Private Forums Now Available

[skrshawk]

Hello,

For those whom it would have benefits the ability to create forums for interest groups on the forums is now available. There are a few ways we can do this, depending on the nature of the community and the level of privacy desired.

 

To request a forum is to be willing to moderate it and accept ultimate responsibility for the state of the forum. Abandoned forums or forums with excessively unacceptable behavior may be closed down at the discretion of the board administrators. Multiple moderators are always acceptable and encouraged for large groups, especially if individual posts or posters are being moderated.

 

The process of requesting a forum is relatively simple, but details will help tremendously: leave a PM for me (skrshawk) with ALL relevant details for the setup of the forum. These include name of forum, a short description, a more detailed description, names of moderators other than yourself, and the kind of privacy you would require (and desired password/member lists, depending on preference). I will contact you confirming the details and if all is acceptable I will get thing set up. Just because this could come up, allow me to say that requesting a forum is no guarantee of its acceptance.

 

The first type of board is a publicly available board that anyone may view, and as per BBF requirements only registered members may post. Communities interested in the greatest ability to expand should request this option assuming there is absolutely no need for privacy.

 

For those requiring a moderate level of privacy and growth any forum can require the user to input a forum-specific password to gain access. This can be an effective means of having a forum for a private club on BBO, since only authorized members can enter the BBO club and read its news file, a logical place to put such a password and change as necessary. It also allows the presence of the forum to be displayed in public so others will know it exists. Changing the forum password is an administrator function, however, so changing it daily just isn?t going to work.

 

For those whom privacy and security is paramount the option exists to set permission masks and tie forum accounts directly to access to private forums. This is the least encouraged option for communities where the members will be changing with much frequency, as it requires a board administrator to manually edit the user?s account to grant access (unfortunately, no lower level of access will suffice). The existence of the forum will not be revealed to the general public through the forum listings. As an example of this, the BBO Yellows maintain private forums (and have for quite some time) for discussing matters relevant to BBO?s security and development that see as much activity as many of the public forums despite much fewer users.

 

There is some middle ground between all of these options and moderator permissions are very flexible ? if so desired it would be possible to make a community where a moderator must approve all posts, or just the starting of new topics (say, a question and answer forum). If a custom privacy solution would best meet you needs, I can answer questions regarding the software?s limitations (which are much greater than our old package!)