Board Customization

Via a web browser, an administrator can:

• Customize the looks and colors of the board.  There are a 8 built-in color themes/skins (with default graphics) and 12 graphical themes (each with a different set of graphics) for you to choose from.  You can also create third-party plugin themes.
• Set up the bulletin board's identity.
• Insertable custom page-level style tag.
• Create [or delete/rename] new forums (limited only by server's resources).
• Create [or delete] new boards (limited only by server's resources).
• Set board topic type:
  - Active: Set to enable its service status.
  - Subscription and subscription limit: Set to allow subscription and the maximum number of people may apply.
  - Anonymous: Any one can participate, registered or unregistered.
  - Registered*: Only registered users can post.
  - Moderated: A strictly moderated mode that requires a moderator to approve a post before it is visible.
  - Administration*: Only administrators/moderators can post--used for announcements, FAQs, news, etc...
  * The 'Registered' and 'Administration' types can be set to 'Private', a mode that uniForum exclusively allows only registered users to read (and post).
  - Group ID: Providing a group of registered users exclusive access to a certain board topic.
• Set posts as board's announcements, the posts that will always remain on top regardless of their date.
• Set advertising banners.
  - uniForum has the ability to rotate advertising banners, you can enter as many ads as you wish and it will sequentially display these ads in various places on the board, you can even control the likelihood of their occurrences.
• Set welcome message -- a popup message that will greet the user as he/she enters the board.
• Link to custom-made user registration's policies and disclaimers page.

Hierarchical Management

uniForum's hierarchical management system is divided into 3 levels, each level has a distinct caliber of access.  Every level requires registration, and to register, the applicant must submit a valid email address.

• Level 1 (junior): The most basic level of access, this level is populated by general participants of the boards, where their purposes are purely for discussion and exchanging ideas.
  
• Level 2 (moderator):
  - This access level can be granted to selective members from level 1, who are highly responsible and most trusted by the owner of the website, or to members in the staff circle.  In his/her authorized board(s), a level 2 member can:
  - Delete and edit any posts, and close sub-topics.
  - Process the admission of new level 1 members, terminate level 1 membership, and edit level 1 members' profiles.
  - Transfer posts between boards.
  - Generate a mass email list from all users to email them at once (each user can choose not to be included in this list).

• Level 3 (Owner and Administrator):
    - This level is sub-divided into two types, administrator and owner.  A level 3 administrator has all the power from level 2, plus, he/she can process the admission of new level 2 members as well as terminating them.
    - There is only one profile/account for the level 3 owner, which will always be uniquely identified as [a default username] ADMINISTRATOR, who can perform all the above functions, plus, he/she can add new level 3 administrators as well as terminating them.
    - Level 3 owner is the highest status that's usually possessed by the owner of the website and can not be terminated/deleted online.  The level 3 owner, ADMINISTRATOR, can only be added manually when creating the database, before uploading to the server
    - All level 3 members can delete posts in mass; customize the boards, filter list, welcome message & layout/color theme; scan for errors, set options, temporary lock, etc...

The use of those levels pretty much depends on the needs of the owner.  On a small-sized website, you can skip utilizing the level 2 access to simplify your management process, however, on a larger scale, making use of all the levels can sophisticatedly help your management to be more flexible.

  For all types of users:

• Built-in dynamic tagging language, featuring secure downloading and the ability to create time/user/group ID dependent block of content, and many more...
• Advanced HTML editor, compatible with MS Internet Explorer 5 or higher.
• Switch between graphical and simple text user interfaces (GUI / SUI).
• Set dozens of client preferences.
• Search in all boards based on keywords and/or username.
• Retrieve entries by specific range of days.
• Sort retrieved entries forward or backward in time.
• Set font size in the sub-topic listing panel and its content.
• Post messages (option can be blocked by a level 3 member).
• Email a post's content to friends.
• Use expressive icons.
• Set various display options.
• Jump to a specific post by its ID.
• View features and statistics.
• Queue posts for later viewing.

  A registered user (level 1 or higher) can additionally have the followings:

• Board topic subscription.
• Buddy list system, an integrated system with 3 functions serving FRIEND, MARKED, and IGNORED types.
• Journal/weblog and guestbook systems, featuring:

- Selectable color theme to match with the member's website.
- Composite editing, allows the editing of all entries at once.
- Individual entry editing and deleting.
- Listing entries by date.
- Email notification of new entry.

• Private messaging system [has the same features as the journal and guestbook systems].
• View all user profiles, or search users based on the information they entered in their profiles.
• An online personal profile with various preferences, settings and statistics.
• A personal image/photo and avatar.
• Permission for the use of HTML tags.
• Encrypt post's content (or create cryptograms).
• Preservation of the registered username.
• Automatic insertion of the registered personal fields (From, Email and URL fields).
• Re-edit or revise his/her own message but only when the revising post has not yet accumulated a reply (However, moderators are not restricted in this sense).
• Send emails to other members.
• Uploading of personal photo/picture via the browser.
• View server time, calendar, character map, connection information, and users history.
• Email reminding and saving for login credentials.
• And more...

Automated Functions

• Board topic level's strictly moderated mode, a mode that every posting must be approved [by a moderator] to make its content visible to viewers.  Administrator can enable uniForum to automatically, instantly nofity moderator(s) [by email] if there're sub-topics pending for approval.
• Custom page-level style tag, you are able to create your own style tag that will be used to format every viewable page in uniForum.
• Posting interval control (or flood control).
• Search interval control.
• Online email-based registration system (no multiple accounts for the same email).
• All users' username's length is controllable by setting the minimum and maximum values.
• Password reminding by email.
• Email notification to the Administrator for every new message posted on the board, this option can be turned on or off.
• Insertion of registered personal fields for every logged in post.
• Date/time stamp for the user's login.
• Message filtering. You can use the filter editor to remove/censure foul languages by masking specific words.
• Hit/View tracking.
• Post/message voting system, you can use this system for polling purposes as well.
• Demo user account, used for purposes of introducing new users to the board whereas its username and password can not be altered by the users.

Statistics - Detailed Analysis and Reports

• Significant posting reports [on the front page]: most recent, most read, most recommended, and most popular.
• Statistics for user or users in relation to all board topics
• Statistics for topics and sub-topics, ideal for use in polling and voting processes.
• Daily posting activity analysis, and view reports on a day-by-day basis.
• User relational analysis, the ability to analyze one's posting activity in relation to another user or all users.
• Individually detailed statistics for each user.

Security & Resource Management

As each feature requires a significant part of the server's resources, understanding the role of each one of them is very crucial in efficient resource management.  To help this, every uniForum's feature can be turned on or off to maximize your message board's performance, that is providing you the ability to control what you need and don't need:

• Secure downloading.
• Selectable emailing protocols, or you can disable email service altogether.
• Password-protected for every account.
• Account/profile suspension.
• Extensive hierarchical management.
• Group ID classification system supports multiple entries per user, and board.
• Accessing to the board by registered or unregistered users can be set separately, or you can disable each group from creating new messages.
• You can control the limit for just about anything, the # of users per subscribable board topic, the # of posts and emails that each type of users may generate per session, the # of items for each listing of significant posting report, the size of the content field, guestbook, journal & private messaging buffer, page size, the length of the excerpt and subject lines, posting interval's time length, etc...
• Switch between the displaying of boards/topics from all forums or just one.
• Switch between graphical or text/simple UIs, user-interface.
• Force single mode, a display mode where uniForum reduces the listing and viewing of subtopics to one single frame--a space saver.
• Turn on or off DHTML and Flash animation.
• Turn on or off the listing of registered members for anonymous user access.
• Turn on or off the private messaging and guestbook systems.
• Set the limit to how many subtopics can be stored in the queue.
• You can clean up the board swiftly by deleting posts in mass number.
• Temporary lock access from all users.
• IP discrimination, or IP banning.
• Adaptive database usage, uniForum can be configured to use two databases, one for posting content and one for user profiles; or, optionally, just one database by combining the "Admin" table of user profiles into the same database of posting content.

Miscellaneous

• uniForum has numerous visual effects with the use of Dynamic HTML and Macromedia Flash.
• Unlike other types of first-generation message boards which could use as many files as the number of entries, a second-generation message board like uniForum uses only a single database to store all entries to the board; thus, data are dynamically reported on a per request basis.
• ASPX files are not compiled code (the compiled mirrors to be running are stored at a different location on the server), we do not recommend opening them in raw format, any accidental deletion of one single character could disrupt the function of the file (if not the whole application itself), furthermore, they're not to be changed without consenting with the author first.   We'd appreciate any suggestions for future improvement.
• uniForum can retrieve and edit data from any ODBC (Open Database Connectivity) compliant databases, those are but not limited to MS SQL Server, Oracle, MS Access, FoxPro, Paradox, etc...  Currently, MS Access and MS SQL database types are fully tested and guaranteed for immediate use.