Goodbye vBulletin

[Tim Skellett]

I read through all the cited articles and their own linked articles. I wasn't impressed at all by the arguments used against the vBulletin software.

Taking the anti-vBulletin arguments one by one:

"Bloated software"

This is heard a lot, yet almost all the time I have seen this phrase or an equivalent used, it's sheer emo and emo only, and has no substance to the charge. Breaking down this specific charge into three bits:

1. the charge that bloated software makes the whole vBulletin-based board run slower, owing to having to process more code than needed.
   .
2. and the charge of "too many features, too many options", yada yada yada.
   .
3. Crowded ACP.

Charge A seems to me to be overstated. In my experience, most boards suffer no performance problems using vBulletin; perhaps the issue of code really does affect some boards, perhaps the biggest ones, but I would like to hear some actual facts, some figures, some real quantitative analysis, before I lend this one much creedence.

Charge B is almost always vacuous. For example, in the Drupal node thread discussing the original article, one user claims no-one really needs a BB Code Editor. That's utterly ridiculous; most vB boards I've ever been on used the Custom BB Code functions, and I myself use them a hell of a lot on my own boards. One man's fish is another man's poisson; just because you don't like the full range of options given by vBulletin doesn't mean that they aren't exactly what someone else is looking for. As it is, I am extremely grateful for the large range of customization and other options offered by the vBulletin software.

And of course, a lot of people find Drupal far too limited. Drupal really has too little options, and the only response of the Drupal adminning community to that was to tell the complainants to help them write more Drupal code, which is hardly a strong refutation of the charge that Drupal is badly underpowered (no email notifications, and other specific lacks discussed in that thread).

I mean, really, the very original essay is ridiculous in how far it goes. The author suggests that these be removed from vBulletin and added as add-on's:

# signatures
# User Profiles
# Avatars (and profile pictures)
# Private Messages
# Subscriptions
# Buddy/ignore Lists
# Post attachments
# Calendar
# Event Reminders
# Announcement
# Polls
# Send Email to users
# Infractions
# User Ranks
# User Reputations
# User Titles
# Paid Subscriptions
# Smilies
# BBCode
# Statistics
# Podcast

This is incredible. In other words, make vBulletin crippleware, then get admins to have to install a whole lot of extra modules just to have what most board users regard as fundamental to a bulletin board????

No way. I like vBulletin as it is, and the users of my boards seem to like all those functions and functionality themselves.

Charge C -- the crowded interface of the vBulletin AdminCP -- is the only really strong charge of the lot. True, the ACP could be made more userfriendly.

"Constantly Changing Templates"

The author of the article exaggerates the amount of hassle in upgrading. I've been through three major upgrades, and doing up styles; it's nowhere near as bad as he makes out.

"Other Gripes of the original author"

Licensing
The author doesn't like the lack of absolute certainty that Jelsoft might not be there tomorrow. Well, goodness. We might be all wiped out by giant asteroids or vicious intestinal amoeba tomorrow, know what I mean? Time to get over it, and accept there is no such thing as absolute certainty, and simply do as best as one can.

Oh yeah, and paying. Well, golly gee. vBulletin offers me as a board owner a huge degree of functionality, and frankly, it's rather cheap at the price. The vB unencoded software, and the vB mod developer community, are what really help me and keep me on vB. IMvHO, it's very well worth what Jelsoft ask for it. Sheeesh. phpBB is free, and I'm very glad I switched from phpBB to vB.

Templates Stored in the Database
The author claims flat files would be better for performance than the database system. I'ld like to see actual comparative figures before I give creedence to this charge.


Security Issues

This is where the argument gets emo again. First off, vB is lambasted for having security problems, then vB is lambasted for quickly issuing security patches??? You can't have it both ways. Either vB is supposed to be insecure -- which I don't believe, not if all upgrades and patches have been implemented -- or vB rushes around with too many updates. Well, look, I'll take the constant updates any day, and rest easy in the knowledge that Jelsoft do indeed pay a great deal of attention to security.


SEO

Perhaps a valid charge of the author's; indeedy, vB could be more SEO'ed for boards. But it's not too bad as it is. Again, the author gives no facts, no comparative analysis with real figures, and I would like to see all that before lending too much creedence.

Finally,
CSS versus tables

Yeah, well, tables, tables, tables.

Tables are robust. They really do work, and there are cases where all the CSS in the world can't really replace a nice HTML table. Now, I grant CSS is better overall, and there is at least one committed vB coder (Mert of the Depkac site) who has developed CSS-only styles for vB, a massive undertaking and one which I respect and admire very highly indeed.

Hopefully, in the future, there will be more CSS stuff, and it will be easier for admins and users to customize. As it is, the newish vBulletin Blogs system is very mainly CSS, and very few tables indeed. It's a steep learning curve for those not used to CSS, and requires a good more work. Worth it in the end.

But when someone says they're leaving vB for Drupal, and then when the lack of features and functionality in current Drupal is pointed out, the response from others is "Well, write the code!"




No way. I'll pay what is a very decent price for vBulletin any time, I'll simply hope giant nematodes don't wipe out Jelsoft tomorrow, and I'll go on using vB and most of its features, and I'll do so very happily. And my boards' members are happier for it (many can remember when my first board was running on freeware, and had all the power of a soggy buttie).

My vote's for vBulletin, every time, for the time being. I've looked at alternatives, tried some, always ended up preferring vB.