phpBB: A User Guide

Table of Contents

• Preface

 

• Chapter 1: Introduction to phpBB
  • Online Communities
  • Building the Community—The Tools
  • The Name
  • The Environment
  • Why phpBB?
  • History
  • Development
  • Example phpBB Sites
    • A Standard phpBB Layout
    • Standard Sites with Different Templates
    • Sites with Standard Style and Modified Features
    • GaiaOnline
  • Summary

 

• Chapter 2: Installing and Configuring phpBB
  • Pre-Installation
    • Requirements
    • The Attack Plan
    • Finishing Pre-Install Touch—The Database
    • phpBB Pre-Installation Checklist
  • Installation
    • Troubleshooting the Installation
      • Symptom
      • Symptom
      • Symptom
      • Symptom
      • Symptom
  • Post-Installation Tasks
  • Security Tips
  • Finding Help
  • Summary

 

• Chapter 3: User Experience: Visitors
  • Overview
  • Registration
    • Step 1
    • Step 2
    • Step 3

• Logging In
  • Editing Your Profile

• Posting
  • Anatomy of a Posting
  • Replying
  • Starting a New Topic
  • Formatting a Posting
  • Editing a Posting
  • Deleting a Posting

• Searching
• Sending and Receiving Private Messages (PM)
• Voting in Polls
• Staying Current with the Topics
• Viewing Information about Other Users
  • Memberlist
  • Usergroups
  • Who Is Online

 

• Chapter 4: User Experience: Moderators and Administrators
  • Moderator Experience
    • Managing Postings
      • Editing and Deleting
      • Editing the First Posting in a Topic
      • Viewing Poster's IP Address
    • Managing Topics
      • Deleting, Locking, and Unlocking Topics
      • Moving Topics
      • Splitting Topics
      • Doing It All Together—The Moderator Control Panel
  • Administrator Experience
    • Administration Panel Overview
    • Forum Admin
      • Forum Management
      • Who Can Do What—Setting Up Forum Permissions
      • Pruning
    • Systems Administration Using General Admin Options
      • Configuration
      • Database Backup and Restore
      • Mass Email
      • Smilies
      • Filtering Words Using Word Censors
    • Introduction to User Management
      • Editing User Profiles
      • Deleting Users
      • Permissions
      • Banning Users
      • Disallowing Users
  • Summary

 

• Chapter 5: Customizing Your Forum
  • phpBB Styles
  • Structure of a Style
    • Style Elements
    • Style Storage
  • Editing phpBB Files
  • Installing a New Style
    • Creating a Copy Style
    • Installing One Element at a Time
    • Troubleshooting
      • Style Does Not Appear in Administration
      • Configuration File Cannot Be Opened
    • Removing an Installed Style
  • Create or Customize
  • Customizing through the Stylesheet
    • Editing the Stylesheet in the Admin Panel
      • Editing Other Theme Components
      • Allowed Values
      • Commonly Used and Altered Elements
    • Changing CSS Styles to Change the Look of Your Site
      • Using External Stylesheets
  • Customizing through Images
    • Installing New Images to Change the Look of Your Site
  • Hacking phpBB
    • MODs and Hacks
    • phpBB Modification
    • Installing a Modification
      • Installing a Downloaded Modification
      • The Copy Action
      • The SQL Action and Editing the Database
      • The Open Action
      • The Find Action
      • The Addition Actions
      • The In-Line Actions
      • The Last Action
      • The Trouble with Templates
      • Uninstalling Modifications
    • Example Modifications
    • Moving Elements
    • Adding New Elements to Your Forum
      • Adding New Languages
  • Summary

 

• Chapter 6: Forum Administration
  • Making Your Board Multi-Lingual
  • Avatars: Enabling and Configuring
  • Managing Smilies
    • Smilies' Properties
    • Smilies Administration Panel
    • Editing or Deleting a Smilie
    • Adding New Smilies
    • Adding Smilies with a .pak File
    • Creating a .pak File
    • Assigning Ranks
  • Understanding Forum Permissions
    • Permission Types and Permission Levels
    • Simple and Advanced Mode of Setting Permissions

• Understanding User Permissions
• Usergroups and Group Permissions
  • Group Permissions

• Second Look into Database Backups and Restore
  • Using phpMyAdmin
  • Using MySQL Command-Line Tools

• The Board's Human Side: Flamewars and Banning

 

• Index