Ninjaboard 
Version
1.1.7 (last update on Jul 27, 2012)
Rating
Compatibility
Reviews
54
License
GPLv2 or later
Non-Commercial
Type
Date Added
13 March 2010
Key features
-------------------
* Totally new codebase takes advantage of modern coding practices for less bugs, higher security, and best of all greater ease of use.
* Codename "Chameleon" auto-skinning engine, adapts the look and feel of your forum to any Joomla! template making it look fantastic without any hacking.
* Powerful permissions system. Create custom usergroups, and optionally assign users to multiple usergroups. Decide who see's what with ease.
* Integrates with Joomla! core. Users, Search, Breadcrumbs, Localization, SEF and more. No more confusing, ugly "do it yourself" solutions like other forums.
* Update Ninjaboard right from the dashboard. Allowing you to keep your site up to date, even when you're on the go.
* Access control over different forums.
* Topic icons by Parthiban Mohanraj (http://bit.ly/Tf9Y), exclusively for Ninjaboard (http://ninjurl.com/PNTWB) .
* Backend fully MooTools 1.2, frontend use jQuery 1.5 to avoid javascript conflicts with templates.
* Clean HTML output, no tables for layout! Switch avatar location or change anything without hacking any templates
* Supports Joomla! html layout overrides. Meaning you can customize at will if you want to. (but it looks so good out of the box no one needs to...)
* Built in converters. Currently supports Kunena 1.6, phpBB3 (bridged) and Ninjaboard 0.5. More coming soon!
* Sample data is optional, and imported on the same screen you import data from other forums. So you can get started right away.
* Multiple settings profiles. Optionally assign profiles to menu items. Meaning you can have multiple *different* forums on one site. No other forum does this!
* Beautiful and intuitive UI. Setting up a forum has never been this simple or fun.
* Customizable dashboard. Two module positions at your disposal for forum stats or notifications.
* Built to take advantage of the new Nooku 0.7 framework.
Chameleon template engine
-----------------------------------------
Ninjaboard comes with a game-changing template engine, which supports a new technique called 'auto-skinning'.
It's capable of blending with any template you install in your site and simply takes on the style of your site.
Unparalleled extensibility
------------------------------------
As a direct result of using Nooku Framework, everything in Ninjaboard's code can be manipulated, extended and changed in any way you want and anywhere you like without hacking anything.
Requirements
----------------------
* PHP 5.2.0 or later.
* MySQL with MySQLi PHP extension. (mysqli means "MySQL improved", gives access to new features in MySQL 4.1 and above).
* MySQL v5.0.41 or later.
* Suhosin users need to add tmpl:// to their protocol whitelist.
Images
Experienced some issues on installation but the staff and Ninja Forge went above and beyond to help identify the other software components that had caused the problem...but instead of just pointing me to the "offenders" tech support (which I expected), the Ninja Forge team offered to fix the problem on my site and did so within 2 hours. Outstanding support.
I couldn't express my gratitude enough for this product. It does everything anyone would want in a forum and more. It effortlessly integrates itself into your site and provides amazing potential for addons. The fact it is distributed free of charge must indicate the developers have self esteem issues! Quick, grab this product before they realize their awesomeness!
Very Good forum I will be replacing all of my sites that have forums with this. Thank you.
I use this forum extension for my aeroclub website. Easy to install (I'm no expert) good looking and lightweight performance. These guys spend a lot of time on the backend interface, which makes it really easy and fun to operate and manage. The forums look smart because they're simple and elegant.
Maybe for larger forums with an intenser activity, a search field would make it even better. Still, five stars!!!
Maybe for larger forums with an intenser activity, a search field would make it even better. Still, five stars!!!
These guys have a truly great extension here! Ninjaboard is, by far, the easiest and most well equipped extension on Joomla. Very easy to use and install.
I'd also like to commend the Mark and Stian. They are always on top of helping you with Ninjaboard whenever necessary and respond quickly if any issues occur. They have it fixed in no time and are willing to take time to go into your site personally and rectify the situation.
Awesome service from these guys. Their forum is also incredibly helpful.
I would absolutely recommend this extension to any and all Joomla users. Novice or expert, it's sure to add a service to your site that you won't be able to live without afterwards.
Thanks again, guys. Appreciate all the work you do!
I'd also like to commend the Mark and Stian. They are always on top of helping you with Ninjaboard whenever necessary and respond quickly if any issues occur. They have it fixed in no time and are willing to take time to go into your site personally and rectify the situation.
Awesome service from these guys. Their forum is also incredibly helpful.
I would absolutely recommend this extension to any and all Joomla users. Novice or expert, it's sure to add a service to your site that you won't be able to live without afterwards.
Thanks again, guys. Appreciate all the work you do!
You found it.
I was searching for a good looking free forum that was easy to upload and install and intuitive to use, if it was feature rich that would be an added bonus.
Ninjaboard ticked all those boxes and the support answered within minutes.
I don't think I've ever been quite as happy with a Joomla product as this one.
I was searching for a good looking free forum that was easy to upload and install and intuitive to use, if it was feature rich that would be an added bonus.
Ninjaboard ticked all those boxes and the support answered within minutes.
I don't think I've ever been quite as happy with a Joomla product as this one.
Really love what these guys created here with ninjaboard. Fits any template (I've tried several dozens) and works straight out of the box.
It's still in early stage of developing but already very stable, I'm looking forward to the new features that coming in the near future.
Also one of the best supports out there, Mark and Stian are always there to help and will go that extra mile to take a look at your site individually, if you have an issue.
Definitely recommend.
It's still in early stage of developing but already very stable, I'm looking forward to the new features that coming in the near future.
Also one of the best supports out there, Mark and Stian are always there to help and will go that extra mile to take a look at your site individually, if you have an issue.
Definitely recommend.
If you are looking for a forum that can be set up and running in minutes and has a clean interface that very cleverly integrates with your existing template (they call the feature 'chameleon') then check this one out. It's still relatively young in development terms buy the guys at NinjaForge are working hard with an impressive planned feature set over an above what is already there - things such as integration with popular community software. Things that impress me most ...
i) Ability to upload your own icons for different forum sections etc.
ii) In-editor previews of posts
iii) Fantastic support - the support folk will bend over backwards to help sort out issues for you - even if they are caused by things out of their control such as the template you are using, or other modules. A real personal touch - becoming quite rare!
i) Ability to upload your own icons for different forum sections etc.
ii) In-editor previews of posts
iii) Fantastic support - the support folk will bend over backwards to help sort out issues for you - even if they are caused by things out of their control such as the template you are using, or other modules. A real personal touch - becoming quite rare!
Saw all the great reviews and the demo, and thought, this is going to be great! Instead, I was disappointed. I tried to install it, but was told MySQL version was old even though I have v.5.0.67. I was left with the component that appeared to be there, but with no functionality. I tried to get support through their forum ~12 hours ago, which, of course, requires registration, but have not received a confirmation email to activate my account. I would love to be able to use it. :-(
Owner's reply
Hi Nene,
You don't need the confirmation email. You can log in immediately after creating your account.
Given that we all live in different timezones, 12 hours ago happened to be the middle of the night for most of us, which is why support may have been delayed.
Usually we respond to support issues within a couple of hours.
The MySQL requirements are set by the Nooku Framework that we use for NB. It hink it is a little unfair to mark NB down because your host doesn't meet the minimum requirements. Mysql is currently at version 5.5.8, so 5.0.x is quite old.
However, I have some issues with this Ninjaboard.
1. permission: I want to disable the users from posting the new topic. I did this by choosing "No access" for Topic, Post and Attachment. However, the "New Topic" button still displayed but after clicking it, the page show nothing. I suggest that the "New Topic" button should not be displayed if there is no permission.
2. cancel button: when posting the new topic, the cancel button works fine with the sample content. However, after creating my own content which is not English, the cancel button redirect to 404 page. It seems that the forum has some issue with non-English language topic title.
3. WYSIWYG editor: I know the security issues about the javascript code injection, etc. But we can prevent this in the forum using regular expression, etc, and because the other big forum system such as phpbb can integrate with jce editor.
To conclude, the forum has a very good look because it integrate with the existing look and feel of Joomla. However, it still lacks of some usability issues.
1. permission: I want to disable the users from posting the new topic. I did this by choosing "No access" for Topic, Post and Attachment. However, the "New Topic" button still displayed but after clicking it, the page show nothing. I suggest that the "New Topic" button should not be displayed if there is no permission.
2. cancel button: when posting the new topic, the cancel button works fine with the sample content. However, after creating my own content which is not English, the cancel button redirect to 404 page. It seems that the forum has some issue with non-English language topic title.
3. WYSIWYG editor: I know the security issues about the javascript code injection, etc. But we can prevent this in the forum using regular expression, etc, and because the other big forum system such as phpbb can integrate with jce editor.
To conclude, the forum has a very good look because it integrate with the existing look and feel of Joomla. However, it still lacks of some usability issues.
Owner's reply
Hi Hash,
Thank you for using Ninjaboard.
I'll try to respond to your issues here, but strongly urge you to contact us via the NinjaForge forum; Two of the issues you mention could have been resolved if you had done so earlier.
1. Permission: This is the first we've heard of this issue. The "New Topic" button will always show. This is a usability feature. Clicking on it will either create a new topic, or take you to the Login Page if you aren't logged in already. I'm not sure why you are getting an error page, but we have thousands of other users and no reports like yours, so it might be something unique to your website. We would love to help you fix this.
2. Cancel Button: This sounds like a bug but we've never gotten a report of this before. We know of numerous non-English forums (Greek, Russian, Chinese, etc) running on Ninjaboard, so this might again be an isolated issue. If you would be kind enough to help us replicate it, we would love to fix it.
3. WYSIWYG Editor: Most WYSIWYG Editors for Joomla (JCE, etc) are too powerful and while adding support for them would be easy, we think it would be irresponsible to do so because of the security implications. Users who don't know better might inadvertently give their users too much access and end up getting their sites compromised. We are definitely going to be adding a WYSIWYG Editor (probably in Ninjaboard 1.2), but it will be bbcode powered, not one of the existing Joomla ones.
Thanks again for the review; We appreciate your feedback and hope to see you on our forum soon, so we can help you with the issues you're faced with.
Ninjaboard is a modern, forward-thinking forum solution that allows users to focus on the conversation. It doesn't take the same old beaten path as other forum solutions, and it doesn't stop there.
I've been testing and following Ninjaboard since the earlier beta releases and have enjoyed watching it develop. Installation has always been a breeze, importing data from other forums like Kunena couldn't be easier and the admin interface is both clean and not overpowering. Don't be caught off-guard by the seemingly simple admin interface, it's noting less than advanced and doesn't try and impress you by overpowering the layout with all of the options presented on one screen.
The Chameleon theme is a designer's dream. It is a true self adapting theme that blends itself nicely with your site template. It's power not only lies in its visual abilities, but also allows you to optionally set custom code (tags, classes, ids) to be used for some of the forums elements, such as the cancel button.
The Usergroups settings rivals the power and flexibility of Joomla 1.6's ACL. It is an amazingly powerful access control feature that allows you fine granularity. Most users won't need to touch it, but it is good to know that it's there. Plus, the user interface for mapping Joomla user groups is really cool.
To me, Ninjaborad is the forum of the future and I'll be using it everywhere I can.
I've been testing and following Ninjaboard since the earlier beta releases and have enjoyed watching it develop. Installation has always been a breeze, importing data from other forums like Kunena couldn't be easier and the admin interface is both clean and not overpowering. Don't be caught off-guard by the seemingly simple admin interface, it's noting less than advanced and doesn't try and impress you by overpowering the layout with all of the options presented on one screen.
The Chameleon theme is a designer's dream. It is a true self adapting theme that blends itself nicely with your site template. It's power not only lies in its visual abilities, but also allows you to optionally set custom code (tags, classes, ids) to be used for some of the forums elements, such as the cancel button.
The Usergroups settings rivals the power and flexibility of Joomla 1.6's ACL. It is an amazingly powerful access control feature that allows you fine granularity. Most users won't need to touch it, but it is good to know that it's there. Plus, the user interface for mapping Joomla user groups is really cool.
To me, Ninjaborad is the forum of the future and I'll be using it everywhere I can.
I am in love with this application.
It was difficult to find a FREE, sophisticated forum to seamlessly integrate into my website---Ninjaboard does. This application is a shining example of what Gnu applications can be: user-friendly, admin-friendly, aesthetically sharp (without over-stylization), multi-featured, and intuitive. I would highly recommend it to anyone who wants a dynamic forum, which operates and assimilates flawlessly.
My only (teeny tiny) issue, is the apparent lack of image options. If there is a way to upload custom avatars, I can't see out how to do it. But maybe I haven't looked hard enough (the website's not yet ready to go live, so I have some time to figure it out).
Great job, Ninjas! Thank you!
It was difficult to find a FREE, sophisticated forum to seamlessly integrate into my website---Ninjaboard does. This application is a shining example of what Gnu applications can be: user-friendly, admin-friendly, aesthetically sharp (without over-stylization), multi-featured, and intuitive. I would highly recommend it to anyone who wants a dynamic forum, which operates and assimilates flawlessly.
My only (teeny tiny) issue, is the apparent lack of image options. If there is a way to upload custom avatars, I can't see out how to do it. But maybe I haven't looked hard enough (the website's not yet ready to go live, so I have some time to figure it out).
Great job, Ninjas! Thank you!
Owner's reply
Hi,
Thanks for your kind words.
We don't have a custom avatar gallery feature yet.
But we would be happy to discuss it in our forums with you
Thanks
Well, i really can't rate nor review Ninjaboard because i failed to try it because of the mysterious and exceptional error occured (templates weren't parsed as php-files). But i would like to praise Ninjaboard's team (namely Stian) for their fast and comprehensive support - in their support forum and they even logged into my website to help me out. I was just out of luck, some problems just can't be solved (fast), Ninjaboard works and works fine for the most of it's users. So those 5 stars come for the excellent support, keep it up!
Beautifully integrated extension that is simple to install and use. Works exactly how Joomla! extensions should work.
Only complaint is that my client would like to limit how many e-mails he receives notifying of new posts, and this extension doesn't seem to have that capability. Other than that, great extension!
Only complaint is that my client would like to limit how many e-mails he receives notifying of new posts, and this extension doesn't seem to have that capability. Other than that, great extension!
We have been testing NinjaBoard since the early days and it's shaping up nicely indeed. If your looking for an entry level, simple to use forum, you can go wrong with this one. If your looking for something a bit more serious but don't want to run a bridge to a forum like phpBB, then use Agora.
If NinjaBoard can add an image gallery tied to the post preview process, then I think they would move ahead of Kunena at that point. Right now, you have simple text and linking abilities.
Keep up the great work Ninja!
If NinjaBoard can add an image gallery tied to the post preview process, then I think they would move ahead of Kunena at that point. Right now, you have simple text and linking abilities.
Keep up the great work Ninja!
I have just installed this software and after some initial glitches I have to say I have found it to be excellent. It could do with some instructions for dummies like me but once you figure it out it is amazing. It blends in seamlessly with my site template and has a nice simple interface for users. The support has been first class - fast and detailed even though I have not paid any subscription. Thank you.
I'm holding back the 5th start, only cause there will not be foreign editor support ( like JCE ) in this release. rc6 shows so much promise its amazing. The chameleon template is very slick. Support and customer care is amazing, even for free support!
This is the ONLY forum currently supporting conversion from ccboard! wtg guys.
This is the ONLY forum currently supporting conversion from ccboard! wtg guys.
Owner's reply
The reason we aren't supporting other editors is because of the security problems involved in giving public access to things like file uploads, javascript, flash uploads and so on. Doing so would get your site hacked within days if not hours.
No other forum allows external editors (as far as I know anyway), for the same reasons.
Just had the pleasure of writing a converter for SMF to Ninjaboard. Well, it's not finished yet, but it's getting there. Converting a forum of 120 000 topics seems like a walk in the park. Based my code off the phpBB converter and it just works like a charm. Ninja code with a Nooku Framework basis is sweet to work with, both on the backend and frontend.
And when I had issues, Stian stepped in and helped me out without hesitation. Thanks!
Chameleon feature is a killer of course, provided you have a proper template of course. User group management is plain sexy.
So… Highly recommended.
And when I had issues, Stian stepped in and helped me out without hesitation. Thanks!
Chameleon feature is a killer of course, provided you have a proper template of course. User group management is plain sexy.
So… Highly recommended.
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