Ikonboard

Ikonboard is a free online forum or Bulletin Board System. Similar to systems such as VBulletin and PhpBB. The general premise allows users to post into a forum, and for others to make replies.

=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 file. 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 Ikonboad 3.0, and development occured 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.

==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 programming 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 database.

==Ikonboard 3.x==

After the release of Ikonboard 3.0, Mecham stopped developing Ikonboard, which by that time had been acquired by the Jarvis Entertainment Group. Development since has been by a team of volunteers. The current reincarnation, currently in 3.1.3 Build 09, is said by supporters to be one of the most stable message board scripts on the internet with no known bugs or security flaws. It is one of the first releases to contain major feature changes and additions. One of these new, much needed, features is the Humain Readable Image (HRI) which keeps malicious users from mass registering. Another addition which is probably the best would be the Update Center. This allows board admins to auto update their software right from their control panel. It is a shame to think that this release may never see the light of day.

==The Future ==

Unfortunately the current future of Ikonboard is very unclear due to the of support and information provided by Westlin Corporation. Allegedly as a result of Hurricane Rita the servers which hosted Ikonboard became unavailable for approximately a month, resulting in some of the development team departing due to lack of comment from Westlin Corporation

A With Westlin refusing to talk to the support staff and developers the iB3.1.3 beta 09 was removed from public access in October 2005 until further notice. It is rumoured that John Jarvis (former owner of Jarvis Entertainment Group) is in legal talks for the rights of Ikonboard, although the situation is very unclear.

=References=

*[http://www.opentechsupport.net/forums/archive/topic/2079-1.html Open Tech Support interview with Mecham (July 2001)] *[http://www.sitepoint.com/article/matt-mecham-ibforums Sitepoint interview with Mecham (September 2002)]

=External links=

*[http://www.ikonboard.com/ Ikonboard website] *[http://forums.ikonboard.com/ Ikonboard support forums] *[http://www.westlin.com/ Westlin Corporation] (formerly Jarvis Entertainment Group)