Question

[greenwood]

I would like to have in my vB, 2 basic categories:

One will be for professional teachersAnother will be for the general public – non-professionals.

I would like to have these 2 general categories separated in such a way, that even before registration of a potential new user, each one will see only their own category because they would have gained initial access through a different directory.

An example of what I had in mind for the setup:Pro Teachers would first gain access to:

Mysite.com/forum/pro-teachers

The general public or students would gain initial access via:

Mysite.com/forum/students

This way, even when they first register, each group is only aware of their own forum.

I know that it is possible to set Vb up in a way where there are private forums, accessible only by those who have access to it, however my questions is regarding finding a way to let the PRO’s feel that they are an elite group and give them the feeling that they are accessing a forum where nothing else exists except for their PRO interests (and not student or other amateur stuff).

I would like them to have this impression as soon as they first enter the Vb even before they have registered.

Question:Do I have to purchase 2 licenses and install them totally separately in 2 different directories,ORIs there some other way to accomplish the above without me having to purchase 2 licenses and without running and maintaining 2 completely separate versions of VB?

[Floris]

Yeah, if you want to run two seperate instances, you will need two licenses.

But .. this is who I would solve it.

I would set up 2 special usergroups and two categories, each with their own forums and subforums.

I will have one dir where the forum is running from and two other dirs where a redirect file is placed that redirects them to the appropiate categories.

Each usergroup will only have access to specified category. Other links will show up as permission denied.

In order to make sure they can't find out 1.2.3 that they are in a seperate category, change the navigation links, so they can't go 'home'. That way the home is their category.

You could make a subdomain too:
http://teachers.yoursite.com/ and http://students.yoursite.com/ both pointing to their own category.

[greenwood]

Originally posted by xiphoid
Yeah, if you want to run two seperate instances, you will need two licenses.

But .. this is who I would solve it.

I would set up 2 special usergroups and two categories, each with their own forums and subforums.

I will have one dir where the forum is running from and two other dirs where a redirect file is placed that redirects them to the appropiate categories.

Each usergroup will only have access to specified category. Other links will show up as permission denied.

In order to make sure they can't find out 1.2.3 that they are in a seperate category, change the navigation links, so they can't go 'home'. That way the home is their category.

You could make a subdomain too:
http://teachers.yoursite.com/ and http://students.yoursite.com/ both pointing to their own category.

1) Initially, during the registration process, before they have any access to read or write, would each potential user group, which gained access through a different web page, still feel that they are registering for a forum which has only the type of content which they care for and not any of the other content?


2) (After the Registration process) Using the method you described, will each user group feel as though they were using their own self contained forum which has in it nothing else except for their own content?

[ManagerJosh]

Originally posted by greenwood
1) Initially, during the registration process, before they have any access to read or write, would each potential user group, which gained access through a different web page, still feel that they are registering for a forum which has only the type of content which they care for and not any of the other content?


2) (After the Registration process) Using the method you described, will each user group feel as though they were using their own self contained forum which has in it nothing else except for their own content?

This sounds like you will need codehacking. However a question is how can you prevent a student from not accessing a teachers area?

[Floris]

If I was you, and I would have to choose, I would purchase two licenses, this way I am sure that each forum is seperate and can be setup that way too.

But I do think with some coding and some hard thinking, it is possible to do this with just one license.