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Adding a discussion forum to your site with Kunena
Iʼll begin the process of installing a forum on my site with Kunena by going to kunena.com and clicking on Download.
On the Joomlacode site, Iʼll download the zip file of the latest version of Kunena here.
Then Iʼll go into the backend of my site to install it. Iʼll go to Extensions, then Install/Uninstall.
Iʼll click on Browse to find the zip file I just downloaded, and then double click on it when I find it.
Then Iʼll click on Upload File and Install.
I can see that Kunena has been successfully installed so I can now go into its admin panel by going to Components and then clicking on Kunena.
This is the main dashboard for Kunena and is where you can get a quick overview of the statistics for your forum.
The first thing Iʼll do is to set up some categories for my forum to give people different places to post topics.
To do this Iʼll go to Forum Administration.
Iʼll see some placeholder categories, or forums, already set up.
In order to set up categories where people can post topics, Iʼll need to have categories set up under top level categories, or forums. This Main Forum top level category is one of those.
The top level categories act as containers for categories, or what in other forum software are sometimes referred to as “boards,” or “sub-boards.”
To set up my first top level forum, Iʼll click on Main Forum.
Iʼll leave the Parent set to “no parent” so that this is a top level category.
Then Iʼll change the name here.
[General Discussion]
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The Description field is a place where you can add a description of this forum that will appear on the main index page of the forum.
Iʼll add one in now.
The Forum Header field allows you to add some extra text to the top of a given forumʼs page.
Iʼm going to leave everything else set on this page the way it is now.
This section below here allows you to change the security and access to this particular forum, or category.
If this forum category were a sub-level category that would contain actual posts, and if you want to lock this forum, or only allow registered users to view it, you can change settings in this section to create higher levels of security.
Since Iʼm done configuring this top level category, Iʼll save it now.
Now Iʼll change the name of this first sub level forum, or category by clicking on its name.
Iʼll leave the Parent set to General Discussion and change the forumʼs name here.
[Community Connections]
Iʼll leave this demo description text and the Forum Header text as it is.
You can, of course, put whatever you like in these fields, or not have anything here at all.
Iʼll leave everything else set as it is and save this category.
Then Iʼll do the same thing for the next category.
[Recommended Resources. Description: Have some resources you'd like to recommend to the community? Share them here.]
Now that Iʼve got that done, Iʼll create a second top level forum container so that I can add some other sub forums, or sub categories, for people to post in.
To do this Iʼll click on New, and Iʼll leave the Parent set to No Parent.
Then Iʼll give this category a name.
[Cycling]
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Iʼll leave the description and forum header fields blank for now.
Down in the Security section, for the Public Access Level, Iʼll select Everybody.
And now Iʼll save this category.
After I save it, in this list here, Iʼll click on the small red “x” in the published column to publish this new category.
Then Iʼll add a couple sub forums under this new top level container by clicking on New.
For the Parent, Iʼll select the top level category I just created.
And then Iʼll give this sub category a name.
[Road Biking]
And Iʼll leave the description and forum header blank for now, and set the Public Access Level to Everybody.
Now Iʼll save this category, and then publish it.
Then, Iʼll do the same thing again and create another subcategory.
[Mountain Biking]
If you would like to reorder your categories, you can do so using the reorder arrows in this column.
Now that I have some forums, or categories, set up I can go into the general configuration and set some things up was there.
To do this, Iʼll click on Kunena Configuration.
There are a lot of parameters that I can change on this page. I wonʼt be going over each of them in detail right now, but will touch on some of the more important ones.
In the Basics section, for the Board Title, Iʼll change this to the name of my forum.
For the Board e-mail address, Iʼll put in a valid e-mail address. This is the e-mail address that will be used when any emails are sent out from the forum, such as when someone reports a post to a moderator.
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For the rest of the parameters in this section, Iʼll leave them set as they are. Each of them are pretty easy to understand with the description of each of them that appears to the right here.
In the SEO settings section, Iʼll leave these things set as they are. You can change a few things about how Kunena handles search engine friendly URLs in this section.
In the Frontend section, and in the Look and Feel section, you can change many things about how threads and messages are laid out.
I will change the parameter called Default Kunena Page. This parameter controls what shows when a person goes to your forum page.
By default, visitors would see the most recent discussions when they go to your forum.
Personally, I like to have the categories appear as the default layout for the forum. So Iʼll change this to Categories.
There are many, many other parameters that you can change the settings for on this configuration page for Kunena.
Iʼm not going to go through each of the dozens and dozens of other parameters on this page right now.
But I encourage you to read through these parameters so that you can see what they do. As I mentioned a moment ago, the explanations next to the parameters are pretty good.
Before I leave this page however, I will point out that in the Security section, which you can see when I scroll down, the default settings are set to allow general public visitors to your site to be able to see the forums and the posts in the forums, but in order to post a message in any of the forums they would have to register and become members of your site.
You can change the security settings for your forum here in this section, if you donʼt like the default settings.
For now, Iʼll save the configuration settings on this page.
Next, Iʼll go ahead and create a menu item for Kunena so that I can see what the forum looks like on the front of the site at this point.
To do that, Iʼll go to Menus and then select Main Menu.
Then Iʼll click on New, and from this list Iʼll select Kunena Forum.
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Iʼll give this menu item a title here, leave everything else as it is, and save this menu item.
And back on the front of the site, Iʼll click on the new menu item I just created for the forum.
With things set as they are currently, both for my site as well as the Kunena configuration parameters, this is how the forum will look on my site.
The first thing I would like to do is to remove the module from the left column so that the forum can use the entire width of the page, and Iʼd also like to remove the modules at the bottom of the page.
To do that, Iʼll go back into the backend of this site and go to Extensions and then select Module Manager.
The module is that I have published in the left column are the Main Menu and the Popular Articles modules.
Iʼll start with the Main Menu thatʼs in the left position on the site.
Iʼll open it by clicking on its name, and then for the Menu Assignment, Iʼll check Select Menu Items from the list.
Then, Iʼll scroll down so that I can see the Forum menu item on the main menu, and Iʼll hold down the command key on a Mac or the control key on a PC and while Iʼm holding that key down Iʼll click on the Forum menu item.
That will deselect just the Forum menu item from this list, which means that this module will no longer appear on this menu itemʼs page.
Then Iʼll save this module.
And then Iʼll do the same thing for all three of the modules that are appearing at the bottom of my site.
Now that I have those modules set to not show on the Forum page, Iʼll go back to the front of the site and refresh the page.
And now the forum is using the full width of the main body container on my site, and the only thing appearing on this page is the forum itself with no other modules.
As you can see, there are two forum containers visible which correlate to the two top level forums, or categories, that I set up in the backend.
If I click on the title of this forum, youʼll see some test topics I created earlier.
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Clicking on a topic, or thread, displays the discussion thread.
Back on the index page for this forum, or category, youʼll notice that I do not have an option to start a new thread.
This is because I left the security settings as the default settings, which prevents non-registered users from being able to post anything in the forums.
As a non-registered user I am able to read the posts, but I canʼt participate in any discussions until I become a registered user.
To do that it, I can click on the Register link right here.
Iʼll fill out these fields here.
This description section and the avatar fields below are not related to Kunena.
In order to upload an avatar image that will appear in the forum, Iʼll need to do that from within Kunena.
At this point Iʼll click on Register.
And as long as everything goes okay with the registration process, Iʼll see this message here after I click on Register.
Iʼll need to check my e-mail inbox to click on a confirmation link.
After Iʼve confirmed my registration, I can come back into the forum and login.
Iʼll click on Login and enter my login information.
And now that Iʼm logged in, Iʼll see a new tab at the top called My Profile, which is where I can upload an avatar image and set other information for my profile.
Iʼll click on it now, and upload an avatar image by clicking on My Avatar.
Then Iʼll click on Browse and navigate to where Iʼve got an image prepared.
Once I find it Iʼll double click on it and then click on Upload.
There are other various options that users can set which you can see by exploring the many items in the left column here.
Now Iʼll go back into the forums by clicking on the Categories tab, and then Iʼll open up this sub forum here.
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And now that Iʼve registered and logged in I can see that I have the option to start a new thread by clicking on this icon here.
Once I do that, I come to the page where I can enter in a title for this topic, or thread, and then I can enter my post text here.
When Iʼm done, I can click on Submit to post this new thread.
Because I created this particular post I can edit this post by clicking on this button here.
If I want to reply to this thread, I just click on Reply Topic.
And now I can enter a reply.
All of the information appearing in the right column here, about the particular user that made this post, can be set to show or not to show in the configuration page within Kunena.
If I click on the My Discussions tab, I can see all of the discussions that I have subscribed to.
Now, I donʼt know if you noticed it earlier, but after someone logs into the forum they are redirected to the home page of the site, which is a little confusing.
In order to be able to reset the page that people will come to after they login, youʼll need to install an extra module, called the Kunena Login Module, and a modified php file.
Iʼll show you how to set these things up now.
To get the Kunena login module, go to this page in the Joomla extensions directory.
You can search for it with in the Joomla Extensions Directory, or click on the link at the top of this lesson to get directly to its page.
Then click on the Download button, and youʼll be taken to the website of the creators of this module.
Click on the Modules and Plug-ins folder, and if you do not have Community Builder installed on your site, download the 1.5.1 version.
At the time that this video is being created, there is a bug in the 1.5.2 version that you will see if you do not have Community Builder installed on your site.
I donʼt have Community Builder installed on my site, so Iʼll download the 1.5.1 version.
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By the time youʼre watching this video, the bug in 1.5.2 may have been fixed so you can go ahead and try that one if you like, or, download whatever the latest version is on this site.
Once Iʼve downloaded it, I can go into the backend of my site and install this module as I would any other extension.
Iʼll go to Extensions and then select Install/Uninstall.
Iʼll click on Browse to find the module I just downloaded, then Iʼll double click on it and then click on Upload file and install.
Now I can go to Extensions and then select Module Manager.
Then Iʼll click on Kunena Login to open up this new module I just installed.
First Iʼll make sure that itʼs enabled here, and then for the Menu Assignment Iʼll click on Select menu items from list, and then Iʼll just select the Forum menu item.
In the parameters for the login redirection page Iʼll select the Forum menu item from this list.
And Iʼll do the same thing for the logout redirection page.
There are a number of other parameters I can change here, but Iʼll leave them alone for now.
Now Iʼll save this module and take a look on the front of the site.
Youʼll notice that this new module has been published in the left position of my template, since thatʼs the position I left it set as.
However, I would like this login module to appear in this location here, within Kunena itself, so that the forum can use the full width of the page.
In order to get the Kunena login module to appear in this location within Kunena, Iʼll need to upload a modified php file for Kunena which currently can only be gotten from the discussion forum on the website where I just downloaded the Kunena login module from.
Back on that site in their discussion forum Iʼll go to their TK support forum and then click on the Kunena login module sub forum.
The thread that has the modified PHP file that I need is called “login module in profile box with default_ex template.”
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You can search for that thread to find it, or just browse until you find it.
Itʼs this thread right here, so Iʼll open it and within this thread I can download the modified PHP file that Iʼll need to upload into Kunena in order to get the Kunena login module to appear in that top profile box.
To download it Iʼll click on this link here.
Once you download this zip file with the modified PHP file in it, you can unzip the file so that it will be ready to upload to the server.
The first step in uploading this file is to first download a copy of the original file in case anything goes wrong.
Iʼll open up my FTP program and do that now.
Iʼll connect to my server by going to File, and then clicking on Site Manager. Iʼll select my site from this list, and then click on connect.
Then Iʼll go to the public HTML directory, which is where my site is installed, and then Iʼll go to the Components directory, then the com_kunena directory, then template, then default, then plug-in, then profilebox.
And in this directory Iʼll first download a copy of the profilebox.php file to my computer so that I have a copy of the original.
First Iʼll select a location on my computer thatʼs in a different location than the modified version so I donʼt override it.
Then Iʼll select it, and right-click and choose download.
And now I can upload the modified version of the profilebox.php file and overwrite the one that is currently there.
Iʼll find the modified version of this file on my computer, select it, right-click and choose Upload.
Now Iʼll need to go into the backend of my site and open up the Kunena login module again.
Back in the Module Manager, Iʼll click on Kunena Login, and Iʼll set Show Title to No.
For the Position, Iʼll type in kunena_profile, which will cause this module to appear in the top profile box of the forum.
And in the parameters, next to Style, Iʼll select Horizontal.
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Then Iʼll save this module and take a look on the front end.
And now this Kunena login module is appearing in the profile box of the forum.
If I login, after I click on login Iʼll be redirected right to this forum instead of to the homepage of my site.
If you would like to change the dimension of the avatar image that appears after logging in, you can do so in the parameters for the Kunena Login module.
Or, if you donʼt want to have that displayed at all you can select to have it not show.
Next, Iʼll show you some extra options that appear on the front end when you login as a moderator.
First, Iʼll go into Kunena and change the rank title of a user I created earlier to a moderator, and then Iʼll login with that user to show you the extra options on the front of the site.
To do this, Iʼll go back into Kunena and Iʼll go in to Components and then click on Kunena.
Then Iʼll click on User Administration.
Next, Iʼll click on the name of the user that I would like to change the rank for.
Next to Rank Title, Iʼll change the rank title for this user to Moderator. This will change the rank title underneath their avatar image for any posts that they make, or in their profile.
You can select which forums, or categories, you would like this user to be able to moderate in this section below here.
Iʼll check Yes next to “is moderator”, and then select all of the forum categories by selecting the first one, holding down the shift key and then selecting the last one.
Then Iʼll save these changes.
And back in the forum on the front of the site, Iʼll login as that user.
And now when I navigate into a discussion thread, I can see that I have a number of extra options available to me as a moderator.
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I can delete posts and threads, or topics, move them, make them into a sticky topic so that it stays at the top of the list of topics, I can lock a topic so that no one else can reply to it, or I can merge it with another topic.
Also, notice that underneath my avatar image my rank has changed to Moderator.
Next, Iʼd like to point out these two tabs up top. One is for Rules and the other is for Help.
If youʼd like to add some forum rules, let me show you how you can do that.
Back in my site Iʼll create a new article where Iʼll put usage rules for my forum.
To do this, Iʼll go to Content, then select Article Manager, and then Iʼll click on New.
Iʼll give this article a name, and put it in the uncategorized section and category.
Then Iʼll put in some text for the forum rules, and save this article.
Then in the list of articles here, Iʼll take note of the ID of this article. Iʼll need to enter this into the Kunena configuration page.
Iʼll do that now by going to Components and then clicking on Kunena, then Iʼll click on Kunena configuration.
Iʼll scroll down to the Frontend section, next to Rules Content ID Iʼll type in the ID of that article I just created.
I could do the same exact process for the Help tab, right below here.
For now, Iʼll just show you this process with the Rules tab.
Keep in mind that you can set both of these tabs to not show at all if you would not like them to appear. You would just set Show rules to No, or Show help to No.
Now Iʼll save these changes and go back to the forum on the front.
Iʼll refresh the page and then click on the Rules tab.
You can see the forum rules I put in that article being inserted right here into the forum.
Next, if the default template that comes with Kunena doesnʼt look good with your site, you can do one of three things: you can either customize the default template, create your own template, or install a Kunena template made by someone else.
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You can find some templates for Kunena in the main Kunena discussion forum here on the Kunena site.
If you scroll down youʼll see a sub forum called User Contributions. In this forum youʼll find threads where people have posted links to download templates that they have made for Kunena.
You can also go to templatekunena.com where they have some free Kunena templates as well as a Kunena template club that you can join to get commercial templates.
Iʼll show you how to install a custom template by downloading a free template from another site.
In the Kunena forum, in the User Contributions board, Iʼll go to Templates and Design, and Iʼll click on this topic here called Sample User Designed Templates.
Iʼll scroll down until I see one that I like, and Iʼll click on it to get to the website where I can download it.
On this page Iʼll click on the Download link.
Once you get on this site, youʼll have to register in order to be able to download any of the Kunena templates.
Once you register and download a template, youʼll have a zip file on your computer.
The first thing youʼll need to do is to unzip the zip file.
Iʼve already done that part of the process and Iʼll now upload that template folder into the appropriate location on the server.
To do this, Iʼll open up my FTP program and then go to Components, then com_kunena, then template, and in this folder Iʼll upload the template folder I just unzipped.
After thatʼs completed, Iʼll go back into the Kunena configuration page.
Then Iʼll scroll down to the frontend section, and next to template Iʼll see an option to select the template I just uploaded in this drop down menu.
Now Iʼll save that change, and then Iʼll go back to the forum and refresh the page.
And now I can see the new template being applied to Kunena.
Lastly, Iʼll do a quick overview of the other options in the Kunena control panel.
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Back in the backend of my site, in Kunena, weʼve already seen the Configuration page, the Forum Administration page, and the User Administration page.
The Edit Smileyʼs page is where you can edit the characters that people will need to type in, in order to insert emoticons into their posts. You can also edit any of the existing emoticons and add new ones.
The Rank Management page allows you to edit the names of the ranks that people will get in the forums based on the number of posts they have written.
You can also change the image associated with each rank, as well as the number of posts needed to reach a certain rank level.
The Uploaded Files Browser allows you to view the collection of files that people have uploaded and attached to any posts in your forum, if you allow them to do so.
Thereʼs nothing showing here because no one has uploaded any files in this forum.
And the same goes for the Uploaded Images Browser page.
The Edit CSS File page allows you to edit the CSS for the template that youʼre using in the forum.
The Prune Forums page allows you to automatically prune, or delete, threads that have not had any posts in a certain number of days, if youʼd like to do so.
The Synchronize Users page allows you to synchronize various aspects related to the members of your forum.
The Recount Category Stats page simply allows you to get the latest update for the statistics on your forum.
And the Support Website Link simply links back to the main Kunena website.
There is much more detail that could be gone in to on the Configuration page, but for now the things that Iʼve covered will be enough to help you get the forum set up and running.
I encourage you to read through all of the available parameters in the Configuration page if youʼd like to make further adjustments that I may not have covered in this video.
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