This article explains how to Install MyBB Forum on Windows
MyBB Forum
MyBB forum is free and open-source forum software. It is intuitive, extensible, and incredibly powerful forum software. It offers good features like forums to threads, posts to private messages, search for profiles, and reputation to warnings.
This forum has everything you need to have to run a community or forum website. There are a good number of themes and plugins available to extend functionality.
MyBB Features,
- Plugins – Supports the plugin system to make adding more features to the forum easy.
- Themes – built-in template and theme editor gives you complete control over your forum’s design.
- Moderation – Powerful and convenient tools for forum moderators and staff to work by your side.
- Administration – Developed and refined to put you in full control of your forum.
- Discussions – Infinite possibilities arise from every conversation on your forum.
- Users – Features to keep your users engaged and active.
- Messaging – Participate in private conversations with several registered users at a time.
- Performance – MyBB has been carefully developed to be both powerful and extremely efficient
You can use XAMPP, WAMP or any other web development software. This will help you to evaluate the forum before moving to production
Pre-Requisite
This tutorial assumes a basic working knowledge of the Windows Operating system.
Software/Tools
- Microsoft Windows 8.1/10 32/64 Bit Operating System (Buy from Microsoft Store
- XAMPP Version: 5.6.28– Free Apache Distribution
- MyBB 1.8.13
MyBB Installation Guide
Follow step by step for complete installation.
Download MyBB forum software
Download forums software from the official download page. 1.8.13 is the current version at the time of writing this article. It is a zip file.
Click on Download MyBB 1.8.13 button shown in below image.
Start XAMPP Apache and MySQL service
Open XAMPP control panel and start Apache and MySQL service. Both services are needed. Make sure Module icon turns green and PID(s) and Ports(s) are populated.
Create MySQL Database and User
MyBB needs a MySQL database to store database object. Open PHPMyAdmin create user and database. Create MYSQL Database MyBB and User mybbadmin as shown below using phpMyAdmin dashboard.
Start forum installation wizard
Extract downloaded file to a drive. It has 2 folders upload and documentation. Rename upload folder to mybb and copy it to C:\xampp\htdocs folder where XAMPP is installed.
Open a web browser and type http://localhost/mybb on the address bar. It opens below a window and your installation is started.
Welcome
This is a welcome page which shown an overview of the installation process. There are different sections. You need to enter valid information and click on next. It is easy to install Wizard Driven Installation.
License Agreement
Read License Agreement and click Next to progress further.
Requirements Check
MyBB installer checks all necessary requirement like PHP Version, Supported DB Extension, PHP XML extensions, etc. See the image below.
Database Configuration
Enter details like Database Engine, Hostname, Username and Password created in the above steps. If you want you can change table pre-fix, else leave it as is.
Table Creation
This just shows table created to store database object by the installer. Just check the log, if no error click next.
Table Population
There is some default data which MyBB install in tables just created above.
Theme Insertion
This step inserts the default theme and template file.
Board Configuration
Specify forum name, contact email, website name, etc. As I am installing on localhost I am not going to change website name.
Create Administrator Account
Create Admin Account. Enter the proper username and strong password for Admin user.
Finish Setup
This is the final step and your forum should be ready.
Below is the dashboard.
Below is the Admin Dashboard.
That’s it and MyBB forum software is installed successfully on Windows using XAMPP.
Next, you need to explore feature and take a decision if you want to go ahead with this forum for a production environment.