Confused on which Social Extension to choose!

[MrAnonymous]

Hi Admin,

I am in a huge dilemma for quite sometime and I need your opinion on this please...

I already have phpbb integrated with Joomla (thanks to your amazing bridge that I purchased just last week) and I want to install one of the Social network extensions (either CB, JomSocial or EasySocial). I have read the list of features for all of these SN extensions and have an understanding on what each of them have to offer. Any of these components can work for my site so I dont know which one to choose (none of them are cheaper neither). My biggest concern is the level of integration and the power of your p8pbb bridge with these extensions. Some of the integration that I like with phpbb and social extension is the ability to show users posts and topics in activity (something that your bridge already does), showing users forum posts in these SN Profiles, inviting friends to join when a new topic is posted in phpbb and whatever else you have got planning.

Based on the features your bridge offers with each of these 3 extensions, which one would you personally choose if you were going to install one for your projects?

Look, I absolutely understand that you may not be able to answer this since each of them has pros and cons and your choice may differ with another person. But since you know inside and out of your bridge, I want you to pick a choice out of these 3 extensions based on:

1) Which extension does your bridge offers the most number of features and highest level integration?

2) Considering the current feature lists of p8pbb bridge and also keeping in mind the future road map of your bridge development, which one do you think your bridge will work the best with?

3) If you were to install phpbb with p8pbb bridge and one of these SN extension, which extension would you personally choose? (you have to choose one please..)

Please choose 1 and I would like to know your thoughts and opinion on this. None of them are cheap so I am a big dilemma on which one to choose before I spend the hard earned money .

Thanks again Admin.

PS: I would also welcome inputs and experience from other users who may have tried these out. Your experience will help a lot.

[Admin]

1) Which extension does your bridge offers the most number of features and highest level integration?

JomSocial

2) Considering the current feature lists of p8pbb bridge and also keeping in mind the future road map of your bridge development, which one do you think your bridge will work the best with?

We think that EasySocial will get more integration next.

3) If you were to install phpbb with p8pbb bridge and one of these SN extension, which extension would you personally choose? (you have to choose one please..)

EasySocial. Just from developer point of view - it has better code and being a developer I like it more.

[MrAnonymous]

Thank you so much for your response. I was actually thinking of going towards EasySocial too. My reasons being, it is new, the development has been very fast and impressive so far, their support is great (like yours), and the lookwise a little different from JomSocial too. Although it has lesser features than JomSocial, if they continue well with their road maps, then it will catch up. The only thing I was re-considering is because the Jomsocial app and your p8pbb plug-ins integration is all ready and available to be integrated now. But since I see that you are also working on creating more integrations with ES as we speak gives me a good sign. Knowing that you also would choose EasySocial from developer point of view helped me a lot. I hope you give as much importance with EasySocial plug-ins too like you did with the JomSocial plug-ins, then your bridge will be awesome and feature packed.

Thanks you so much for your honest response. Really appreciated!

[Admin]

Thanks for your feedback!

[sarrene]

As a client and web admin/developer, I recommend going with EasySocial. As Admin had stated the code is a lot cleaner with less overhead to the site.

JomSocial has more features built in, but can also become a bit.. messy. Being that I was a jomsocial user since it came out, it was a difficult move at first, but once I had moved over to EasySocial when they were still in beta, I was amazed at the clean code, the easy customizations, etc.

I am not sure how difficult it has been for Admin to work with EasySocial and making the plugins and such, but I can assure you, he/they do a great job. And that was never a worry for me.

Good luck!

[Admin]

I can only add that EasySocial developer answers fast and can help with new required features in next version (though sometimes it takes time).

[MrAnonymous]

Thank you Sarrene for your input. Its fantastic to hear the thoughts from someone who has tried both JomSocial and ES (from web admin's perspective). I also checked out your site darkrelic and it does give me some inspiration on how we can use phpbb and Joomla's social network together. Thanks for that.

[sarrene]

Not a problem I am actually using both MightySights and p8pBB 3 bridge. I would also like to add that Support here is wonderful!

Good luck! share your site if you like. Would love to see how it turns out.