Here are some of the new features and improvements of JForum 2.1:
UPDATED
Including all features listed here, version 2.1.4 includes several fixes, specially for PostgreSQL and HSQLDB. Other minor improvements, including for the email tasks were made as well.
For users who are already running version 2.1 or 2.1.3 and would like to migrate, a patch is available in the download page: http://www.jforum.net/download.jsp
List of changes in JForum 2.1
:arrow: Attachments - Now it is possible to attach files to the messages. JForum provides a complete and powerful management, including Extension Groups, with the option to block some set of extensions, Quota Limits configurable by user groups and individual users, so you can impose a limit of size to the uploaded files, maximum number of attachments per message, and some more configurable options.
:arrow: Bookmarks - Did you liked of some
thread? add it to your bookmark. Each discussion thread has a like named "Bookmark it!", which, when used, will save the thread's address in your bookmark list, so you can refer to it at any time. You may also choose to make your bookmark entries visible to other users, sharing information with everyone.
:arrow: Karma - "karma" is a rating which messages and users get according to the quality of the discussion. You may rate each message individually, be it good or bad, and then have a clear and simply visual of the best - or worst - messages. The karma is represented by little stars icons, which appear in each message and in the user's profile.
:arrow: Message Moderation - Now, board administrators may choose to only allow a new message be posted to some Category or Forum after it is approved by some administrator. So, when an user post a new message, it enters in a queue, waiting for the approval. If it gets an "ok", then all users will be able to see the message.
:arrow: Member Listing - JForum 2.1 includes a new feature, Member Listing, which lists all registered users in the board.
:arrow: Read-only / Reply-only forums - Now forums may be set as "read only" to some pre-determined users or groups, making it impossible to create new messages in the respective forum. It is useful in cases when the administrator decides that some forum should not get any more messages, but wants to keep the content available for consult purposes. On the other hand, "Reply-only" forums allow that users or groups with special privileges create new threads, but restrict regular users to be able to only reply to existing topics.
:arrow: Localized Icons - Icons which have text, like "New Topic", "Reply" and "Quote" now can be configured to be shown in different languages, independently of the board's language.
:arrow: Online status in the messages - When reading a thread, the online status of the message's author is displayed along to its username and personal information.
:arrow: Plugable cache engine - Starting from version 2.1, JForum is able to use different ways to cache data. The default implementation uses regular collection classes and comes with an implementation using JBossCache, for replicated cache.
:arrow: Configurable login authenticator - Also, JForum 2.1 can be configured to use domain specific classes to autheticate users. This is very useful when integrating JForum to other systems.
:arrow: Other features:
Improved bbcode handling - now URLs are automatically transfored into links. Bug fixes in the parser were also made
DataSource connections - possibility to use a DataSource to connect to the database
Captcha - JForum can be configured to require users to prove they're human, by asking them to enter a text which is displayed in a image. Very useful to prevent robots to regiter.
User registration locking - the administration can "lock" the register proccess, to avoid users to register in the board.
MySQL 4.1+ support - support for the newest versions of MySQL
RSS for Recent Topics
Lots of bug fixes - many new bug fixes and improvements to existing code were made
[originally posted on jforum.net by Rafael Steil]