The Worst Things You Can Ever Do(tm)
 

What follows is a list of things that you should always do, except in extraordinary circumstances, when operating vBulletin. If you have any extra points, you can reply. While these are IMO, they're also commonly accepted.

1. Never ban search bots. They may use a bit of bandwidth when crawling your site, but you'll get more users when people find your site via Google, Yahoo, etc.

2. Always allow guests to view your site. You may get many registrations if you turn off guest viewing, but virtually nobody will post because the majority of registrants will simply view your site and leave.

3. Don't use a graphics-heavy layout such as those like Yaxay and other sites. Some people think they look good, but remember the majority of computer users are using 800x600 on a 56Kb modem. Also, remember that search engine bots can't index the text within images.

4. Always allow guests to view forums and threads, as well as clearly being able to tell statistics like the number of people online and the number of total posts. You don't need to give them access to attachments, the actual Who's Online page, or the memberlist. Do let them view profiles. If your forums offer special features such as a Tip of the Day, entice them by showing them the first several hundred chars of the tip, and then require them to register to view the rest.

5. Participate in your forums' discussions. This is crucial when starting out because it makes your site look busy. Once you get many hundreds of users, you can sit back some more.

6. Don't even bother considering promoting those who ask to be moderators. Instead, promote a moderator when you feel that (s)he is a great asset to the forum in a sense of maturity, responsibility, and resourcefulness on your site.

7. If you want to ban a person's IP, ban just that exact IP. Never ban a partial IP because for ISPs such as AOL and other dialups, you risk banning random users by accident.

8. If you do ban somebody, remain firm in your decision. Never let down! If they keep trying to register, keep banning. Most importantly, don't keep in communication with them. It only gives them further incentive. Publicly and privately with them, just pretend that they never existed.

9. Never, under any circumstances except for corporate websites, have another administrator.

10. Likewise, never turn on HTML anywhere, including but not limited to posts, signatures, and private messages. It opens up cross-site scripting vulnerabilities (XSS) which, simply explained, allows a user to inject malicious Javascript into a page and eventually steal your password.

11. Always stay up to date on your version of vBulletin. There are literally no exceptions to this. Always use the absolute latest stable (non-beta and non-RC) version which contains the latest security and bug fixes.

12. Never install a hack unless you need it. I guarantee you that you don't need a stock ticker, a weather display, a welcome panel, a massive list of useless stats, and a coffee machine all crammed at the top of the page.

Any others?

i think u have just about covered the essenials :D here here

suggestion, instead of just saying that you shouldnt have a graphic intense skin. Say, If your going to have a graphic intense design for cable users, have an alternative skin for 56k users.

is that a hint to wot insidethepixel wil b like ? cant w8

Is that a hint to what Inside The Pixel will be like? I can't wait.

insidethepixel is not a graphics community, its a design firm. and is not graphic intense imo... the only reason we have done graphic intense sites is because the clients have wanted graphic intense designs... we can do "lite" skins.

im gald u understood my english :p

I'm glad he also translated it for the rest of us!

i'd love to have a coffee machine come with the forums...need it sometimes :)

Can I add for people starting sites-

On the first page of your site give a clear explanation of what the site is about and what it features.

So many vbulletin sites I have seen where people are asking why no one ever joins up is because it's not clearly defined what the site is about.

Example: Welcome to the Apple forums, this site is a discussion board for all Apple Enthusiasts.

Have a theme and stick to it and your guests should be able to figure out what the site is about in the first fifteen seconds.

Mike

Good advice from everyone. :)

Nothing wrong with having more than one a administrator. Many forums do this and I can't see any problem with it. :) Maybe it's your personal preference, I don't think it's a general tip though IMO. ;)

Good tip on not promoting people who ask to be moderators though - hate people who do that! (and I also never give them mod status if they ask, especially if they do it in public!)

It is a bad idea because you're effectively giving the keys to somebody else. They can then wreak havoc when they want.

The good thing about vB3 is that you can set Administrator Permissions, so you can block them from any options in the Admin CP individually. :)

Also in vB3 you can make sure your other Admins can't change the locks on you. :)

I think having some adminstrators that you can trust is not a bad thing, however database access and/or FTP access is website suicide.

Website suicide... sounds like a new band. ;)

In refrence to additional admins. I had someone I thought I could trust when we started ,and they took the liberty of downloading their very own copy of the data base and tryed to clone my site....Good tip,,,,

You have to make sure you can trust them BEFORE you admin them. I have adminned several people, although there was one which I adminned out of pity for the hell of it, and he took the liberty to take advantage of me setting debug mode on and deleted all the settings.

But now that I have (rather, had) admins that I can trust, I haven't had any problems.

Where is the setting to ban search bots so I can check my settings?

Thanks

Doug

Great tips if you intend on building a very big and busy site.

However, there are some forums that are tightly focused, intimate even, and bigger is not always better in those cases. With them, content (and therefore, quality of membership) is king. I suspect sites like that need different strategies.

That's a little out of date. :)

Always backup your database and files on a regular basis.

If possible and resources are available, even test a restore to ensure your backup process is effective...

Huge one! ;)

The worst things you can ever do?

Auto promote new users to Administrator on Activation ;)

And send the FTP details of the site with the activation mail :)

as someone said, it totally depends what you're going for. sure, your car forums might benefit by someone seeing all the super flash threads and stuff and joining, but something like my teen support & advice forum requires a certain amount of privacy for my members. i show thread titles and fully published articles, but hide anything that a member wouldnt want their worst enemy seeing.

As hambil was referring to graphics I agree. A site design is dependent on its theme and audience. For gaming sites, the people expect a layout that appeals and is strong.

what i normally do is create another usergroup which does not have the power to edit post etc but can access admin sections and have their own colored username.

i put them in here on trial whilst i c if they are up 2 the job or not, plus it gives them a sense of power :D

Why is it? I know a lot of people who still use Dial Up and often I am found using 800x600 resolution, especially late at night.

some nice suggestions :)

Just thought about another couple which I have experienced as an end user before I got my first vB.

Don't pretend that you are someone else. Multiple personalities always get themselves found out.

Make sure you have your usergroup permissions right. You really don't want to have banned users having access to your admin forum.

If you are going to invent stories for the change of ownership because a site started out as a spin off from another one and you are trying to keep incognito then at least try and make it remotely realistic.

I think that is it really.

(No digs at anyone are intended with this post - it is simply for educational and informational purposes only.)

If you're suggesting to be true/up-front then I agree fully. :)

Still that just depends on the case.
In the forum I admin at i'm 1 of 3 admins.
The owner is an admin because it's his site. The other admin helps to run the site. I install, create and maintain hacks and the forum software.
So in our case 3 admins is good.

Perhaps you should change it to "another administrator that you met online"?
Cause if you know a person from real life and you make the site with him/her from the beginning how can that be bad? It's not your site then, you own half of the site and he/she owns the other half ;)

Personally I own my site with my boyfriend and we equally share the responsiblities (although I code more and he pays more but it balances in the end).

Personally I know over 100 people online, of those that I know only 1 user is still on dial up. So I do tend to believe that the statement indicating that the majority of online users are on a 56k line is in fact out of date. Not to say that they don't exist, but imo they are not the majority anymore, at least not of north american users, I don't know much about the rest of the world in this regards.

Out of my entire forum, I, the owner, am the only user still on 56k. lol
The worst part is uploading and downloading.
/me eagerly awaits cable internet

Great advice! Thanks!

good read, altho i dont agree with the 56k part ;)

pretty sure here in scotland u cant get 56k anymore.(or atleast near the big citys) think the lowest is 4mb and am on a 10mb line wich most peeps i know have aswell.

Overall a good thread, well written.

To add our views to this, our site has three administrators. All have full access to the site, the adminCP, FTP and the SQL database. One of us deals mostly with the hosting and financial side of the site. Another deals with the graphics and the content of the site, along with the general user interaction as he's slightly less impulsive than me. I tend to deal with the coding side of things, making additions to the site and generally keeping it all together technically.

We all have complete trust in eachother.

We have a variety of forums, some of which are not displayed to guests, some of which are. This is more due to content within the forums, as opposed to enticing signup.

We have a few moderators across the forums, just to keep them tidy, but more importantly they are tasked with adding content to the forums and driving their respective areas. We give them pretty much complete creative control over their respective areas. The IT and electronics section is moderated by a guy who has an intense area in the subject. The vBookie forum with the betting threads is moderated by a fellow admin, as he has an intense interest in all forms of sport.

The adult material forum is moderated by a man. Because we're generally more perverted :p

We tend not to ban users, based purely because a lot of us, including the three admins, have came from a forum which was bought out and has had a great deal of restrictions imposed on it. We're all adults on our website, the youngest registered age is seventeen if I remember correctly, so we think that simply warning a user who oversteps the mark is the best way to proceed. It's working very well for us.

Just my two cents.

haha you're kidding :(

All the other advice was spot on but there is nothing wrong with giving administrator permissions to other people, especially in my case where I have known the other administrators for around 5 years. Unless your board only has like 5 people viewing it at one time, having only 1 person who can actually get stuff done is impossible :/ If this is a guide for newer forums, sure. Don't make another admin. Established communities with more administrators is perfectly fine.

that depends on the forum target audience........... :bunny: I think i get a lot of hits from 3rd world countries without cable.. one of my members is in Iraq, she has 56k.