How to Build ReCom?

[youngyew]

Firstly, I would like to say that ReCom is one of the best forums i have ever been to. Marvellous jobs, ReCom Anchors! I salute the effort and commitment you all devoted for this platform of communicaton.

Now I am interested to set up a forum for my course in my previous school. It was australian matriculation in international education centre, UITm, shah alam. We currently have a yahoo group, but as you all know, yahoo group sucks. Horrendous threads categorization (in fact no categories at all), bad interface, yada yada yada... Anyone who has tried yahoo before should know what i am saying. Circles99, msn groups etc we have tried, but don't seem effective for me. We even tried blog, it allowed more creativity, but again, no forum function.

So here are a few questions for the people behind ReCom or any other people who have experience in this:

1. How do you guys buy the domain name of recom.org? How much does it cost per year?
2. What is the MySQL, PHPNuke about? Keep appearing on this site, but forgive me for having null knowledge in these.
3. How to set up forums?
4. Do you have to be proficient in any of the programming languages to set up one of these forums?

I will be grateful for any feedback. FYI, I have little experience in programming and I learnt HTML codes (I know it's kinda outdated now) with some basic of CSS. Java script? Learning. PERL? No. :wink: Interest to learn new computer languages? Abound. 8)

[masterof_none]

How to build ReCom? Hm, interesting question.

The easiest thing is , you don't need to reinvent the wheel. We already did it. Just invite your friends here and you can also help us running ReCom :D . You'll gradually learn from us how to run it (all the stuff behind , finding good host, troubleshooting , etc).

But, if you want to build it yourself, prepare for the thrilling journey ahead. !

Firstly, I would like to say that ReCom is one of the best forums i have ever been to. Marvellous jobs, ReCom Anchors! I salute the effort and commitment you all devoted for this platform of communicaton.
Thanks Youngyew.


We currently have a yahoo group, but as you all know, yahoo group sucks.


the only thing that yahoogroups good are that it workds and it's free. I agree with you that its interface sucs.


1. How do you guys buy the domain name of recom.org? How much does it cost per year?


We registered with Godaddy.com http://www.godaddy.com. Just check out the price there. It's pretty cheap. But you can use other places.


2. What is the MySQL, PHPNuke about? Keep appearing on this site, but forgive me for having null knowledge in these.

MySQL is one of the databases out there. You could also use commercial database like PostgreSQL, or Oracle. But you don't want Oracle, because it's expensive. That's why people like us use MySQL, it's free and it's well-supported.
PHPNuke is one of the content management system. There are others such as Mambo (used by internshipasia http://www.internshipasia.com) .
check this for more lists of other CMS that might interest you.
http://www.opensourcecms.com/


3. How to set up forums?

usually, forum comes with CMS. but if you want to install standalone forums without CMS, you can do that too. (if you just want forums).
start with Google, but phpBB is one of the most popular forums around.


4. Do you have to be proficient in any of the programming languages to set up one of these forums?

No, you don't need to. But it's going to help a lot if you know PHP or other languages that the forums used (some use Python, etc). but PHP is the most widely used for open source webbing.


I will be grateful for any feedback. FYI, I have little experience in programming and I learnt HTML codes (I know it's kinda outdated now) with some basic of CSS.

HTML is not outdated. It's a must. So, after HTML, then only you can learn more.


Java script? Learning. PERL? No. :wink: Interest to learn new computer languages? Abound. 8)
[/quote]
start with C or PHP. They have quite the same syntax. No need Perl if you don't do scripting. (unless you like Perl). But PHP can do a lot of wonder Perl can do. Hope that help.

[qedx]

if you want to run just a standalone forum, using phpBB (uses php, duh) or YaBB (in perl i think) the easiest way I think.

http://www.yabbforum.com/
http://www.phpbb.com/

[youngyew]

Thank you so much masterof_none and qedx!! I never expected such a detailed instructions to building a forumming site! You all are wonderfully helpful, man! No wonder people once said this (ReCom) is where all the best of Malaysian are... 8)

Having said that, surely I am not one of them, because I still have some problems here.

1. It still costs some amount of money, albeit being cheap in some hosting sites, isn't it? Can we host the forum (or is it called community or something else? sorry if the word usage is wrong) in free sites like geocities, etc? What if the University provides free web hosting spaces for us?

2. I notice that it all comes under a package, like the e-mail, themes etc. Is the php thingy very customizable?

3. What does MySQL have to do with forum sites like ReCom? You mean forum is a kind of database? Is it like, every entry and every message is stored in the database, then the forum system kind of render the HTML page at the instance from the database?

4. A all in all question: I am a student, with meagre financial support and a lot of enthusiasm (and intermediate experience) in forumming and computer languages. So is it possible, if at all, for me to set up a standalone forum site like ReCom?

Cheers! Thanks again!!

[masterof_none]

1. It still costs some amount of money, albeit being cheap in some hosting sites, isn't it? Can we host the forum (or is it called community or something else? sorry if the word usage is wrong) in free sites like geocities, etc? What if the University provides free web hosting spaces for us?

Free hosting usually allows you to build your personal webpage and that's it. There's nothing more to it. If you want more than website (access to database, some emails and such), U usually have to pay for it, like this GeoCities PRO.

http://order.sbs.yahoo.com/ds/ChoosePackageOptions?.p=G1&d=&ext=&.src=geo


2. I notice that it all comes under a package, like the e-mail, themes etc. Is the php thingy very customizable?


I'm not sure what do you mean by 'it' here. You mean the webhosting or CMS?. Also, not sure what you mean by 'php thingy'. PHP is just a scripting language. PHPNuke is a CMS. And PHPNuke does not come with emails. Usually email accounts is provided by your webhosting.


3. What does MySQL have to do with forum sites like ReCom? You mean forum is a kind of database? Is it like, every entry and every message is stored in the database, then the forum system kind of render the HTML page at the instance from the database?


If you've done programming, most likely you've done an assignment like read input, store in a file, and read the file back. Database is just like that, to store the data. (that's why the 'data' is in the word). You could also store it in a file (they call it 'flat file'), but you usually want a uniform way of reading a file, so database is kind of like a flat file that could be organized according to categories (Google 'what is database' for details).



4. A all in all question: I am a student, with meagre financial support and a lot of enthusiasm (and intermediate experience) in forumming and computer languages. So is it possible, if at all, for me to set up a standalone forum site like ReCom?


Actually, you're just like the rest of us. Why don't you PM me (or any other Anchors) and we can discuss more about what project are you working on. We have some surplus space available and we can help you throughout the process.

[Maximus05]

Just out of curiousity and maybe a little misunderstandings... can we create our own forum.. i mean without using the provided hosting or sth like that.. i don't understand long explanations... as my English is pretty bad...

and if we could what should we suppose to know first before creating such forum.. PHP? Java? or HTML?

[Psycho]

if to setup a forum is the idea here, I'd like to recommend http://www.forumer.com/ . They do everything for you there. Either you can choose Invision Power Board or phpBB, plus skins can also be modified. I've tried it myself for my school's ex-students hangout. It works just fine, n best of all, free.

[misled_youth]

Firstly, I would like to say that ReCom is one of the best forums i have ever been to. Marvellous jobs, ReCom Anchors! I salute the effort and commitment you all devoted for this platform of communicaton.

I agree that it is a job well done, but can be better. What they have in skill, they lack in humility, but then again, they are only human.

[maxx]

Firstly, I would like to say that ReCom is one of the best forums i have ever been to. Marvellous jobs, ReCom Anchors! I salute the effort and commitment you all devoted for this platform of communicaton.

I agree that it is a job well done, but can be better. What they have in skill, they lack in humility, but then again, they are only human.
lack in humility.. sounds interesting...