Information AboutIkonboard |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT IKONBOARD | |
| internet forum software | |
Ikonboard is a free Online Forum or Bulletin Board System developed in Perl for use on MySQL , PostgreSQL , Oracle , as well as Flat File databases. VERSION HISTORY Ikonboard 0.9 The first released version of Ikonboard was 0.9 beta, in September 1999 . It was written by Matthew Mecham in Perl and stored all data in Flat Text Files . Compared to present-day message board software, such as Mecham's own Invision Power Board , it contained only basic features. Ikonboard 1.x Releases in the 1.x series of Ikonboard built on the original 0.9 beta code. It was still authored entirely by Mecham, and stored data in text files. Ikonboard 2.1.x Ikonboard's 2.1.x series incorporated some of the ideas and developments from the 1.x series, but started with a new codebase. It was with the 2.1.x series releases that Ikonboard really became popular on the web, perhaps due to its status as a free alternative to UBB . The 2.1.x releases of Ikonboard contained many of the features found in today's forum software. As with previous releases, Ikonboard 2.1.x releases were written in Perl and used a flat file storage system. While the actual code for the software continued to be written exclusively by Mecham, other members from the "Ikonboard community" assisted in providing things like images and documentation. Ikonboard 2.2 Ikonboard 2.2 was an effort to continue improving the 2.x series after Mecham shifted his efforts to Ikonboard 3.0, and development occurred alongside that of Ikonboard 3.0. Most of the development, promotion, and support efforts were focused on the 3.0 series, however, and there has never been a stable release of Ikonboard 2.2. Since late December 2005 the download for the 2.2 development was removed from the site, and effectively discontinued as the team work on the 3.x series. Ikonboard 3.0 Ikonboard 3.0 represented a "total rewrite" for Ikonboard. The board was still coded entirely in Perl; however, Mecham adopted an Object-oriented style of coding, and did away with flat files in favor of storage abstraction, allowing data storage in a Relational Database such as MySQL or Oracle . After the release of Ikonboard 3.0, Mecham stopped developing Ikonboard, which by that time had been acquired by the Jarvis Entertainment Group. Between the transition there was a brief dispute of the domain name ownership which resulted in the website being down for a few weeks and pointing users to forum software, specifically Invision Power Board . After the issue was resolved the site continued, with development since being made by a team of volunteers. Releases in the 3.0.x series represented small fixes and improvements on Mecham's 3.0.0 code. Ikonboard 3.1 As the new developers gained familiarity with the code, larger changes were made in the 3.1.x series releases. For a long time the stable version was 3.1.2a. Noticeable additions included the addition of a 'quick reply' box below topics. The next release was due to be 3.2 and was originally started in 2003. However for various reasons work of this version stalled, with many of the developers leaving to work on Infinite Core Technology , another forum software. This resulting in the next release of Ikonboard becoming 3.1.3, and was publically released on January 30 2006 . It currently contains only minor bugs and no known security vulnerabilities. It is one of the first releases to contain major feature changes and additions. The most significant new additions in this release will include the Humain Readable Image (HRI) which keeps malicious users from mass registering, and an update centre in the adminCP. The current release is iB 3.1.4 which is a release which fixes several bugs that were found in version 3.1.3. Ikonboard 3.2 iB 3.2 is the next planned release of Ikonboard, and will see numerous changes. Originally work on 'iB 3.2' began in late April 2003. However work on this version stalled and development made towards this version was released as iB 3.1.3. After the release of iB 3.1.4 work on 3.2 formerly restarted on 10th February 2006. The current development version is build 3, though to date currently no public releases have been made. More information on iB 3.2 can be found at: http://wiki.ikonboard.com/wiki/IB_3.2 IKONBOARD OWNERSHIP Under Westlin With the departure of former John Jarvis, the Jarvis Entertainment Group changed its name to Westlin Corporation. During much of September 2005 , the servers on which Ikonboard was hosted were unavailable. Westlin declined to comment on the outage, prompting several staff members to quit. In October 2005 , with Westlin still declining to talk to the support staff and developers, Ikonboard releases were no longer available for download. Under Pitboss Ent. On October 28 , 2005 , after weeks of speculation, ownership of Ikonboard was officially transferred to John Jarvis. At the beginning of December 2005 Ikonboard came back online with a new support forum with the help of Joshua Johnson, as previous backups of the board were unavailable. Ikonboard is now back under ownership of John Jarvis. On 18th December 2005 the Ikonboard website was given a refresh by one of its' support staff, who later became part of the admin. Under the ownership the site initally suffered numerous problems ranging from problems with the server to the domain being suspended. However things have become more stable, with new releases of iB being made. Under Level 6 Studios On March 22 , 2006 , it was announced to staff by the head of Ikonboard that Pitboss as such no longer existed, and all its assets (including Ikonboard) now came under "Level 6 Studios". This has since been confirmed as Pitboss Entertainments' site now mirrors 'Top Site Lists', and the domain records for Ikonboard.com have been updated to reflect the new owners/company name. Related Info Sine mid-2005 the staff of Ikonboard have refered to themselves as 'The Ikonboard Team'. This team consists of unpaid volunteers, who provide support as well as developing future releases. The team has remained largely unchanged despite the changes of ownership, though some are no longer actively part of the current support team. RELATED PRODUCTS myIkonboard myIkonboard is a separate product originally created by Ikonboards' parent company. While not directly connected to Ikonboard, it was originally powered by a PHP development version of Ikonboard. This version was relatively short lived, with myIkonboard going down about a year prior to the change of ownership. In March 2006 it was announced by Ikonboards' new owners that myIkonboard would return, powered by the Ikonboard software. Support has never been officially provided by Ikonboard staff due to the buggy nature of the myIkonboard software, being never fully finished and development halted, as well as the fact that myIkonboard was a separate product to Ikonboard. PHP versions In 2003 work began on creating a PHP version. Under the name 'project mongoose' 2 versions were developed entitled 'Ikonboard PHP' and 'iBPLite'. However neither product made it to a public release, though a version of Ikonboard PHP was used in the original myIkonboard. To date, no further work has been done in developing a PHP version since the change of ownership. REFERENCES
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