phpBB Weekly

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download MP3 Episode (82.9 MB)

Episode Duration: 1:12:25
On This Episode: David Lewis (Highway of Life), Francis Lewis (Handyman), and Michael Williams (mtotheikle)

Sponsor: Online meetings made easy. Try GotoMeeting FREE for 30 days! www.gotomeeting.com/techpodcasts/

NOTE: These show notes do not contain as many links as we would like them to due to the phpBB.com outage. We will add more links where appropriate once phpBB.com is back.

Douglas was at a conference in San Francisco during this episode, and you know what that means: David brings on guest team members to help him out. He was joined on this episode by Paul of the MOD Team, Francis Lewis (Handyman) of the MOD Team and StarTrekGuide, and Michael Williams (mtotheikle), Development Leader of StarTrekGuide. And the topic of discussion? Our well-known favorite topic of discussion–MODs.

First off, MODX 1.2.2 and AutoMOD 1.0.0 beta2 have been simultaneously released. MODX 1.2.2 mainly contains a number of XSL fixes and tweaks, and AutoMOD 1.0.0 beta2 includes a few new features and a number of bugfixes. The four of them also discuss some of their favorite MODs, take a look at some of the biggest MODs for phpBB3 and phpBB2, and chat about how MODding has evolved from phpBB2 to phpBB3.

February 1st marked the last day that the Development Team would release security patches for phpBB2, thus ending any and all support for phpBB2. It also marked the last day that any phpBB2 submissions would be accepted into the MODs Database. We talk about the ending of security patches as well as discuss how long it would take for very large boards to upgrade from phpBB2 to phpBB3. Finally, they also discuss the recent blog post on phpBB.com discussing why team members don’t give private support to users.

Last week’s poll question, “If you could add one more feature to the new WhiteHouse.gov website, what would it be?”, is still open and will run through Saturday, February 7. So go vote!
The MOD of the Week is Mods Database by lefty74, and the Style of the Week is Hermes by CyberAlien.

Be sure to join us next week when we will have a special edition phpBB Weekly episode with featured discussion of the ongoing phpBB.com outage, joined by members of the phpBB teams who have been busy this week rebuilding the site.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download MP3 Episode (42.6 MB)

Episode Duration: 1:14:52
On This Episode: Douglas Bell (Fountain of Apples) and David Lewis (Highway of Life)

This weekend, we mark phpBB Weekly’s second anniversary (that right, can you believe we’ve been doing this for two years now?) and the beginning of the year 2009. But that also brings with it some other news, which may or may not be disappointing depending on your point of view: phpBB2 has been officially retired and support for phpBB2 has ended. We take a look at the end of support announcement and look down the road and discuss how phpBB2 will be further phased out over the next few weeks and months. And Douglas is once again very disappointed about the news, while David tries to tell him to get over it.

However, if you didn’t already notice, we launched a new website for ourselves, and so we spend a bit of the beginning of the episode reviewing what has changed on our website and on our podcast, as well as providing a glimpse of some further changes that may be coming down the road.

The MOD Team continues to make waves with the announcement that the MPV (MOD pre-validator) source code has been released in the MODX Tools repository of the phpBB Code Forge, plus it can now run on any site without the need to have phpBB installed. We discuss the reasons for releasing the MPV source and David also attempts to describe some of the other tools under development in the MODX Tools repository. He couldn’t remember all of them, however, so we’ll probably make some corrections next week.

Finally, there will be a phpBB Meeting in Scotland, UK on Saturday, January 24th. We discuss a bit of the activities that will be happening there; we’re not sure yet if we’ll be doing anything special in connection with the meetup on the 24th or not, so stay tuned. Plus, Douglas has decided to do something about his own pipe dreams and has posted a topic looking for interest in a San Francisco phpBB conference/meetup this summer, and David and Douglas discuss some of the logistics of that, if it happens. Plus, Ashley Pinner (NeoThermic) also shares some perspective on both of these via the chat room.

The MOD of the Week is Prime Birthdate Require by primehalo, and the Style of the Week is Revolution by Semi_Deus. Also, our first-ever phpBB Weekly poll question for this week is “What do you think of the new phpBB Weekly website?” Vote in the poll on the right sidebar on our website, and we’ll evaluate the responses to the poll on our next episode.

2009 is here, and we’re ready for another great year of phpBB Weekly! Thanks for listening, as always.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download MP3 Episode (43.7 MB)

Episode Duration: 1:16:17
On This Episode: Douglas Bell (Fountain of Apples), David Lewis (Highway of Life), and Dave Rathbun (drathbun)

Sponsor: Online meetings made easy. Try GotoMeeting FREE for 30 days! www.gotomeeting.com/techpodcasts/

With the official retirement of phpBB2 fast-approaching, what is someone still using the legacy version of phpBB to do? Where are they supposed to go? Well, on this episode, phpBB.com Moderator Team member Dave Rathbun joins us to tell us about a new site he is launching to provide a home for these wandering souls: phpBB2Refugees, which launches on December 9th (that’s today!). During the episode, Dave tells us about phpBB2Refugees, including what the site’s goals are, how long he intends to run it, as well as a bit of info on some of the things he did to put it together. (If you look closely, it won’t take long to notice that their installation of phpBB2 has quite a number of MODs present.) We highly recommend that you check out their site and recommend it to any phpBB2-using friends that you are aware of.

We also chat a bit with Dave about the Moderator Team, and about his infamous phpBB Doctor Blog, which has a lot of really interesting content that you’ll want to take a look at.

And in honor of today’s topic, we switched ranks this week and chose a phpBB2 MOD and Style this week. The MOD of the Week is Approval MOD by uncle.f, and the Style of the Week is Christmas by CyberAlien. We’d also like to hear your MOD and Style Recommendations for us to possibly feature in future episodes!

phpBB Weekly is a proud member of the Tech Podcast Network. Check them out for other great technology podcasts.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download MP3 Episode (39.1 MB)

Episode Duration: 1:08:22
On This Episode: Douglas Bell (Fountain of Apples) and David Lewis (Highway of Life)

Sponsor: Online meetings made easy. Try GotoMeeting FREE for 30 days! www.gotomeeting.com/techpodcasts/

We had a slightly harder time preparing for this week’s episode–when you’ve gotten so used to the idea that the phpBB.com teams will have a new news story every single week and then suddenly, there’s nothing new to talk about… let’s say it caught us by surprise. However, we did manage to improvise a pretty good show.

As of the day we recorded this episode, there were only 40 days left until the formal retirement of phpBB2. We take another look at the rapidly-approaching date as well as review the different teams’ timetables for adjusting to the retirement, and Douglas shares that in honor of the retirement, he will be launching a completely brand new phpBBWeekly.net website on January 1st with a new phpBB3-branded album artwork and some new features.

Then, David leads a tutorial about Custom Profile Fields in phpBB3. He covers how they work, how to set them up, as well as how to integrate them into your site and your style in a number of different ways, as well as sharing a number of examples on how he’s used them on StarTrekGuide.

Additional links mentioned in this episode:
Custom Profile Fields Flash Tutorial
Wiki Article on Integrating Custom Profile Fields within your styles

The MOD of the Week is Add Disclaimer by david63 and the Style of the Week is Chrimbo by ModphpBB3.

And, because we couldn’t resist a little pre-Thanksgiving fun, the closing music is from the U Can’t Stuff This eCard. Hope you have a great Turkey Day on Thursday!

phpBB Weekly is a proud member of the Tech Podcast Network. Check them out for other great technology podcasts.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download MP3 Episode (55.8 MB)

Episode Duration: 1:37:28
On This Episode: Douglas Bell (Fountain of Apples), David Lewis (Highway of Life), and Patrick O’Keefe

Sponsor: Try GotoMeeting free for 30 days! For this special offer, visit www.gotomeeting.com/techpodcasts/.

This episode of phpBB was a fun one for Douglas because he had the opportunity to go back and talk about phpBB2 again! And he owes it all to, of all people, the MOD team, thanks to their release of EasyMOD 0.4.0 for phpBB2.

But first, Patrick O’Keefe of phpBBHacks.com joins us once again to tell us all about phpBBHacks.com Idol, a contest that’s partially about MODs and Styles and much more about popularity, along with the chance to win nearly $1000 worth in prizes and books (plus we’re throwing in the chance to be featured on a future episode of phpBB Weekly!). The deadline to submit your phpBB3 MOD/hack or style is Saturday, July 12, after which, voting will begin! We’ll be keeping a close eye on this contest as it progresses.

Then of course, Douglas talks all about EasyMOD 0.4.0, including recapping a bit on EasyMOD’s long history, discussing what’s new in 0.4.0 (mostly MODX support), and reviewing the release based on some testing that he did. David also gives us a bit more insight on the upcoming MOD Package Manager (Blinky) that’s still in development.

And speaking of the MOD team and phpBB2, per the phpBB2 Retirement Plan, the MOD team set the MOD Requests and MOD Writers Discussion forums for phpBB2 to read only on July 1, as well as disabling new topics in the MODs in Development forum for phpBB2, which we talk briefly about. Dave Rathbun (drathbun) also joins us to talk about these various phpBB2 topics.

And, last but not least, people have been receiving their 3.0 Berties at last, and the crazy pictures are here.

For what might possibly be our last phpBB2 MOD and Style of the Week (though please leave a comment if you’d like the phpBB2 MOD and Style coverage to continue), the MOD of the Week is Visual Confirmation on New Posters by Thoul, and the Style of the Week is subMerged by redhair.

phpBB Weekly is a proud member of the Tech Podcast Network. Check them out for other great technology podcasts.