Can this be done?
 

Hi folks,
I currently use phpBB for all of my sites, and am looking to move to vBulletin.

Currently on my sites, users can login from anywhere and have "You have 4 Private Messages"-style alerts in the header bar of each page. Also, they can comment on articles and reviews using the phpBB interface (if they are logged in). If needed (for competitions and the like), I can reference the user's account data in any page via the $userdata array.

My simple question is this...can vBulletin do all those things? If it can, can someone point me in the direction of the hacks/mods so I can take a look for myself, please?

If it can, I'm about 99.9% sure that I'll be shelling out for vBulletin by the end of next week :)

Thanks in advance!

-Private messages show in the top right corner (there is a modification you can apply to show a flashing red image too [send yourself a PM to test it here])

-You'll need an articles system first, depends on the one you choose

-$bbuserinfo or $vbulletin->userinfo in 3.5