What does IPBWI mean?
IPBWI stands for Invision Power Board Website Integration.

What’s the difference between IPBWI and IPBWI for WordPress?
IPBWI is a free, GPL licensed Application Programming Interface (API) allowing you developing own PHP applications connected to Invision Power Board. PHP skills are required to benefit from this product.

IPBWI for WordPress is a commercial plugin for WordPress based on IPBWI API. There are no PHP skills required. This plugin allows Single Sign On, several Features and Widgets for WordPress to combine IP.board as community plattform with WordPress as content management system and blog.

IPBWI for WordPress FAQ

How can I test IPBWI for WordPress before buying?
You can download the free 30 days demo

I’m using WordPress – should I use IPBWI as API or IPBWI for WordPress?
IPBWI for WordPress uses IPBWI API to make the plugin functionalities possible. IPBWI for WordPress is not free while the IPBWI API is free. Nevertheless, you would invest thounds of $ and hundreds of hours to reach the same featurebase and stability as IPBWI for WordPress. Additionally, Updates in WordPress and IP.board need to be cared of, too. My opinion: If you like the demo of IPBWI for WordPress, you’ll go the cheaper way just buying a license.

Wy should one choose this product as opposed to having something custom, waiting, or finding something that does not have encoded files?

• The effort to make IPBWI for WordPress to a proper plugin and not a dirty hack is immense. There are tons of tweaks to increase compatibility. I have years of knowledge about integration to IP.board. You can wait for another solution, but IPBWI for WordPress is the most updated, most compatible, most continued and most supported plugin with the biggest feature setup you can find in the web. I’ve seen many competitors the last years which all failed with continuing the product on a long period.
• My target group are small and medium sized companies who know worth of a good service and support and don’t need to get everything for free. Additionally, I’m offering enhancing IPBWI for WordPress with customer ordered features. I have had customers, who ordered me enhancing IPBWI for WordPress to fit their needs. I gave them a 50% discount on my hourly rate and released the ordered features within IPBWI for WordPress, so all customers had a benefit.
• IPBWI for WordPress is encoded on it’s core files only. You can customize all the widget’s output code on PHP, HTML and CSS base, you can hook into encoded functions and you can use the whole IPBWI API through IPBWI for WordPress within your template to enhance WordPress with your own integration features.

What does SSO mean?

SSO means Single Sign On and describes that IPBWI for WordPress will take care that all user accounts are synced. It also includes ability to automaticly login on both systems with same login credentials. Automatic login follows the same origin policy, but allows wildcards for subdomains.

How does synchronization work?

• new user registers, doesn’t exist in IPB and WP:
  • IPBWI for WordPress will automaticly create both accounts in IPB and WP with same credentials, fully synced
• user exists in WP but not IPB:
  • IPBWI for WordPress will automaticly create IPB account upon next login in either IPB or WP, fully synced
• user exists in IPB, but not in WP:
  • IPBWI for WordPress will automaticly create WP account upon next login in either IPB or WP, fully synced
• user exists in IPB AND WP with same credentials (already synced):
  • IPBWI for WordPress will take care that every future change of login credentials will be automaticly synced with both systems, IPB and WP
• user exists in IPB AND WP with different credentials (one or more of the following fields aren’t synced: login, email, password):
  • IPBWI has no chance to sync this useraccount, because it would be a security issue e.g. to automaticly overwrite the email or password in one system when it differs with the other system.
  • solutions:
    • admin manually syncs account (works with unsynced login, email or password)
    • user resets password via password recovery option, either via IPB or WP (works with unsynced password)

If IPBWI for WordPress works not as described above on your system, it could have different reasons which should be fixed, e.g. plugin incompatibility, false configuration or bugs. Contact me then and I’ll take a view on that.

I’d like to keep the blog area of my site open to guests along with the name, url, and email areas for commenting. I saw on this site a lot isn’t available until you register or sign in. Is it for show or is this something that isn’t easily changed? Or is http://ipbwi.com/ not fully bridged with this forum?

it’s a question of permissions. E.g. IPBWI for WordPress fully respects forum permissions, so on IPBWI.com, I’ve decided to prevent guests posting new comments on the website. Of course, you can enable guests posting forum comments on your blog posts by giving guests write access to the comment forum on your board’s admin area. Additionally, ipbwi.com has another secondlevel domain than straightvisions.com, that’s the reason why there is no cookie sharing possible at the moment between the forum and ipbwi.com (Nevertheless, login with same credentials is possible).

How easy is it to install and then to set up? How much technical knowledge is required?

it’s quite easy, but some basic Hosting Administration skills are required. E.g. Ion Cube Loader in the latest version needs to be installed, you should be able to retrieve installed PHP version on your server (e.g. via phpinfo) and you should know how to set correct server-side-paths in the settings (retrieving with phpinfo). A HowTo install IPBWI for WordPress is published on http://ipbwi.com/howto-ipbwi4wp/ – you can try out installing the free Demo first or order my installation service.

If IPBWI is ever discontinued will there be any problems with removing the bridge or replacing the bridge if another developer ever creates one?

No, There is no problem with deactivating or removing the bridge. If IPBWI for WordPress is ever discontinued, I’ll make the code opensource and free.

How well does this work on shared hosting?

it works well on shared hosting environment. Please note, that WordPress, IPBWI for WordPress and IP.board need to be installed on the same server / host account.

Are there any conflicts with Gravatar (forum or WP) or social network created accounts from sites like Twitter/FB?

Please test this with the free Demo by your own, I can not give a guarantee for that at the moment.

How much transparency is there with bugs and/or is there any sort of bug tracker other than http://straightvisio…for-wordpress/ ?

I have had setup a bugtracker for previous versions of IPBWI. Unfortunately, most user did ignore the bugtracker and just wrote bugs within the support forum. So with version 3, I’ve removed the bugtracker and use the supportforum as plattform for bugreports.

I’m really mainly concerned about sharing of accounts. This creates accounts for both WP and IPB instead of using a single database?

IPBWI for WordPress duplicates accounts to make it easy to deactivate IPBWI for WordPress if needed. Both, WordPress and IP.board are keeped independent from each other. This improves compatibility with future updates of WordPress and IP.board, too.

One has to pay every so many months. Is there to be expected updates every so often? Will the bridge continue to work if someone decides to no longer pay or to renew at a later time?

The buyed license has lifetime validity, but to get access to updates, you have to renew the license. You don’t need to renew every 6 months, it’s up to you to decide wether it worths to renew or not for getting access to new updates.

One thing that made me hesitant is that I’ve seen this product linked to several times on the official IPS forums, but I have never see any developers around on that site. Is there a reason or is it not seen as productive?

The official IPS forums are not the official IPBWI and IPBWI for WordPress support forums. Unfortunately, I have no time to search for “ipbwi” term on IPS official forums every day. I’m happy that so many users are discussing there about my product and ask questions, but to get in contact with me, you should use the official IPBWI support forum.

Are there any issues with special characters or languages of usernames?

no, there aren’t. Nevertheless, if you find any, I’ll fix them instantly.

Can you choose to have user sign into either WP or IPB and not both? Do they need to sign into both or just one to be logged into both?

yes, you can choose to use IPBWI for WordPress (including setting up redirects for login/logout/registration etc. from IP.board to WordPress), IP.board or both as possible sign-in/sign-on gate.

Do the developers care about what type of content is used with their product?

no, I need the domain or IP address of the site to create a proper license file, but the content of the site does not bother me. Of course there are some law – and more important – morality borders, e.g. pedophilia will not be supported on any way.

I noticed the fee renews every 6 months is there a one off fee instead?

You can cancel the half-year fee in your paypal account immediately after you’ve buyed the package. This fee is optional and includes updates. If you e.g. want to update yearly, you can renew the package after 1 year. Not paying the fee does not mean your WordPress installation becomes deactivated! It does only mean you’ll be not able to use an IPBWI for WordPress version newer than 6 months after your last renewal.