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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 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,
there are many benefits to using Fossil's built-in forum feature, some
of which you cannot get by using third-party alternatives:
* <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].
* <b>Distributed and Tamper-Proof:</b> 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.
* <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 [https://fossil-scm.org/forum/forumpost/9b6f3f36bdb | just
35 MB of space] in a Fossil forum repository.
* <b>Built-in Full-Text Search:</b> Fossil forums use
[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...
* <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.
* <b>Contribute Off-Line:</b> Fossil forum posts work like any other
insertion into the repository, so a user can create new threads and
reply to existing ones while off-line, then sync their
contributions to the server they cloned from when back on-line.
Yes, you can post to the forum from inside a tent, miles from the
nearest WiFi router or cellular data tower.
* <b>Interlink with Other Fossil-Managed Artifacts:</b> 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.
* <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.
* <b>Role-Based Access Control:</b> The forum uses the same
[./caps/ | capability-based access control
system] that Fossil uses to control all other repository accesses.
The Fossil forum feature simply adds [./caps/ref.html#2 | several new fine-grained
capabilities] to the existing system.
* <b>Enduring, Open File Format:</b> 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 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
restrict posts to plain text only or to allow wild-west
HTML-formatted MIME email. Fossil's lightweight markup language
formatting features give you a middle path, providing your users
enough formatting power to communicate complex ideas well without
providing so much power as to risk
[https://wonko.com/post/html-escaping | security problems].
* <b>Easy Email Alerts:</b> You can configure Fossil to
[./alerts.md | send email alerts]. Forum post emails include the
complete message content for the benefit of those that prefer to
visit the forum only when they need to post something. Alerts are
optional, and each user gets the choice of immediate or daily
digest delivery.
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<title>Fossil Forums</title>
<h2>Introduction</h2>
Fossil includes a built-in discussion forum, designed to substitute
for a mailing list. Email notification is available to receive posts,
but the web-based UI must be used to enter new posts. Advantages of
the forum include:
* <b>Easy to Administer:</b> If you have already set up a
[./server/|Fossil server] with [./alerts.md|email alerts]
then turning on the forum feature
is just a matter of flipping some permission bits. There is
no new software to install and configure, and the same logins
and passwords work.
* <b>Malefactor Resistant:</b> Because Fossil accepts forum posts
only via the web UI, it is more resistent to spam. Passers-by
can post to the forum anonymously (subject to moderation), without
the hassle of a sign-up process.
* <b>Distributed and Tamper-Proof:</b> Posts are stored in the Fossil
repository using the same [./fileformat.wiki | DAG/Merkle-tree design]
that Fossil uses to store your check-ins, wiki documents, etc.
Forum posts sync to cloned repositories.
* <b>Editable:</b> Forum posts can be amended after they are sent,
to fix typos or provide updates. The original posts are preserved
as part of the historical record, but only the amended posts are
displayed by default.
* <b>Built-in Full-Text Search:</b> Forum posts can be included in
the index used by the built-in Fossil search logic.
* <b>Off-Line Access:</b> Because forum posts are synced along with
all other artifacts, you can search the forum, or add new posts
to the forum, while off-line.
* <b>Automatically Cross-Referenced To Other Fossil Artifacts:</b> Because forum
posts are normal Fossil artifacts, you can link from them to
other Fossil artifacts (check-ins, wiki, tickets) and from those other
artifacts to forum posts. The reverse links are recognized and
displayed automatically on the receiver.
* <b>Consistent Display:</b> Forum posts can be in Markdown,
Fossil Wiki, or plain text. Whichever format is used, the result is
displayed consistently across all platforms, including mobile.
<h2>Example Installations</h2>
Both the [forum:/forum|Fossil project itself] and the
[https://sqlite.org/forum/forum|SQLite project] use the Fossil forum in place
of mailing lists. The forum has worked well on both projects. The ability
to post anonymously provides a low-resistance path for people to report
problems, resulting in more problems being reported and fixed.
The ability to moderate and amend forum posts means that the
forums contain better information. And backups and archives
are as easy as running "clone".
Both Fossil and SQLite keep their forums as separate repositories.
But there is no requirement to do this. A forum can be coresident in
the same repository with the source code.
<h2 id="setup">Setting up a Fossil Forum</h2>
<h3 id="caps">Capabilities</h3>
By default, no Fossil user has permission to use the forums except for
users with Setup and Admin capabilities, which get these as part of the
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