Newbie questions - is SMF the right choice for my application?

[DavidA]

Hi

I have often used bulletin boards/forums and now I want to build my own first forum.  I want it to serve the teachers of a small school. The teachers are in teams and I would like to provide a private forum for each team.  For example, we might have the following forums and participants:

Governers
    Visible to Headmaster, Parent_A

Infant teachers
    Visible to Headmaster, Teacher_A, Teacher_B

Primary teachers
    Visible to Headmaster, Teacher_C, Teacher_D

I will not need to customise the look - we don't need anything fancy. I will need email notifications (hopefully with choice of immediate notification / daily digest).

The most important requirement is that each forum should be visible only to chosen individuals.  Guest access should be disabled.

I am a software engineer but would like a short learning curve as I don't have much time to spend on this task.

Will SMF fulfill these requirements?

Is it easy to configure the security for what I require?

Should I use SMF 1.1, or a SMF 2.0 RC?

If you think that such a simple application as mine would be more suited to another BB software, please say so  .

We will run it on Centos 5.5.

I will be very grateful for any advice you can provide.

Best regards

David

[Spoogs]

SMF will do what you want just fine
I prefer the 2.0 branch simply because I never used 1.1x branch.

[SlammedDime]

You can create membergroups in SMF and assign membergroups access to specific boards, and then also add various users to 1 or more membergroups.  That should fulfill your biggest requirement.

As for notifications: SMF provides the ability to receive updates from a topic you have posted to (only one notification per topic regardless of how many updates, until you view the topic again), as well as to be notified of new topics to boards (same principal, one update per board until you read the board).

SMF also has the ability to disable guest browsing, showing a login screen to anyone who is not logged in, regardless of what they try and view.

I would also suggest using SMF 2.0.  I would not suggest, however, loading it up with modifications (if you even find yourself needing any), as once SMF 2.0 is 'Gold', an overwrite of all files will be required to upgrade, thus forcing you to reinstall any modifications.

[DavidA]

Thanks very much for your replies but ...

As for notifications: SMF provides the ability to receive updates from a topic you have posted to (only one notification per topic regardless of how many updates, until you view the topic again), as well as to be notified of new topics to boards (same principal, one update per board until you read the board).

I would like a notification for every post to every topic in a board, regardless of whether or not I started the topic. Is that not supported?

[SlammedDime]

I haven't tested the 'Notify' option that extensively, however I do not believe that is supported.  Image a board with 1000 members who all get updates to every post in every topic... now imagine a board that is semi active... you're looking at sending out thousands, if not tens of thousands of emails per hour.  There might be a modification for something similar, but it's not a standard feature of SMF.

It is possible to manually subscribe to a topic that you have not participated in, but this has to be done on a topic by topic basis by the person wanting to receive notifications. (and again, only one notification is sent out when there is new replies, until you view the topic, then at the next reply, you'll receive another notification)

[Spoogs]

I agree with SD there, a notification for every post is overkill IMO, there are time I come here and there has been 1000's of posts sine I last logged in, there is no way I want that many emails from any site about anything.

[DavidA]

I fully understand your point. Our boards would be very low volume but it would be important that everyone be informed when a new message is posted.

I guess that SMF is not the right tool for my application.  Google groups would probably do what we want, but I wanted to host the tool on our own server and provide a bulletin board feel.

I wonder if anyone could suggest an alternative tool?

[floridaflatlander]

Why don't you just visit several times during the day and click "Show unread posts since last visit".

I probably go to phpfreaks 8-20 times a day and click the link to unread post. It's a fast way to see what people have posted.

I'm assuming that your have other duties too, just get in the habit of going once an hour plus or minus, over time that would be about as often as you check your email.

[ARG01]

I agree with SD there, a notification for every post is overkill IMO, there are time I come here and there has been 1000's of posts sine I last logged in, there is no way I want that many emails from any site about anything.

I also agree. Not to mention the load it may have on the server. You service provider may also have restrictions that may be affected by receiving 1000's of emails per day or even per hour. 

[SlammedDime]

I don't think he has to worry about a Service Provider... if they have their own server to put this on, and judging by the first post, they have their own email server as well, or at least an internal mail server, that wouldn't be a problem either.  Using Postfix to relay all mail to the mail server wouldn't incur much load.  But this is not a standard setup of someone who uses SMF, so the feature wouldn't be there.

[ARG01]

Just saying. My service provider is Comcast and they recently added a monthly data transfer limit that includes emails. I use an smtp for my sites and each email sent or received does add to the limit. I guess it all depends on how ones email is set up but either way, notices for each and every post is not a good idea.