This post teaches the users with Hestia Style installed on their board for ad placement in the forum page. This ad placement creates a column in the left side of the forum page, by shifting the topic/forum list to the right. And one ad will be placed just after the topic/forum list.

Ads in left side of the Forum

In this the ad appears in the left side of the viewforum page as an sky scrapper. Check the screen shot for the exact placement.

Step1: Open the viewforum_body.html file.

Step 2: Look for the following line in the code.

<!– INCLUDE overall_header.html –>

This line is the first line on the viewforum_body.html code page.

Step3: Just after this line paste the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

{$CA_BLOCK_START}
<table class=”tablebg” width=”100%” cellspacing=”{$CA_SPACING}”>
{$CA_CAP_START}{$CA_CAP_END}
<tr>
<td class=”row1 nobold” width=”160″ valign=”top”><p class=”genmed”>
your ad goes here
</p>
</td>
<td align=”left” valign=”top”>
<br />

Step4: Now look for the following line in the code.

<!– INCLUDE breadcrumbs.html –>

Step5: Add the following lines just after these lines.

</td>
</tr>
</table>
<br/>

Step 6: Save the changes made to the file.

Ad just after forum List

The ad appears just after the forum list, where the list of the topic and forum finishes. Check the attached screen shot for the clear location of ad placement.

Step1: Open the viewforum_body.html file.

Step 2: Look for the following line in the code.

<!– IF S_DISPLAY_ONLINE_LIST –>

Step3: Just above this line paste the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

{$CA_BLOCK_START}
<table class=”tablebg” width=”100%” cellspacing=”{$CA_SPACING}”>
{$CA_CAP_START}Advertisements{$CA_CAP_END}
<tr>
<td class=”row1 nobold” width=”100%” valign=”middle”><p class=”genmed”>
<center>
your ad goes here
</center>
</p></td>
</tr>
</table>
{$CA_BLOCK_END}

Step 4: Save the changes made to the file.

We hope this modification helps you with the ad placement, if you have any problem with the customization of ads with this style visit our official forum for Hestia.

Check our Ad Placement solution for CA Vintage style:

• Ad placement on index page of CA Vintage Style
• Ads Placement in Forum page for CA Vintage style
• Ads Placement in topics for CA Vintage style

Its something very odd to compare PhpBB and Wordpress, since they both are different platform of open source blogging and community activities. But i am going to compare both of them. The comparison is going to be done on the basis of the of the SEO (search engine optimization).

PhpBB SEO

When we talk of SEO for PhpBB, we are calling up one of the toughest thing to be implemented in it.

Why it is so difficult to be implemented? The reason is simple, no one likes to mess with the codes, specially when it comes to a live board. Is their any easy way available to do it? Yes their is an easy way to implement SEO over a fresh PhpBB forum, their is a pre-modded version available.

By default the URL’s are not custom writable in PhpBB, but the SEO mod enables the URL rewriting. And the new feature is equally powerful as the URL rewriting in wordpress.

It eliminates zero duplicate after the forum with full 301 URL redirect.

Well, this is the only SEO option available for PhpBB, and PhpBB-SEO is doing a great job in managing and continuously improving the SEO experience for the PhpBB users. And we personally recommend all our users to use PhpBB along with PhpBB-SEO to our users.

Wordpress SEO

Implementing SEO on wordpress is one of the easiest task to be performed by a wordpress owner. Their are some of the great plug-in that makes this task very easy. In wordpress we have a lot of choices available, but we will be focusing mainly on the two top plug-ins for it.

All in one SEO

Its a great plug-in and is updated quite frequently, and is one of the pioneer of the SEO for wordpress. This is something we recommend all the wordpress bloggers.

Some Features:

• Canonical URLs
• Backward-Compatibility with many other plugins, like Auto Meta, Ultimate Tag Warrior and others.
• Fine tune Page Navigational Links
• Built-in API so other plugins/themes can access and extend functionality
• Provides SEO Integration for WP e-Commerce sites
• Nonce Security
• Support for CMS-style WordPress installations
• Automatically optimizes your titles for search engines
• Generates META tags automatically
• Avoids the typical duplicate content found on Wordpress blogs
• For beginners, you don’t even have to look at the options, it works out-of-the-box. Just install.
• For advanced users, you can fine-tune everything
• You can override any title and set any META description and any META keywords you want.

Platinum SEO

Well its a “predecessor” of All in one SEO since they are competitors of each other. This is also a great option for wordpress and a should have for the users. They have a great 301 redirect but they adds their site URL in the footer. And it provides a migration option from All in one SEO to Platinum SEO i.e. their own plug-in.

Some Features:

Automatic 301 redirects for any permalink changes

Canonical URLs

Optimized Post and Page Titles for search engines

Generates all SEO relevant META tags automatically

Option to specify meta description and meta keywords tag for categories and tag pages (http://techblissonline.com/wordpress-categories/)**

Option to turn off Page title or Post title rewrites for any particular post or page (http://techblissonline.com/page-title/)**

Option to turn off Page title or Post title format for any particular post or page.

Helps you avoid duplicate content

Lets you override any title and set any META description and META keywords, for any post or page

Compatible with most other plugins, like Auto Meta, Ultimate Tag Warrior and others.However you may have to disable All in One SEO pack

You don’t have to fear changing permalinks. If you are not satisfied with the current permalink, change it through Settings>Permalinks in your admin panel, without worrying about loss of Page rank or google penalty.

Platinum SEO plugin will take care of issuing a 301 redirect to the new location.This is a new essential feature, not present in All in one SEO

Add index, noindex, follow or nofollow, noodp, noydir, noarchive, nosnippet meta tags to any post/page.These options are not available in All in one SEO Pack.Find out why this option to set post/page level Meta Robots Tag useful?

Note: Both these are great plug-ins that helps in optimizing your blog for search engines. But at a time their should be only one plug-in functional (active) on a blog.

And if you require help with the installation of these SEO services you can take help of our professional service for wordpress and PhpBB.

Ad Placement on Index page of CA Vintage style is one of the most easiest modification compared to the placements on viewforum and viewtopic pages. This placement needs putting your ad code just before and after the specific line of code. Well we will be taking two zones over here also, zone 1 and zone 2. Look at the screenshot for the exact positions of the Ads zones.

Ad Placement Before/ After Category on Index Page

Both the zones could be explained in this explanation itself, since both the ads are to be placed before and after the line.

Step1: Open the index_body.html file.

Step 2: Look for the following line in the code.

<!– INCLUDE forumlist_body.html –>

Step3: Just above and below this line paste the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

{$CA_BLOCK2_START}Advertisements{$CA_BLOCK2_START2}
<center>
your ad goes here
</center>
{$CA_BLOCK2_END2}
{$CA_BLOCK2_END}

Check the attached screenshot for the placement of code for specific zones, all instructions are covered in the images.

Step 4: Save the changes made to the file.

We hope this is the simple modification for ad placement on the index page of the forum. If you have some problem with the placement contact us here on the official forum for CA Vintage.

This is a continuation post over the ads placement in CA Vintage style. In the last we have covered the Ads Placement in topics for CA Vintage style and this post focuses on the ad placement in the forum page. The ad is placement as a sky scrapper on the left hand side of the forum page, and on the top and bottom of a forum, check the attached screen shot for the exact location. We have specified two zones for better understanding, zone1 and zone2.

Ads in left side of the Forum

In zone 1 the ad appears in the left side of the viewforum page as an sky scrapper.

Step1: Open the viewforum_body.html file.

Step 2: Look for the following line in the code.

<!– INCLUDE overall_header.html –>

This line is the first line on the viewforum_body.html code page.

Step3: Just after this line paste the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

<table width=”100%” cellspacing=”1″>
<tr>
<td width=”160″ align=”left” valign=”top”>
{$CA_BLOCK2_START}Adverts{$CA_BLOCK2_START2}
<center>
your ad goes here
</center>
{$CA_BLOCK2_END2}
{$CA_BLOCK2_END}
</td>
<td align=”left” valign=”top”>

Step4: Now look for the following line in the code.

<hr />

Step5: Add the following lines just above these lines.

</td>
</tr>
</table>

Step 6: Save the changes made to the file.

Ad just after forum List

In zone 2 the ad appears in the bottom of the viewforum page, just after the forum list. Refer Zone 2 for the position in the screen shot.

Step1: Open the viewforum_body.html file.

Step 2: Look for the following line in the code.

<!– INCLUDE jumpbox.html –>

Step3: Just above this line paste the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

{$CA_BLOCK2_START}Advertisements{$CA_BLOCK2_START2}
<center>
your ad goes here
</center>
{$CA_BLOCK2_END2}
{$CA_BLOCK2_END}

Step 4: Save the changes made to the file.

We hope this modification is simple and attractive with respect to the ad placement on forum page. If you have some problem with the placement contact us here on the official forum for CA Vintage.

We have been asked by some of our users to provide ad placements in CA Vintage style ever since we implemented the style, few days back. Well with the styles provides by stsoftware.biz customization is something that could be achieved in an easy go. This post only focuses on the placement in viewtopic page, where the actual content lies in a forum. We have divided the ad placement in two zones on the viewtopic page. Check the screen shot for the zones and placement.

Ads in the first post

In zone 1 the ad appears just before the content in the viewtopic page of the forum. Its a very lucrative position that increases the click through rate for any forum. This position gives you great results if an rectangular ad block is placed there. Well lets focus on the ad placement first, later we will cover the optimization.

Note: The ad appears only in the first post not to the replies made to it.

Step1: Open the viewtopic_body.html file.

Step 2: Look for in the following line in the code.

{postrow.MESSAGE}</div>

Step3: Just before this line paste the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

<!– IF postrow.S_FIRST_ROW –>
your ad goes here
<br/>
<!—ENDIF –>

Step 4: Save the changes made to the file.

Ads after first post

In the Zone 2 the ad appears just after the first post i.e. in-between the content body and the first reply; check the screen shot for exact position. This is also one of the best position that a forum owner love to have. Lets look at the steps to be followed:

Step1: Open the viewtopic_body.html file.

Step2: Look for the following lines in the code

</div>
<!– END postrow –>

Step3: Just before these lines add the following code, replacing your ad goes here with your ad code.

<!– IF postrow.S_ROW_COUNT == 0 –>
{$CA_BLOCK_START}
<center>
your ad goes here
</center>
{$CA_BLOCK_END}
<!—ENDIF –>

Step 4: Save the changes made to the file.

Well the ad placement is completed over the viewtopic_body.html page for the CA Vintage style. We will be covering the ad placement in the viewforum_body.html and index_body.html page. These customizations are really going to be awesome and we are sure you will love them.

If you faces any problem leave a comment, and if you want to discuss over this style entire its official forum for it.

I have worked for various entertainment forum clients and one of their very basic requirement is video’s for the site. There are lot of mod’s available over the Phpbb.com, but they are mainly available for YouTube and Google videos. If you like to add any other video site you can create custom BB Code for it. But creating custom for every video site is a very tedious job.

Well we have a mod that is still in beta over PhpBB3 forum, but we are using it successfully for almost a year for our clients. The beauty of the mod is that you need not make any code modifications in the files, simply upload a file and create a custom code.

The installation is a simple few step installation:

1. Upload the file (video.php) in the root of the site.
2. Now Login into forum’s admin control panel.
3. Select Posting tab from the top tabs.
   
4. The window provides you with a option of adding new BB code, check the extreme right of window.
   
5. Now fill up the available block/form. Add the BB Code that want to use in the BBCode Usage.

   [video]{TEXT}[/video]
   
   In the HTML replacement block enter.

   <script type=”text/javascript” src=”video.php?link={TEXT}”></script>

   In the help line, enter the mouse over for the video BB Code.

   Add the Video

   In the settings, check the display box.

   Lastly, submit.

   

There are a large number of Videos that are supported by this BB Code, a partial list of the supported video sites includes YouTube, Google video, daily motion, metacafe. MySpace, starsclips, yahoo, photo bucket, filefront, stage6, veoh, vidilife, game trailers, vidiac, game spot, mega video, vimeo, Game videos, tu.tv and God tube.

We hope that you find might had found your favorite video site in the list.

Download the Mod from Rapidshare || Uploading.

Its really a desire for new web entrepreneur to experiment with new things. Here when you have implemented a new forum, you always want to install new styles. Being new with all these things its a big question, how to install and where to look?

Where to look for new styles?

This is the first question with new users, where to look for fresh styles. Their are lot of sites that provides free styles for phpbb3, but the best place is phpbb’s officially validated styles. All the themes posted their are mostly contributed by the phpbb developers and the themes are regularly updated as soon as a new version of phpbb is released.

I personally use and recommends  Stsotware.biz styles designed by Vjacheslav Trushkin, they provide great styles and support.

How to install new styles?

New style could be stepped in two easy steps, upload style to server and install from the admin panel.

Upload style files on server:

There are various ways of uploading file to the server. It could be done through FTP client (FileZilla) and even through the web control panel (Cpanel). This post focuses on file upload through Cpanel.

1. Login into your Cpanel
2. Open file manager, and go the style folder on the panel /public_html/phpbbwp/forum/styles
3. Now upload the zip file (here ca_vantage.zip) that contains the style file that you want to install.
   
4. After uploading, reload the current page.
   
5. Select the zip file and click on extract.
   
6. The work on server is complete, now move to the admin control panel of forum.

Install Style from ACP forum:

1. Login into ACP (Administrator Control Panel)
2. Select the Style Tab from the top, and choose the style you want to install.
   
3. Now make the choice for default theme and activation on next screen.
   
4. Screen shot and link of the new theme (new users should register and login to observe the theme and features)
   
   Those who like this style can download it from here.

This is how we can do the file upload on server through the Cpanel. Hopefully this will help you with the installation. If you have any problem with it, just leave a comment for support.

The footer of PhpBB could be optimized greatly specially in the case of being hosted on an Blue Host hosting which have simple scripts to manage the installation for you. But this post gives you the potential of customizing your footer for popup and popunder ads also.

Manage footer Affiliate

In the default installation of the phpbb forum through blue hosts simple scripts software, a footer credit not is being attached on every page. Well this link should be attached their to give them credit for the installation. But better way is to get it replaced by an affiliate link of bluehost. And i recommend to highlight it in bold to make it attractive to the users.

Lets proceed to the modification and the steps to be carried out to do so.

1. Login into the admin panel of the forum.
2. Select the style tab>> templates>> click edit on selected style (here i have choosen prosilver)
3. Select overall_footer.html from the dropdown file selection. In the editing frame look for the div highlighted in the image.
   
4. In that particular class you can look for the codes that you want to edit and replace them with the new one and even add new things.

   I have replaced <a href=”http://www.bluehost.com” title=”web hosting”>web hosting</a> with

<b><a href=”http://www.bluehost.com/track/colorsofnet” title=”web hosting”>web hosting</a></b>

This is the image of old footer

This is the image of new footer

Adding Pop Up and Pop Under ads

The best place to add pop up and pop under ads in an phpbb forum is its footer, since it loads in the last when the entire page is loaded. The code can be added before the following lines.

</body>
</html>

And if you have any problem with the parsing of your ad code, you could comment for help over here. We will help you get it parsed on your phpbb forum.

We have installed a new PhpBB forum for the blog, and we have covered the Setup of PhpBB forum from BlueHost account in our last post. Agenda of this post is to cover the things that a new user needs to perform over a newly installed forum.

Change the Username, Email and Password

When you first login into your forum, you should change the default username (admin) and password.

In the administration panel from the general tab>> Quick access >> Manage users

In the select user page, enter admin as the member to be searched.

Now you are on the overview page of the admin user, all the changes highlighted in red squares (username, email and Password) need to be made.

Remember: When these changes are submitted you will automatically be logged out, now login again with the new username and password.

Board Configuration

After the Authentication changes, we are now moving to the Board configuration. From the general tab>> Board configuration>> select Board settings

Here you can determine the basic operation of your board, give it a fitting name and description, and among other settings adjust the default values for time zone and language.

These are some of the basic settings that need to be implemented at the earliest on a newly installed forum. And note that most of the settings are covered in the general tab itself.

If you want a Twitter “Follow” badge on your forum check our post on Floating Twitter “Follow” Badge on PhpBB Forum.

I am a user of BlueHost webhosting for almost a year now, and i am very much satisfied with their services. This time i decided to use their inbuilt software/services for implementing the Phpbb forum. Their were two software choices available for implementing the forum, one was the simple scripts and the other one Fantastico De Luxe. I preferred Simple Scripts for the implementation as their are lot of reasons for choosing them, we will discuss about that later.

Installation of PhpBB Forum

I will be covering the installation step by step to make it easy for others to implement.

Step 1: Login into your control panel.

Step 2: Go to Software/Services, and open simple scripts. You will be redirected to a simple scripts page.

Step 3: Select PhpBB forum from the available forum choices.

Step 4: Now you will move to installation options, select install for a brand new installation.

Step 5: In the installation preferences page, select the stable version of PhpBB. Select the domain for which you want the installation, and select the path (here i have selected forum, if you want it in root than leave it blank). Just enter the path and it will automatically create it over the server, you need not manually go to file manager and create it.

Agree to the GPLv2 License agreement, and complete.

Step 6: The forum is created and the details are available to you, use those details to login into your forum.

Their are certain changes that needed to be implemented on a new forum, we will be covering that in our upcoming post.

Till than you can try our Floating Twitter “Follow” Badge on PhpBB Forum post to implement a twitter badge, just like the one we have on our forum.