Techy Questions (forums, database, etc) - prob'ly beyond my means...

[BlueCross]

So I'm kinda getting involved in developing a Website for a WoW guild (which is not a problem).  However, the 'Master' (nice Master) wants to have a forum as well (currently using freeforums, which seems incredibly messy).

Anyway... is there a way to link the website to the forum data, such as member list, member properties, etc. and import that data to the web page?

[Solwyn]

Yes, it's totally possible, but it depends on the forum type.

With most php forums, you can perform a query of the same database that the forum is on.

I'd have to see the way the forum is installed in order to throw you any code. Some forums are uber secure, and encrypt a lot of data to keep people from hacking them, so external scripts might not work well.

[Chucara]

Yes, it is very possible; most larger and newer forums have plugins or entire content management systems that allow exactly this. For one, I know SMF (which we are using) has a module to allow this.

If you need any help, you can just drop me a mail, and I'll help. I was thinking about expanding the capabilities of the forum/website anyway. With someone on my neck, I might actually get around to it

[BlueCross]

Gee, my HTML cup runneth over.

Do either of you guys know anything about 'freeforums.com'?  That's the one we're using, and it seems Very Sucky.

Also, where does one find examples of code to imbed in my web pages where I actually grabs da data?  Not having done that, I don't even know where to begin.

[Solwyn]

I've never heard of it, but it looks like it's one of those proprietary systems where they just give you access to the forum and you don't get any of the source code to mess with. It's like piggy-backing on a commercial forum but without the added traffic or maintenance people.

In any case, I recommend using something like phpBB or simplemachines. You need to have access to a mysql database for either one, but they're pretty easy to set up.

If you want to have access to the forums, you'll need to make sure you're writing in php (file extention.php), and you'll include bits of code that the server parses before sending it to the browser, encapsulated in tag like this...

Code: [Select]

<?php 
  // insert code here
?>
I couldn't tell you what kind of code you'd need in there, especially since I don't know what kind of server you're on. But that's the basis.
Like Chucara said just let us know and we can do the specific stuff as needed.

[Chucara]

I've never heard of freeforums before, so I can't tell you how good it is. I do know that it isn't one of the "bigger" forums, and therefore the amount of support is smaller.

If you don't need to allow people to log in to the main site, you could just query the database running the forum (for the member list) without too much hassle.

As for actual code, that realy depends on what you're looking for.

If you're building it on SMF, the SMF site has examples written in PHP. If you're looking to do it from scratch, PHP is very commonly used and there are examples everywhere. (PHP.net is the official site with one of the best documentations available for any language).

I don't know if you want an ad-based solution, or if you want to host it yourself. The latter gives you all the freedom you need, but costs money. This board is hosted at hostzero.com, which costs $20 in setup, after which you only need to pay for the domain. ($10 a year, depending on the domain you (.com, .net etc.)