need some advice guys

[srm]

I have an internet radio website. I have been using phpbb but I like SMF much better.

What I want to do is install SMF fresh and new on my server but I want to use some sort of portal or CMS where i can maybe have a few blocks or something and maybe be able to have latest post appear on my front page.

I read about tinyportal but from what i read it is not liking the themes too much.

I want to use the musicona theme .

Does anyone got any suggestions? What CMS intgergrates with SMF real well and will allow me to universally apply the musicona theme site wide?

also i want to use a photo gallery like CM or something to intergrate into my site as well.

Any suggestions? I am looking for the easiest and least painless way to do this since it is very difficult for me to figure out a lot of technical things . Although I have used ezportal with phpbb before but that about broke my back trying to get that to work correctly.

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated . I am going to be doing the install of SMF today or tonight but first I want to hear from you guys before I go and do something without first knowing what I should do.

Thanks.

[Kindred]

joomla/mambo has a bridge for smf and also has additional components, like photo galleries, and even some ham/radio stuff...

[srm]

can i use the musicona theme with joomla/mambo? will the SMF theme I choose act upon the CMS theme too OR vice versa? I think I am liking this tiny portal the more i read about it. The musicona theme is perfect because it has a calender where i can post the radio schedule.  

[Kindred]

you'll probably have to play around with the themes a bit to get a joomla wrapped site working the way you want.  Joomla has it's own template system, so the SMF theme will not spread to joomla...

TinyPortal is a good system

[srm]

Ok cool I think Ill give tiny portal a shot.

So heres an important next step question. When my visitors go to my root domain exampl: www.MYDOMAIN.COM    I want there to be basically a portal with some blocks and maybe some recent forum post and what not All using the theme of my choice with tiny portal .Then I want visitors to have to either click a link or one of the recent post that i include on my main index page before they can actually go into the FORUMS .

So do  i need to install SMF in a subdirectory like for example ? mydomain.com/forum ? or should i install it in the root www direcory?

I want my main index page to be the portal page.

any help will be greatly appreciated.

I just now uploades SMF to my root www directory but have not installed it yet. I need to know the answer to my above question before i go any further?

[Kindred]

if you plan to use tiny portal, then yes, you should load smf in the root of your site.  Tiny portal installs as an overlay to the forum, which means that people will see the tinyportal frontpage and have to click a link for the forums within TP...

If you plan to use Joomla, then I suggest you install smf in a subdirectory and joomla in the root.