How important is a portal page

Teknomancer · Posted: 10/30/2005, 5:18 am Post subject: How important is a portal page

How important do you think a portal page to a site is. Personally, I don't feel much need of having a portal page to cover a site that is ONLY a forum.

I feel a portal page is needed only when the site has many other sections than just the forum. But the portal page sometimes also seems to "fit' fine for pure forum sites, and many people use it this way too.

I'm deciding whether or not I should have a portal page for my site which happens to be only a discussion forum like CommunityAdmins.

So, how important/essential do you think a portal page is?
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harishankar · Posted: 10/30/2005, 9:33 am Post subject:

It's a highly over-rated feature. I don't think a pure forum needs a front page. However a customized portal page does give a more polished look to a site. Also it's nice to have new site announcements show up in the front page. Apart from these small things, I really don't see the need for a portal page.
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Cross_+_Flame · Posted: 10/30/2005, 9:48 am Post subject:

I don't like the portal page. Too much information to be processed. I use drupal for content management for the main site which gives me a streamlined look, but links to everywhere else. KISS - Keep It Stupidly Simple!
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Truestar · Moderator

It sounds as if portals are a big thing. I must confess, I'm not a genius when it comes to the internet. Laughing

I may be a good administrator, but when it comes to the technical stuff, I'm dead.

So what is a portal? I have an idea, but I'm not sure.

Thanks.
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~HG~ · Posted: 10/30/2005, 2:53 pm Post subject:

A portal to me is like having a front door.

All my forums have portals and this is where I have a number of links etc plus it gives the user an opportunity to quickly see what is new since their last visit.

A lot of members actually read the recent topics on the portal and enter the forum that way.
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Nick · Posted: 10/30/2005, 10:32 pm Post subject:

What's the best portal out there for phpbb?
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dealo · Posted: 10/31/2005, 12:32 am Post subject:

for me im not a big fan of them either.

i generally bookmark a forum at the index.php that way i dont even have to see them.

Teknomancer · Posted: 10/31/2005, 8:06 am Post subject:

PHP-Nuke and Post-Nuke are the two most popular portals for phpBB, infact they are the only two I know of for phpBB.

For SMF forums, there is a mod for adding portals I think.

Portals (typical ones) are pages that have links like "Home", "Forums", "About", "Gallery" etc. on the left, have News and announcements in the middle, have login etc. on the right.

Most portals are usually 3 columnar pages that provide a sort of doorway/entry into the forum and other parts of the site.
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harishankar · Posted: 10/31/2005, 10:55 am Post subject:

Teknomancer · Posted: 10/31/2005, 11:22 am Post subject:

I'm not confused. I know what a portal page is Smile

I agree I didn't know that PHP-Nuke or Post-Nuke can be used with other forum software, but I think it's quite obvious that it's mainly used by phpBB forums.. I haven't come across a single vBulletin, Invision or SMF forum that uses PHP/PostNuke.

It may, but that's not popular atleast.
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