Comments on: BuddyPress user test drive part 1

By: Jason Barone

Jason Barone — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 23:26:22 +0000

@Tradenet: I’ve seen the Teamsugar.com website and I have to agree that it IS a great example of Drupal. However, I read the initial posting on Drupal.org of the main developer of teamsugar. From my understanding, that site was built and is currently maintained by full time developers. While some companeis may be able to do that, the typical user out there simply just can’t afford to hire developers to build something that in-depth. And without being a programmer or developer, most people will definitely not be able to build, or manage something *anywhere* close to that site. I believe currently Teamsugar.com is still running on a very early version of Drupal, like 4 or 5 or something. So there’s is extensive programming involved in that site.

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE Drupal and I would love for my community to be built off of it, but I don’t want to bring in a developer to do that at this point, it doesn’t make sense for my business. But I do think Drupal is one hell of a platfotm to build off it, especially when you consider it can do nearly everything you would need it to do, plus it has integration with many applications, including openid, facebook connect, Sugarcrm, and nearly anything else you can think of. The problem is it’s too difficult for the typical user to take advantage of.

Enter BuddyPress. BP is one hell of an out-of-the-box solution and I’m so excited to see where the idea goes. The combination of having one of the best blogging platforms out there, with a great community of developers, and adding social networking in the mix is a formula for success. At the rate that WP is going, BP might be one heck of a solution besides using Drupal. You can follow the install instructions for WP and BP and have a social network up and running within 15 minutes that looks as good as http://testbp.org, that’s IMPRESSIVE. Kudos to the developers.

By: Elgg and BuddyPress compared part 1 | openedweb.com

Elgg and BuddyPress compared part 1 | openedweb.com — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 16:06:44 +0000

[...] Regular visitors to this blog have probably read many of my posts on Elgg. Recently, I posted some first impressions of BuddyPress as a user having created an account on BuddyPress’s test [...]

By: ggg

ggg — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 17:49:46 +0000

I Like both elgg + buddypress ..but BP is in beta stage at the mo therefore you can’t kill it yet cos there’s no album & stats plugin.
Just like when elgg started out!
With BP you can use any wordpress theme as home page with the BP plugins.
elgg is good but lacks the wordpress maybe one day a bridge is created for it.
Horses for courses !

By: Tradenet

Tradenet — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 16:30:55 +0000

Yes that and the money. No matter how you slice it. You still have to take the time (and money) to set up a script. Paid or otherwise.

By: Klamm

Klamm — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 09:13:17 +0000

Think about the required time for setting up Elgg and multiply it for your fees, it could be less expensive than you think. I think that the problem is not the money, it is the fact that, If I’m not wrong, you can’t easily modify the script.

By: Tradenet

Tradenet — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 15:31:53 +0000

I agree. Plus it’s (Ning) too expensive IMHO.

By: Cristiano

Cristiano — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 23:04:55 +0000

Steve,

Review, socialengine.net please.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 20:25:36 +0000

The Spam Cadets just love WordPress in general. Big target!

By: Tradenet

Tradenet — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:50:47 +0000

Well I just know how the “(Russian) Spam Cadets” just LOVED (LOVES) WPMu.

Yeah, Donncha has been updating the trunk. But I never hold my breath….it will be released some time after the New Year. Putting dates on things (in the open source world) is mere speculation, IMHO.

By: Jim

Jim — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:29:49 +0000

Tradenet,

Fair enough, and I know some good folks working on Drupal, I just don’t think it frames an experience were a user can truly control his or her own space. And for me that makes all the difference. As to the security, well that is always a concern with any application, and if the merging of the three is unstable now (which it definitely is) I’m betting it won’t be for long.

As to Donncha’s updating WPMu to 2.7, he has already been updating the trac trunk and logging tickets. And given the way things have been going with development over the last two years, January is not just a guess—but a very great likelihood. Do you think Donncha is just going to stop at 2.6.5? I think you would harder pressed to establish why that is the case, rather than the alternative.

By: Tradenet

Tradenet — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:58:48 +0000

Socialengine.net? Open your wallet.

By: Tradenet

Tradenet — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:55:29 +0000

Jim Jim Jim, I didn’t say Drupal was the be all or end all. But another platform to consider. Have a look at: http://teamsugar.com/
I think that’s a good example of a social network built around the druapl engine. Some people may not want to make available “dynamic sub-domains”.

Drupal has a very active development community. That’s what I look at.

As far as v.2.7 WPMu is concerned it up to Donncha. Saying January is merely speculation on your part. Further BBPress is in alpha release NOT beta.

Frankly I find that above cocktail ie. WPMu/Buddypress/BBPress all to unwieldy as far as security is concerned.