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Well, in my opinion, I have been getting quite accustomed to the IPB 2.2/2.1 style admin panel, and I gotta say, their admin panel is pretty well designed. Sure, your stuff isn't all in one big list, but I like the tabbed effect they've done there..
I hold a perpetual licence for IPB, and an owned license for vB, and as others have said in this thread, there's quite a few differences between the two. For both forum software, I've spent countless hours in the admin panel just skinning the forum. I like IPB's "Macro" setup they have, but with 2.2 and the tons of new images they've added, it seems like they didn't want to utilize that macro system for the new images. Also, IPB hasn't come out with a new GDK ever since IPB 2.0.0 FINAL was released, so that's way behind. vBulletin's template editor is quite easy to use, and the CSS editor is great. But I'm one of those people that would rather edit the raw css file right there.
As for skins and styles, vBulletin has a great resource at vb.org, whereas IPB, you gotta google around, and 9 times out of 10, the sites you DO find, just won't accept the average person's email address because they've either been spammed to death in the past, or hacked. I don't like that.
As far as features, I love IPB's editor and how it looks, but it's a tad image heavy. You can't even attach files to an IPB 2.2 board WITHOUT javascript enabled, which is also a bad point there. Polls in IPB 2.2 also require javascript. I absolutely love how vBulletin doesn't REQUIRE the use of javascript to navagate the forums. vBulletin knows that javascript simply isn't available to all users. IPB also has had to COMPRESS their javascript files, because of how excessive it is. Hell, I wonder how I even handled running a 2.1.7 board on dialup. *shrugs*
As far as modules and add-on scripts, IPB has quite a few handy ones, but 9 times out of 10, you're gonna end up having to purchase an additional license just for that module.
But in the end, it all boils down to user preference. I run my own site using vBulletin, and the hacks I got are pretty minimal, because vBulletin gives me just what I need. I run an IPB 2.2 for a friend's site, and it needed a few code hacks just to get some things working as needed.. (Try to get a PNG image to show up in the "Recent PMs tab" of that my assistant thingy without any source edits)
Well, I'm going to close this post with a thought. Reguarding Google Guru's comment on IPB's profile system. I, for one, love the new profiles IPB has introduced, BUT, IPB needs to do something about privacy. Lots of members don't like how all of a sudden, their contacts in their Personal Messenger address list, all of a sudden became "Friends", and that information is now displayed to the public for everyone to see. Myself, I would like to simply turn that off, but you simply can't, because the only options for it is to show 3, 5, or 10 friends in that block. Comments are the same way. Yea, I know, you can simply revert to the old profile view prior to 2.2, but then the profiles go back to something static and unused. I, for one, wouldn't blame it if Jelsoft actually "copies" that feature because of popular demand. iDunno, let's just leave it to fate and see what fate has in store for us.
I hold a perpetual licence for IPB, and an owned license for vB, and as others have said in this thread, there's quite a few differences between the two. For both forum software, I've spent countless hours in the admin panel just skinning the forum. I like IPB's "Macro" setup they have, but with 2.2 and the tons of new images they've added, it seems like they didn't want to utilize that macro system for the new images. Also, IPB hasn't come out with a new GDK ever since IPB 2.0.0 FINAL was released, so that's way behind. vBulletin's template editor is quite easy to use, and the CSS editor is great. But I'm one of those people that would rather edit the raw css file right there.
As for skins and styles, vBulletin has a great resource at vb.org, whereas IPB, you gotta google around, and 9 times out of 10, the sites you DO find, just won't accept the average person's email address because they've either been spammed to death in the past, or hacked. I don't like that.
As far as features, I love IPB's editor and how it looks, but it's a tad image heavy. You can't even attach files to an IPB 2.2 board WITHOUT javascript enabled, which is also a bad point there. Polls in IPB 2.2 also require javascript. I absolutely love how vBulletin doesn't REQUIRE the use of javascript to navagate the forums. vBulletin knows that javascript simply isn't available to all users. IPB also has had to COMPRESS their javascript files, because of how excessive it is. Hell, I wonder how I even handled running a 2.1.7 board on dialup. *shrugs*
As far as modules and add-on scripts, IPB has quite a few handy ones, but 9 times out of 10, you're gonna end up having to purchase an additional license just for that module.
But in the end, it all boils down to user preference. I run my own site using vBulletin, and the hacks I got are pretty minimal, because vBulletin gives me just what I need. I run an IPB 2.2 for a friend's site, and it needed a few code hacks just to get some things working as needed.. (Try to get a PNG image to show up in the "Recent PMs tab" of that my assistant thingy without any source edits)
Well, I'm going to close this post with a thought. Reguarding Google Guru's comment on IPB's profile system. I, for one, love the new profiles IPB has introduced, BUT, IPB needs to do something about privacy. Lots of members don't like how all of a sudden, their contacts in their Personal Messenger address list, all of a sudden became "Friends", and that information is now displayed to the public for everyone to see. Myself, I would like to simply turn that off, but you simply can't, because the only options for it is to show 3, 5, or 10 friends in that block. Comments are the same way. Yea, I know, you can simply revert to the old profile view prior to 2.2, but then the profiles go back to something static and unused. I, for one, wouldn't blame it if Jelsoft actually "copies" that feature because of popular demand. iDunno, let's just leave it to fate and see what fate has in store for us.
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If topic descriptions are such a stupid idea, as you claim, then why have they been requested on vBulletin.org several times in the past?
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