the target audience. I'm sure syndication tools could be easily built into it to provide static views to scrapers etc.
Gmo 11y ago
Sorry for the late response, I think this comment by babatong has the gist of what I don't like about Discourse : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10131932 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10131932 Everything is "fluid" and flat (as in hierarchy flat). I like the more traditional hierarchical type of forum. On top of that, with Discourse, you're never too sure if/when there is a new message and if you didn't miss anything.

jbrooksuk 11y ago

I setup Discourse for a couple of days and absolutely hated everything about it. - It actually ok to setup, following instructions. - The UI is awful. - Changing the sub domain didn't work until I executed some commands. - The admin panel was awful, just a mess. - The frontend didn't really guide the user through what they were doing.

voltagex_ 11y ago
Plus it takes 1+GB of RAM to run properly.
tzumby 11y ago
It just depends what framework/language you are familiar with. Discourse makes sense if you work with Rails (you'll have an easier time both deploying and customizing the UI). If you work with PHP then Flarum would be a better choice.
sanderjd 11y ago
I think a lot of the issues with deploying and managing Discourse are probably spot-on, but as a user rather than an administrator, it's by far my favorite forum UI of the many I've come across through the years. YMMV I suppose.