I have got to give vBulletin it's due... it does one thing perfectly...

[Azhria Lilu]

Originally Posted by Kier

The vBulletin 3 style system was really good at producing the kind of output that was required back when I wrote that system, but it's a bit cumbersome now when you want a lot more control over CSS. Still, I'm glad my work has stood the test of time and that people still find it useable and friendly so many years after I first put it together

It might be cumbersome now, but the ease of styling the 3 series is miles ahead of the 4. (We miss you, Kier )I'm with Peggy on having given up on designing vB4 any time soon - it's just a chaotic messy jumble.

[Peggy]

Originally Posted by Azhria Lilu

..... the ease of styling the 3 series is miles ahead of the 4. (We miss you, Kier )

You ain't just whistlin' dixie girlfriend!

[Ryan Ashbrook]

Originally Posted by Azhria Lilu

It might be cumbersome now, but the ease of styling the 3 series is miles ahead of the 4. (We miss you, Kier )I'm with Peggy on having given up on designing vB4 any time soon - it's just a chaotic messy jumble.

That's why I'm glad I actually know a decent amount of CSS, no need for any kind of system so long as I can directly edit the CSS itself.

Not gonna lie, though, vB3's Main CSS system was top notch.

[Lynne]

Originally Posted by Ryan Ashbrook

That's why I'm glad I actually know a decent amount of CSS, no need for any kind of system so long as I can directly edit the CSS itself.

Not gonna lie, though, vB3's Main CSS system was top notch.

I have to say that vB3's styling was really, really easy to use. However, if you understand CSS, then the vB4 styling is pretty powerful. I love playing with it. I do think the admin cp page for it could be a lot better done since it can be a PITA at times to find things between the stylevars and the css templates, but once you have a system to find it all, it's quite easy to use.

[Kier]

The vB4 styling system in essence follows my design, but unfortunately, various factors meant that what was finally shipped fell a long way short of what I had originally intended. It's missing huge portions of the styling UI that would have made it properly useable...

[Mark.B]

Originally Posted by Kier

The vB4 styling system in essence follows my design, but unfortunately, various factors meant that what was finally shipped fell a long way short of what I had originally intended. It's missing huge portions of the styling UI that would have made it properly useable...

Kier it remains an absolute tragedy that you had to leave. Setting aside any of the politics behind it all, it now becomes abundantly clear how much of the success of vBulletin was down to you and the way you developed the software.

It's also now clear that your successors cannot match that. I did give them a chance, I don't want to blame the actual coders because I think they are constrained by poor management.

In the long term I believe vBulletin is now finished. IPB has siezed the initiative and will become the market leaders in the fullness of time.

Of course....unless anyone has any....other ideas....ahem...

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Mark.B

It's also now clear that your successors cannot match that. I did give them a chance, I don't want to blame the actual coders because I think they are constrained by poor management.

In the long term I believe vBulletin is now finished. IPB has siezed the initiative and will become the market leaders in the fullness of time.

Of course....unless anyone has any....other ideas....ahem...

Mark, you took my exact thoughts and put them into words better than I ever could have. Regardless of who may be in the lead now, IP.Board is progressing quickly and in a rather astonishingly positive manner, while vBulletin lags behind and seems to be going backwards at times. In the long run, IP.Board will take the lead, and I fear for vBulletin that they've lost it forever. Not that I care for them (since they got themselves into this mess), but it's just the surprising fact of the matter.

It seems that we are currently in the period of crossing over, where vBulletin loses its customers while IP.Board gains them; the weight of the ship is shifting to the other side, and it's certainly rocking the boat!

In a short matter of time, people who come to the forum-creation/management scene for the first time will be looking at IP.Board as their first choice, with vBulletin being a second-resort option, which is the total opposite of how things were in the recent past.

[Gordie]

Originally Posted by Nick

Mark, you took my exact thoughts and put them into words better than I ever could have. Regardless of who may be in the lead now, IP.Board is progressing quickly and in a rather astonishingly positive manner, while vBulletin lags behind and seems to be going backwards at times. In the long run, IP.Board will take the lead, and I fear for vBulletin that they've lost it forever. Not that I care for them (since they got themselves into this mess), but it's just the surprising fact of the matter.

It seems that we are currently in the period of crossing over, where vBulletin loses its customers while IP.Board gains them; the weight of the ship is shifting to the other side, and it's certainly rocking the boat!

In a short matter of time, people who come to the forum-creation/management scene for the first time will be looking at IP.Board as their first choice, with vBulletin being a second-resort option, which is the total opposite of how things were in the recent past.

I agree Nick.

I was an original UBB customer. I've owned UBB.Threads, UBB Eve and now vBulletin. I held on with UBB for a long time as I always thought they were going to release "the next big thing" and it never came. But they were always promising it was coming and probably still are!

This time with vBulletin, it feels exactly the same. UBB acted very much like vB is now. The same censorship, the same supression of info, developers leaving etc. etc. At that time you could slowly see vBulletin improving and improving little by little and one by one, admins slowly started changing platforms

When I left UBB, it was my site's database that was used by Jerry to develop the importer for UBB Eve into vB3.

Now that Rick Baker has regained ownership of UBB.Threads (from Ted O'Neill and Infopop/Groupee/Social Strata or whatever the heck their name is this month) I would think good things are no-doubt coming with Threads. I still actually own an expired .Threads license. But I digress!

vB feels like it's very much going down the very same road that UBB did. And this time 'round, I don't plan to stick around to read the writing on the wall.

[3Phase]

Originally Posted by cheat-master30

So, would pretty much everyone agree vB 3's system is the best?

I would be really surprised if everyone agreed on anything.


I have no remarks on the past or might-have-beens. I am very impressed with the vb4 Stylevars and the opportunities it offers and the upgrade to vb3 (which was nice) ... without having had time to really explore and use it. For those not immersed on old-vB politics I doubt vB is finished, far from it. Perhaps a newer customer base will have a different appreciation of what it offers. Further improvements over time will not be seen as catching up, but as, well, improvements.

I would love to see links to a number of sites with a lot of customization using only admincp, not separate css files. And, are they using vb3 or vb4? Anything with a separate css file, not done through the admincp, doesn't count.

[Webmist]

I'm going to try to be opened minded and see where vB is headed. Sometimes the light finally blinds people to do the best thing for their customer base.

Don't get me wrong. I don't mind if the time comes spending some long weekends to convert to another platform. And I certainly will be one of the first to hop over.

Now that I've gotten over the shock of the change to vB4 I'll base any decision I make on response, customer service, and if they address the known bugs over the 4 series.... Unless someone comes out with something better....*keeping an eye on Kier's page** I maybe going over to IPB when the 3 series is no longer supported. I've already converted one due to hefty renew fee. I was one that let it expire.

I've been styling vb4 and must admin I prefer the css tableless way better. It would have been nice to see some things different. Especially with the stylevariables. Not to mention the merge system definately has some issues to work out. But I finally did get it styles and it looks like IPB.

As someone that doesn't care and won't get into the politics over at IB I could care less. I do care on paying for something that works and provides appropiate bug fixes, customer support, and cares about their own products. And that's where my business will go. That's what I pay out money for otherwise I could probably go with any open source product. But for my piece of mind that's what I want and what I expect.

[mrgtb]

MyBB has a pretty good styling system, which many will not be aware off because they don't look at it. You can edit all the CSS directly from within the Admin CP, add new CSS as well. PLus they have everything arranged to make the CSS changes much more user friendly.

As far as vBulletin 4 goes. You should look at it like this, it can't get worse - only better as time moves on.

[Peggy]

I like MyBB.

[Rocket 442]

For myself, I prefer IPB's styling system.

This may be because I'm a designer and can work well within css files, but its organized much more, and their in-browser editor is great for what you need it for. I'd still much rather upload files to the server and use dreamweaver or another syntax editor to work with them, but as far as the in-browser experience it seems the most powerful for me.

I don't need to worry about some main css pieces being in a separate admin area than others, just much more organized to me.

I can see where vB is nice for people who just want to change simple things, but aren't versed in CSS.

[Adam Green]

Do never forget where IB makes its money from: From vbulletin forums. It's their core income.

The vbulletin customers (we admins) are a total minority in the advertisement money they get from their forums. That's why they need to have a stable platform that can easily be upgraded, skinned and maintained. Never forget that! This is far more important for IB than "being better" than other forum software. Although some things like the forumhome sidebar seems to be copied from IPB which I do not understand. What IB needs is a stable software that can be maintained easily and can run without any more products they have to rely on. Hence the seo and cms integration.

• SEO is obvious as you do not want to rely three figure million dollar worth of forums on a third party script where you own the core software to run it anyway.
• The cms is obvious as you can not market forum software to most ad agencies, you can not even place your website on wikipedia as its "just a forum".

IB people are not stupid and I do believe they do not care that much about their "vbulletin admin" customer base - but they care much more in creating a better software product than jelsoft before!

[Peggy]

Originally Posted by Adam Green

Do never forget where IB makes its money from: From vbulletin forums. It's their core income.

I highly doubt that vBulletin is IB's core income.

and I do believe they do not care that much about their "vbulletin admin" customer base - but they care much more in creating a better software product than jelsoft before!

I also do not believe that they care more about vBulletin than the jelsoft people before them.