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<title>Fossil Forums</title>
<h2>Introduction</h2>
As of Fossil 2.7, Fossil includes a built-in discussion forum feature.
Any project complex enough to be managed by Fossil can probably benefit
from having a discussion forum. Even if your project has a discussion
Any project complex enough to benefit from being managed by Fossil and
which has more than one user can probably also benefit from having a
discussion forum. Even if your project has a discussion forum already,
forum already, there are further benefits that stem from using Fossil's
built-in forum feature:
* Third-party discussion forum and mailing list software tends to be
difficult to install, set up, and administer. Fossil Forums aim to
be as close to zero-configuration as is practical.
* <b>Easy to administer:</b> Third-party discussion forum and mailing
list software tends to be difficult to install, set up, and
administer. The Fossil forum feature aims to be as close to
zero-configuration as is practical.
* <b>Malefactor resistant:</b> Because Fossil accepts forum posts
only via the web UI, it is inherently [./antibot.wiki | protected
against bots].
* Posts are stored in the Fossil repository using the same
[./fileformat.wiki | block chain technology] that Fossil uses to
store your check-ins, wiki documents, etc. Posts sync to cloned
repositories in a tamper-proof fashion.
* Because of Fossil's [./delta_format.wiki | delta compression
technology], discussions add little to the size of a cloned
repository. Ten years of the SQLite project's discussions —
averaging 2 or 3 dozen posts per day — compress down to just
35 MB of space in a Fossil Forums repository.
* <b>Space Efficient:</b> Because of Fossil's [./delta_format.wiki |
delta compression technology], discussions add little to the size
of a cloned repository. Ten years of the SQLite project's
discussions — averaging about 2 dozen posts per day — compress down
to [/forumpost/9b6f3f36bdb | just 35 MB of space] in a Fossil
forum repository.
* <b>Built-in Full-Text Search:</b> Fossil forums use
* Fossil Forums use [https://sqlite.org/fts3.html | SQLite's powerful
FTS4 full-text search engine]. If your project currently uses a
mailing list for discussions, this means you are no longer reliant
upon third-party mailing list archive services to provide a useful
search engine for your discussions.
[https://sqlite.org/fts3.html | SQLite's powerful FTS4 engine] to
handle searches. If your project currently uses a mailing list for
discussions, this means you are no longer reliant upon third-party
mailing list archive services to provide a useful search engine for
your discussions. If you are running a private Fossil repository,
you may not even have the <em>option</em> of delegating this useful
service to a third-party; Fossil provides this service out of the
box.
* <b>One Result Per Matching Post:</b> When you search the forum
archives via the Fossil web interface, you get only one result for
each matching post. When you search for project information via a
standard web search engine, you might get a result from the project
site's own mail archive plus one from Nabble, one from Gmane, one
from The Mail Archive...
* Because Fossil is a [./concepts.wiki | distributed version control
system], project members can search your forum archive while
disconnected from the network where the central Fossil instance
runs. Your past discussions are potentially just as valuable as a
wiki document or checkin comment: there is no good reason why you
should have to wait to get back on the Internet or back to the
office before you can search for past posts.
* <b>Search Off-Line:</b> Because Fossil is a [./concepts.wiki |
distributed version control system], project members can search
your forum archive while disconnected from the network where the
central Fossil instance runs. Your past discussions are potentially
just as valuable as a wiki document or checkin comment: there is no
good reason why you should have to wait to get back on the Internet
or back to the office before you can search for past posts.
* When you search the forum archives via the Fossil web interface,
* <b>Contribute Off-Line:</b> Fossil forum posts work like any other
you get only one result for each matching post. When you search a
mailing list's archives using a standard web search engine, you
might get a result from the project site's own mail archive plus
one from Nabble, one from Gmane, one from The Mail Archive...
* Because forum posts are normal Fossil artifacts, you can interlink
them with other Fossil artifacts using short internal links: link
to forum threads from a [./tickets.wiki | ticket], link to a wiki
document from a forum post, etc. These links are internal and
managed by Fossil itself, so links never become invalid simply
because your third-party forum software or mailing list search
engine changed its URL scheme.
posts are normal Fossil artifacts, you can interlink them with
other Fossil artifacts using short internal links: link to forum
threads from a [./tickets.wiki | ticket], link to a wiki document
from a forum post, etc.
* <b>Durable Links:</b> Once you create a valid internal artifact
link in Fossil, it <em>remains</em> valid, durably. With
third-party forum software and mailing list search engines, your
links are only valid until the third-party component changes its
URL scheme or disappears from the web.
* The forum uses the same role-based access control mechanism as
Fossil uses for all other accesses.
* <b>Role-Based Access Control:</b> The forum uses the same
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-based_access_control | RBAC
system] that Fossil uses to control all other repository accesses.
The Fossil forum feature simply adds several new fine-grained
capability bits to the existing system.
* <b>Enduring, Open File Format:</b> Since Fossil has an
* Since Fossil has an [./fileformat.wiki | open and well-documented
file format], your discussion archives are truly that:
<em>archives</em>. You are no longer dependent on a third-party
piece of software or service sticking around. Should you choose to
stop using Fossil, you can easily extract your discussion traffic
for transfer to another system.
[./fileformat.wiki | open and well-documented file format], your
discussion archives are truly that: <em>archives</em>. You are no
longer dependent on the lifetime and business model of a
third-party piece of software or service. Should you choose to stop
using Fossil, you can easily extract your discussion traffic for
transfer to another system.
* <b>Lightweight Markup:</b> Posts can be marked up using Fossil's
existing [/md_rules | Markdown] and [/wiki_rules | Wiki] markup
processors. No longer must you choose between two bad options: to
* Posts can be marked up using Fossil's existing [/md_rules |
Markdown] and [/wiki_rules | Wiki] markup languages. No longer must
you choose to restrict your discussion forums to plain text only
(good for security) or to allow HTML-formatted MIME email (good for
complex discussions). Fossil Forums provide <em>enough</em>
formatting without giving up security.
* Fossil forums integrate with third-party
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_transfer_agent | message transfer agents]
such as Postfix, Exim, and Sendmail. If you've got mail service
configured on the server hosting your Fossil instance, it can send
notifications of new posts to interested forum users, complete with
message content for those that prefer to visit the forum only when
they need to post something.
* Because Fossil accepts forum posts only via the web UI, it is
* <b>Easy Notification Emails:</b> Fossil's forum feature integrates
with popular [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_transfer_agent
| message transfer agents] (MTAs) such as Postfix, Exim, and
Sendmail. It is easy to configure Fossil to send notifications of
new posts to interested forum users via your Fossil server's
existing MTA. Notification emails include the complete message
content for the benefit of those that prefer to visit the forum
only when they need to post something.
* <b>Talks to Everyone:</b> Because Fossil delegates email handling
inherently [./antibot.wiki | protected against bots].
<h2>Setting up a Fossil Forum</h2>
<h2>Setting up aFossil Forum</h2>
<h3>Permissions</h3>
Fossil forums use the same role-based access control mechanism as
for normal Fossil repository logins.
There are several dedicated forum-related capability bits you can grant
|