Sandbox Development and Consulting Inc. » bbPress

WalkIberia (WordPress CMS/bbPress)

jzelazny — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 16:20:00 +0000

url: http://walkiberia.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

Custom Web Design
Custom Graphic Design
XHTML/CSS programming
WordPress theme creation
Custom PHP programming
Custom jQuery programming
Custom bbPress Theme

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress, bbPress, PHP, jQuery

front end:

The client wanted something with a lot of different content areas on all views. This site has a lot of moving parts: slideshows, carousels, tabs, custom views for home, category views, bbPress theme, etc.

back end:

For ease of use, the forum and site login is single sign-on. There are a few custom admin panels for ad management as well as to specify what goes into the featured slideshows. There are also a number of custom functions that make all the moving parts dynamic so the client can easily feature, change, move around the content in all views.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

After this site was completed – I duplicated it to another domain (Portuguese): http://passear.com which was the first time I used the Portuguese build of WordPress. WordPress is still easy to use – even it not in your native language!

Pypeline (WordPress CMS & bbPress Forum)

jzelazny — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 21:00:08 +0000

url: http://www.guidewiregroup.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
WordPress theme creation
bbPress theme creation
Custom PHP programming
Custom jQuery programming

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress, bbPress, PHP, jQuery

front end:

The client wanted an easy to manage site with a forum – completely designed from the ground up. We provided them with a completely custom design for an integrated WordPress/bbPress site.

back end:

The main goal with this site was to make a single sign-on web site for the client and their users. We tied in bbPress, added some jQuery functionality (scroller, etc) – and used everything we could to make sure it was easily managed.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

I love working with bbPress and WordPress together and enjoy the simplicity of this site.

SDAC Inc Forums (bbPress)

jzelazny — Tue, 26 May 2009 17:15:51 +0000

url: http://www.sandboxdev.com/forums

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
phpBB to bbPress migration
bbPress theme
bbPress/WordPress integration

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, bbPress, phpBB, PHP, WordPress

front end:

I had created the WordPress theme for the main SDAC Inc. site last year and started with that. I then created a custom bbPress theme using customized template files and some additional CSS for the forum specific code. I focused on making the templates simple and as lightweight as possible so that everything would look tied into the main site.

back end:

The forums run on the latest version of bbPress and have user integration with the main WordPress CMS web site so users can log into the forums or web site using one user name and password. I installed a number of anti-spam plugins to reduce the number of spam registrations and posts.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

I needed a place for people to discuss the released SDAC plugins and soon to be themes so I decided to implement bbPress. This was a great way to show clients that integrating WordPress and bbPress can easily be done on the backend with user management as well as on the front end with shared CSS/XHTML.

Scott Berkun Forums (phpBB to bbPress)

jzelazny — Tue, 26 May 2009 16:43:08 +0000

url: http://www.scottberkun.com/forums

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
phpBB to bbPress migration
bbPress theme
bbPress/WordPress integration

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, bbPress, phpBB, PHP, WordPress

front end:

I had created the WordPress theme and phpBB skin a few years ago. I created the bbPress theme based on the already in place WordPress theme and a custom bbPress theme that I use for all clients.

back end:

After some issues with phpBB, the client decided it was time to migrate to bbPress. I created an import script and then imported the data and users. I also suggested the client consider some spam plugins to block spam bots (which has yet to be installed).

lessons learned/random thoughts:

With thousands of spam user registrations and posts – migrating the data post cleanup would be highly recommended and much faster. This is something I am definitely going to recommend next time around.

Neatorama Forum (bbPress/ bbPress Theme)

jzelazny — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:57:01 +0000

url: http://www.neatorama.com/forum/

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
bbPress installation/configuration
bbPress theme customization
WordPress/bbPress integration

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress, PHP, CSS, bbPress

front end:

The client approached me with mockups for the forum that I then turned into the XHTML and CSS in the bbPress theme. The layout is simple in order to match the main site layout.

back end:

The backend was pretty straightforward. The trickiest part of this project was using the latest version of bbPress which had some key changes from the latest released version.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

bbPress is always great to work with and I am glad to see others embracing it.

California Literary Review Forum (bbPress)

jzelazny — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 21:33:11 +0000

url: http://www.calitreview.com/forum

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
bbPress theme customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, bbPress , PHP, CSS

front end:

I had worked with this client before with their WordPress theme so when building the bbPress theme, I was able to resuse most of the WordPress layout and CSS and then add in and customize the existing bbPress XHTML/CSS. I used the basic layout and then added colors and styles that were clean and minimal.

back end:

The client wanted a simple, easy to use and manage forum and he was very familiar with WordPress so I recommended bbPress.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

bbPress gets better and better with each release.

Disgruntles Site (bbPress and WordPress Blog)

jzelazny — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 14:45:17 +0000

url: http://www.disgruntles.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
bbPress theme customization
WordPress blog theme customization
bbPress plugins and customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress, PHP, CSS, bbPress

front end:

The client approached me with mockups for the site that I then turned into the XHTML and CSS in the bbPress and WordPress themes. The layout is simple and to the point.

back end:

The main site uses a heavily customized version of bbPress for the main site that I put together using custom functions and existing plugins. This functionality and layout that is not typically seen in “forums”, but the site is a great blend (functionally/visually) of a blog and a forum. The other pages and blog part of the site was created using a basic install of WordPress.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

This was a great project to work on and it really made me spend a lot of time looking through all the bbPress functions to turn bbPress into a flexible framework to get this job done. I look forward to more bbPress sites in the future because even though the codebase is still rather immature – there is a great base it’s lightweight footprint makes it really easy to work with.

Chicago Sports Talk (bbPress and WordPress MU Project)

jzelazny — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 17:09:19 +0000

url: http://www.chicagosportstalk.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
Custom web design
bbPress theme customization
WordPress MU theme customization
WordPress MU and bbPress plugins customization

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, WordPress Mu, PHP, CSS, bbPress

front end:

The client approached me wanting a grey and red three column design and I put the rest together. This site is going to be loaded with image posts so the themes for bbPress and WordPress needed to be minimal and non-distracting to the content. The client also wanted something that would be easily customized per blog in the future so I put together a theme that would be easy to modify in the future to only require a few changes for a new color scheme. The theme for the WordPress Mu site and the bbPress site use the same basic CSS so global updates are also easy and quick.

back end:

This project uses bbPress for the forums and then is integrated with WordPress Mu for a single sign on solution. There are plugins used in both bbPress and WordPress Mu to tie the two sites together as well as to aggregate content between sites.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

We are based in Chicago and love Chicago sports and we look forward to following the news and stories that come out of this site!

PFDebate (bbPress Theme)

jzelazny — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 03:35:21 +0000

url: http://forums.pfdebate.com/

SDAC Inc. provided:

XHTML/CSS programming
bbPress theme customization
WordPress CMS setup and configuration

technologies used:

XHTML, CSS, bbPress

front end:

The client approached me with a basic design already in place that he wanted to turn into a bbPress theme. I used the existing code and modified it a bit to work with bbPress so that the forum section of the site did not stand out so much as being completely different.

back end:

This project uses bbPress which is very similar to working with WordPress so editing theme files and adding plugins were easily done.

lessons learned/random thoughts:

bbPress themes have several files, but is still much nicer to customize than phpBB – in my opinion