Why there is no social groups utillity developed by ips ?

[STEWIE]

Too bad that ipb is so good looking but missing some very important features..
how you make a good community without social groups?
If posibble i want a answer from an ips official.

And a second thing that i would like to say is that i think it is a very bad idea to show "you can not post" or "you can not start a new thread" buttons( when the user is not logedin), who come up whith this idea? wouldn`t be better if instead the buttons would say "login to cooment" or just..."post replay" and when the user click it redirect to login/register page ?
"you can not reply" .. bad idea... the user understands that.. it can not make anything on your forum..
My onest opinion is that ipb has a very frindly design and some very good features for developing a community, but also failed to understand some important addons, like social groups, guest can not vote at polls(even when the permission in the admin cp is on),in the blogs there is no side block with info about the autor(picture,comments etc, but al least picture, and in gallery you can not see all the pictures from an album whithout making yourself angry because there are no arrows above the picture, the arrows are somewhere at the bottom and you have to use the scrool to click on the arrow (left ,right) very annoing..
I hope that you undestand that i love some features at ipb, and i had choose ipb for my community but please take into cosideration what i had wrore above ( sorry for bad english)

ps: i have a valid ipb license , and i will also buy ip downloads, ip gallery, ip blog and ip content, so please take into cosideration, and reply
thx

[.Ian]

Hi,

As you are an active customer this might be better in the customer lounge or feedback forums.

As far as the wording goes, you can alter all this within the language file. Very simple :)

As far as social groups, it has been requested many times, but I guess IPS are concentrating on other things at the moment. In any even a mod is being written for it and is due out soon.

If you think there is a bug with voting by guests, then best option is to report it in the tracker so that it can be fixed for the next version.

Other feedback comment is best posted in the correct forum, as it will get lost in here.

Oh and welcome to IPS :)

[Alex K.]

I'll go ahead and move this to the feedback forum since it isn't really a pre-sales query.

In general, the reason we haven't included vB's 'social groups' as a feature is because we don't really see much of a need for them, at least in the way vB uses them. I've never seen a vB forum in which social groups were a significant part of the community, which makes me wonder about your claim that you can't form a good community without them; there are thousands of strong IPB-based communities and none of them use social groups.

Given the amount of demand for social groups, we are considering incorporating a similar feature in a future release, however no definite plans have been made as of yet. There's also a member who's creating a mod to accomplish this; this thread has more details.


As .Ian said, you can easily change the wording of that button in the language manager in the ACP. The main reason for using the current wording is because many communities restrict users' posting in certain forums (e.g. a site announcements forum), which would get confusing if a user was being told to log in to post in the forum, even if they were already logged in and there was no way for them to gain access to posting in that forum.

.Ian seems to have covered everything else. :)

[.Ian]

In general, the reason we haven't included vB's 'social groups' as a feature is because we don't really see much of a need for them, at least in the way vB uses them. I've never seen a vB forum in which social groups were a significant part of the community, which makes me wonder about your claim that you can't form a good community without them; there are thousands of strong IPB-based communities and none of them use social groups.

The reason that none of them use social groups is because it is not currently possible :P ;)

Given the amount of demand for social groups, we are considering incorporating a similar feature in a future release, however no definite plans have been made as of yet. There's also a member who's creating a mod to accomplish this; [url="http://community.invisionpower.com/topic/306451-pin-social-groups/"]this thread[/url] has more details.

Glad to hear that IPS might introduce a similar feature in the future as it is clear that each time it is raised it produces a lot of response, and would be popular IMHO.

[Tanax]

Given the amount of demand for social groups, we are considering incorporating a similar feature in a future release, however no definite plans have been made as of yet. There's also a member who's creating a mod to accomplish this; [url=http://community.invisionpower.com/topic/306451-pin-social-groups/]this thread[/url] has more details

If you decide to incorporate "social groups" - please do it differently than vB has made. Their way is just not.. right.

[.Ian]

IPS often take existing ideas and improve upon them :)

[STEWIE]

yes, i undestand whith the "you can not.. " button, and i will make the changes, but regarding the social groups problem.. all i can say is that maybe i see a better potential in this addon, i undestand that you think that social groups are not important, i think you are wrong but that is, you answer my question.Yes i know a user is making a mod for social groups, if you lokk at the page 2 i wrote that i will buy( having no option from ips) but my main concer with this third party mods is with updates, if, let`s say that i upgrade to ipb 3.5 or 4.8 in the future, how can i be sure that an individual(no real guarantee whatsoever) will make proper updates , and not make me loose money and time?

IPB is superios than vbulletin in many ways but be awere that this thing that you have less mods ans more important less options in the official product, is not making a good impresion on costumers.
I, myself want to start, a big forum, and i had read and compared vbuletin and ipb weeks and weeks, right now i decided to give a shot to ipb software(because i like the feeling of it) but options made directly by the company are also very important.
I can not understand how you do not find important social groups feature, look at forums.digitalpoint.com which runs vb, and you will see that social groups are important, at least i intend to use it at maximum.

Now let me say a simple feature, but in my opinion very important one, wich you have put it in users post: in the right side there are the + an - icons at every post , that feature is very important for a good community, and for quality discussions, i like that feature very much because if you are a dumb person and make stupid coments the community will punish you and your reputation will be .. and in this way quality is improoved.

You did`,t said anything about the gallery isshue, can you make this more friendly in order to see more pictures without use scroll?

thx for you responses

[STEWIE]

sorry for double post.
And i have a question, is it posibble to give acces to a moderator in admin cp on the forums zone but only on one forum? because all i found is give acces to forums area but this will meke him able to edit all the forums, wich some times is wrong and not secure.
To be more clear: i want to make asuper mderator but only on one forum(not category) and this moderator should be able to acces admin cp and make/edit/delete forums only in that specific one,
can i do that?

[3DKiwi]

I have run a pretty active board / forum for the last 6 years. I've never had a request for social groups. While I can see some benefits for some sites depending on who their target audience is, it's not something I have any need for. I would rather IPS focus on other things first e.g. improved search etc.

3DKiwi

[texterted]

I had them on my old vB forum... no one used them!

[.Ian]

I suppose it depends upon the aim of the forum - we have football (soccer) clubs so groups is a natural thing.

Of course I might be totally wrong if we can introduce them - but for us it is the ability for clubs to be part of a bigger picture, but also unique.

[Rikki]

This is only my personal view on social groups, not an official line that affects any roadmap or chance of them being added...

I really don't think they are useful in the context of a bulletin board. Bulletin boards generally are one community sharing an interest in a particular topic that brought them there. Compare this to facebook or MySpace, where there is no single subject - everyone joins, in order to find people they know. In a facebook context, social groups makes sense. I don't think it makes as much sense to fragment a community that has already been brought together by a single subject.

Just my opinion :)

[.Ian]

Bulletin boards are so 1990's ;) and are not 'communities' though and certainly not 100% of a site - a site should not rely upon any one component (otherwise why would IPS sell blogs, Content, gallery etc.) .

I suppose it is like a town saying we will not allow a different cultures to set up their own community within our town.

What I am trying to say (and probably failing ;) ) is that one needs to think outside of the box.

Every site is different and a good product like IPS should be able to cater for differing sites - who knows what will come after twitter and facebook - but IPS has to reflect upon what users want and not just what admins 'think' their uses want. Not an easy task.

[RLetc]

Anyone who's ever set up a sub-forum at the request of a member has a need for social groups. Social groups merely mean that they can get a sub-forum without the set-up. If there are modifications here that allow something similar then, in effect, you do have social groups. I presume it's possible to start a forum section called 'social groups' and manually add subforums on demand and set the requester up as mod of that forum - That's a social group right there. All it is is a matter of converting the manual steps into something more automatic.

I run a couple of vb boards, one big, one small - the bb has 20 active group forums handled by an excellent mod while the small board uses the stock vb groups features and has about 12 groups of which 5 are active.

[STEWIE]

@ Rikki , are you an ipb official? please tell me, if you are, it means i can throw away my ipb license, if this is the official response, and the official understand of a community here, i give up..
did you know what a community means?
did you know what the title of the invision power website is?
"Invision Power - Community Forum, Blog, Gallery, CMS, and more - We are community experts"..

Please, but please confirm or infirm that your opinion is an official one, if so i give away my ipb license ( free/no charge)

[Peter F.]

please someone answer my question:

is it posibble to give acces to a moderator in admin cp on the forums zone but only on one forum? because all i found is give acces to forums area but this will meke him able to edit all the forums, wich some times is wrong and not secure.

To be more clear: i want to make asuper mderator but only on one forum(not category) and this moderator should be able to acces admin cp and make/edit/delete forums only in that specific one,

can i do that?

No, it's not possible to limit admin access on a per forum basis.

[.Ian]

[color=#5D5D5D][font=tahoma, arial, verdana, sans-serif]please someone answer my question:

is it posibble to give acces to a moderator in admin cp on the forums zone but only on one forum? because all i found is give acces to forums area but this will meke him able to edit all the forums, wich some times is wrong and not secure.

To be more clear: i want to make asuper mderator but only on one forum(not category) and this moderator should be able to acces admin cp and make/edit/delete forums only in that specific one,

can i do that?[/font][/color]

Not really related to the topic in hand and is better in a new topic (going off at an angle never helps topics ;) )

However to answer your question, you can assign moderators to just one forum yes, but not Admin CP (as that would give many more permissions) - if you need help with this ask in the peer-to-peer forum.

[Rikki]

[size="4"]@ Rikki[/size] , are you an ipb official? please tell me, if you are, it means i can throw away my ipb license, if this is the official response, and the official understand of a community here, i give up..

did you know what a community means?

did you know what the title of the invision power website is?

"Invision Power - Community Forum, Blog, Gallery, CMS, and more - [size="7"]We are community experts[/size]"..

Please, but please confirm or infirm that your opinion is an official one, if so i give away my ipb license ( free/no charge)

I made it clear it was my personal opinion. And let's not get silly and try and claim that we can only use the term 'community' if we have social groups. Social groups are just one feature that might make up a community. We have dozens of other things too.

[RLetc]

[size="4"]@ Rikki[/size] , are you an ipb official? please tell me, if you are, it means i can throw away my ipb license, if this is the official response, and the official understand of a community here, i give up..

did you know what a community means?

did you know what the title of the invision power website is?

"Invision Power - Community Forum, Blog, Gallery, CMS, and more - [size="7"]We are community experts[/size]"..

Please, but please confirm or infirm that your opinion is an official one, if so i give away my ipb license ( free/no charge)

I'll have it please:D

[.Ian]

[size="4"]@ Rikki[/size] , are you an ipb official? please tell me, if you are, it means i can throw away my ipb license, if this is the official response, and the official understand of a community here, i give up..

did you know what a community means?

did you know what the title of the invision power website is?

"Invision Power - Community Forum, Blog, Gallery, CMS, and more - [size="7"]We are community experts[/size]"..

Please, but please confirm or infirm that your opinion is an official one, if so i give away my ipb license ( free/no charge)

Calm down ghyghty - your message has been altered at least 3 times - we are all here to help each other. Rikki was giving his own personal opinion (he made that clear), so please do not have a go at him - he doesn't deserve it (even if you think he was wrong).

If you wish to give your licence away, that is your choice (I will gladly receive ;) ) - but we need to work together not bash each other.

[loyals7]

Please, but please confirm or infirm that your opinion is an official one, if so i give away my ipb license ( free/no charge)

Give me your license i am waiting. thanks. (w00t)

@Rikki please confirm your response is an official one :devil:

[STEWIE]

if i will give you my ipb license, it will be usless, belive me ;)
i had bought that license hoping that ipb understood better how to make, grow and administrate a community.
ian is right, so i will ask only this, were, among the above answers any oficial response from the ips head developers?
if yes, wich one?

thx

[.Ian]

if i will give you my ipb license, it will be usless, belive me ;)

i had bought that license hoping that ipb understood better how to make, grow and administrate a community.

ian is right, so i will ask only this, were, among the above answers any oficial response from the ips head developers?

if yes, wich one?

thx

There is not an official response no, just personal ones & no your licence would not be useless ;)

IPS do not always post plans, but in another post today it was stated that IPS are looking into social groups. So it will may come but not in 3.1, maybe 3.2 - but your guess is as good as mine.

[loyals7]

if i will give you my ipb license, it will be usless, belive me ;)

i had bought that license hoping that ipb understood better how to make, grow and administrate a community.

ian is right, so i will ask only this, were, among the above answers any oficial response from the ips head developers?

if yes, wich one?

thx

Wait for Charles or Matt then. :whistle:

and don't worry i would make a good use of your IPB lic. you have no idea how some people love IPB here and i am one of them. :wub:

[Mark]

We tend to steer clear from official yes/nos to suggestions... this is why ;)

ghyghty, social groups may or may not get included in future. I personally like the idea (and is on my personal wish list) - but it's not something we've discussed officially.

As always, we announce development plans in the blog, any speculation or opinions posted elsewhere shouldn't be taken as gospel ;)