How the forum works

In the shoutbox, we were discussing what was involved in starting up and running a forum (bulletin board), so I thought I would draw back the curtain and show you the wizardry behind the scenes. :hypno:


First of all, the site is hosted on a remote server. While it's theoretically possible to serve a website from home, a forum (especially one with a shoutbox) would require that the owner would need internet access that could accommodate dozens, if not hundreds, of simultaneous connections at any given time. Unless you live in an area with extremely fast upload speeds, it would best be served by a company that specializes in website hosting. These companies have entire buildings full of servers at different places across the country, and are manned by people whose sole job is to keep them up and running.

When you set up a website, the first thing you normally do is register a domain. Once that's done, you shop for whatever hosting fits your needs and budget. Once you get hooked up with a web host, they will give you your own IP (internet protocol) number, and email you instructions on how to access your new server. Once you get logged in, you set name servers, and then point your new domain to your server.

A website consists of two parts: the file system, and the database. The file system contains the forum program itself, and is also where images and other media is stored. The database is the brain of the site where the information is stored...threads, posts, user info, messages, etc.

Here's how the setup looks...

Attachment 3220

To get to the site, the users enter the domain name, the domain registrar transfers you via the name servers to the IP of your website, and you access the site program...in our case, vBulletin. Whenever a person views the site, they are viewing individual web pages rendered by the forum software. The information that you see in threads and posts is the stuff stored in the database. When you upload a picture and type a description, the image is stored in the file system, and the wording is stored in the database. When another person views your thread, they are seeing a page rendered by the file system, wording provided by the database, and a picture stored in files but called up by the database.

The administrators and moderators have access to other screens which allow them to do their evil bidding. Here's a screen cap of the admin control panel

Attachment 3221

Thru the AdminCP, the admin tells the site what it should look like and how it should function. Moderators have a similar ModCP which allows them to moderate/move/prune posts and threads as well as do some user functions.

The site owner (Super Admin) not only accesses the forum like everybody else, but he also has access directly to the server to do site maintenance, do backups, upgrade the software, etc.

I hope this helps you guys get an understanding of what goes on in the background. :peace:

What does it cost you monthly to keep this thing up and running for freeloaders like me?

Hosting itself is $55/mo

Thanks for the insight al.......Sounds tricky to me, makes me glad yer up to the task! I certainly appreciate all you do to give us this little slice of Internet hangout, to be quite honest my day wouldn't be complete without it........

I take issue with the database being the brain. it is nothing more than a storage medium. The application is the brain, it is doing all the work. Some databases do incorporate logic in the form of stored procedures, but that's just stupid, and this one does not do that :)

By the way, you are paying too much. I can hook up you up if you like.