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Douglas missed this episode because his return flight from Long Beach the day before suffered a seven hour delay (read more if you’re interested), effectively turning it into a red eye flight, so he slept in during this episode. TalkShoe apparently wasn’t being cooperative, but in a fairly Official Podcast-esque episode of phpBB Weekly, he is joined via a Skype conference call by phpBB team members Paul and Techie-Micheal.

This episode, like about a third of our episodes to date, is all about MODs. David, Paul, and Micheal talk extensively about MOD Development, the MOD Database, and other things MOD authors may want to know. Finally, they talk a bit about the tribulations of giving support for boards with MODs on them, and what the Support Team can and cannot do to help you when a MODded board needs help.

The MOD of the Week is Prime Memberlist Filter for phpBB3 by primehalo, and the Style of the Week is Brushed Metal for phpBB3 by Robin Huurman.

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In this episode of phpBB Weekly, David and I are joined by guest host Micheal Cottingham (Techie-Micheal), the phpBB Support Team Leader. In what is so far our longest episode ever, David, Douglas, and Micheal talk about a number of different things, particularly relating to phpBB3, and also have a good time. MOD authors, server admins, and users concerned about security will really enjoy some of the more technical aspects of the conversation, while regular phpBB enthusiasts will also enjoy other parts of the episode.

David and MIcheal touch on a number of different things in phpBB3, including how phpbb_root_path is now handled as a defined constant instead of a variable, custom template paths, the new phpBB error handler, modularity, the naming of language files in modules, the hidden create_schema_files.php script and the DBMS, and the opening of the new MOD and Styles Databases. They also talk a bit about the various things in phpBB3 that make it more secure, including the “http only” cookie setting, request_var(), the removal of HTML support in posts (improved BBCode), serving avatars and attachments through download.php, SSL, XSS and SQL injection, and leaving vars unset along with the dangers of register_globals. In addition, Micheal asks an interesting question that stumps Douglas (although the jury’s still out on whether or not Douglas was actually stumped).

The MOD of the Week is Clickable forum and topic rows by tumba25, the very first phpBB3 MOD to be approved by the MOD team. The Style of the Week is Poolhall Junkies by Scott Stubblefield, also for phpBB3. Again, if you want to recommend a MOD or Style to us, bookmark it on del.icio.us with the tag “phpbbwmod” or “phpbbwstyle”.

Be sure to join us next week on August 11th for phpBB Weekly #027 where David will talk about phpBB3 modules in detail, for both administrators and MOD authors. Thanks again to Micheal for joining us. Also thanks to phpBB Weekly’s new sponsor, Audible.com. For your FREE audiobook, go to Audible.com/TalkShoe.