vBulletin WPMU Bridge

[Caddyman]

I would post this in paid request but i want to know if this is possible and if anyone else has interest in it.

Me and a few others have pooled together $200USD to find a coder to create a working bridge between WordPress MU and vBulletin.

We would like to have a bridge that at least lets vB and WPMU share a login, if usergroup permissions could be shared as well in some way that would be great, but not absolutely necessary.

Right now the vB and WPMU installs reside on the same servers.

If we need to come up with more $$ or if someone here wants the same thing and wants to pledge some money LMK and I can add it. Right now we have $200 dedicated.

We are very serious about this request and really hope that we can find a coder that can make it happen and at least get a ballpark price if $200 wont do it.


I AM NOT ASKING FOR MONEY, REALLY ALL IM LOOKING FOR IS A CODER ABLE TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN.

FWIW, we have been talking about this for some time HERE

[ArnyVee]

Thank you for posting this Caddyman!

I could use this 'bridge' for my upcoming blogs and have been looking for a coder to take on the task. Hope we can find someone soon!

[donnacha]

I would be interesting in throwing in on this if the right coder appears.

[jazzyname]

interested if anything new has come of this? Its been awhile, I would be willing to chip in, on a wordpress MU / VB3.X bridge too.

[donnacha]

Originally Posted by jazzyname

interested if anything new has come of this? Its been awhile, I would be willing to chip in, on a wordpress MU / VB3.X bridge too.

Unfortunately, no.

Despite the long history of vBulletin being usable with and benefitting from different products, the new owners of vBulletin decided that such projects are a danger to their business.

We had a big thread going in November and December of 2008 about creating such a bridge:

Why BuddyPress is vBulletin's Big Opportunity

... lots of people were interested, we could see how awesome BuddyPress was but that, at that time, it's forum was the weak link in the chain. We saw that vBulletin could become the standard forum within the social framework that BuddyPress provides, a huge opportunity for them.

Unfortunately, the new owners were freaked out about the competitive potential of Open Source software and shut the thread down, a very short-sighted move. That was the point at which quite a few of us decided to give up on vBulletin and, luckily, as a result, we missed the whole vB4 debacle.

BuddyPress has come a long way since then and while the forum component, bbPress, is still not as advanced as vBulletin, the overall BuddyPress package is now miles ahead, I haven't looked back.

[TheComputerGuy]

I'm really looking into this for my site.

[donnacha]

Originally Posted by TheComputerGuy

I'm really looking into this for my site.

Unfortunately, for the reasons discussed above, I don't think it will happen anytime soon, not unless vBulletin gets sold to smarter owners.

You should set up a test site and take a look at what WordPress can do for you without needing vBulletin, it has come a long way since the requests for this bridge were first shot down by the company. Of particular interest, the new version 3.0, due out in a couple of weeks, merge normal WPMU into normal WordPress, so, the installation is much more straightforward - the ability to run multiple sites from one WordPress installation will now just be another standard feature, call Multi-site.

Also, BuddyPress is now very impressive and no longer requires WPMU, it already works, as a plugin, for normal WordPress in both single site mode and the new multi-site mode.

Good luck with your site, the friendliest gun forum on the Internet sounds like fun