Microsoft Office Live Small Business Community

I was hoping someone would know how do I add a forum to my website?  Thank you in advance! 

Michelle www.MerryMatrimony.com

Hello Michelle74:

I used a iframe to embed message forum into website, you can see a example at http://silvermoonfurniture.com/forum.aspx here is the code I used with html module just replace the address in blue/purple with the address of your forum:

<iframe src="http://tapq.com/observereffect/coastriders/index.php" width="730px" height="400px" frameborder="0" marginwidth ="0px" marginheight="0px" scrolling="auto"></iframe>

Gary
New Mountain Tavern	Silver Moon Furniture

Here is list of free forum hosting services.

http://officelivepages.com/host_forum_blog.aspx

I really appreciate your help.  I am looking forward to adding a forum this weekend!

Michelle www.MerryMatrimony.com

I am trying to add forums to my website and I am using Office Live too. So how do I go about it?

I dont want to create forums in free website. But if I can have a Main Header link titled "Forums" that will link to the forums, its fine.

Bhargav, by "main header link" are you referring to your navigation?  First, go to the Masters Forum help sites a few rows down from here.  Look for the code to "redirect to another site."  Check StudioAllen, OfficeLivePages, altArtifact, Godzdude and perhaps Axcede.

Now create a new page and paste the Redirect code into an HTML module with the appropriate site reference.  When the navigation button is clicked, the visitor will be "redirected" to your forum.

www.fidalgoweather.net
Check the Masters Forum for help and good ideas.
For beginners: Getting started with OLSB.

Hey RX Dave Thanks

By Main Header, I mean Navigation. I am new in using forum, can you please provide me a little more help in navigating!

Thanks 

Here you go:  http://myofficelivecommunity.com/discuss/forums/46.aspx

It's down 11 rows from where you are right now.  It's a useful spot to know about because there is a lot of good info and help in those sites.  Let us know if you need any further assistance.

www.fidalgoweather.net
Check the Masters Forum for help and good ideas.
For beginners: Getting started with OLSB.

what is the difference between a blog & a forum? They look the same to me. Thanks!

A blog (an abridgment of the term web log) is a website, usually maintained by an individual, with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog. (Source: Wikipedia)

An Internet forum is a web or NNTP application for holding discussions and posting user-generated content.^[1][2] Internet forums are also commonly referred to as Web forums, newsgroups, message boards, discussion boards, (electronic) discussion groups, discussion forums, bulletin boards, fora (the Latin plural) or simply forums. The terms "forum" and "board" may refer to the entire community or to a specific sub-forum dealing with a distinct topic. Messages within these sub-forums are then displayed either in chronological order or as threaded discussions. In many cases a gateway allows access to the same data via an HTTP or an NNTP interface. (Source: Wikipedia)

Royster 

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

Is this free? Thanx!

that was for scybyte's 1st suggestion about the link he provided.

Not sure what you are referring to, but yes, there are free forum hosts and free blog hosts out there on the net. However, integration with Office Live Small Business is not that great as there are no native blog or forum applications for it. The way that many people are doing to "integrate" OLSB with forums or blogs (other than the RSS feed from Windows Live Spaces) is that they use an IFRAME to add a blog or forum website (because the blog or forum is hosted elsewhere) in their OLSB website. The really bad thing with that approach is that it does nothing in terms of SEO for your OLSB domain. as search engines will not associate the content in your forum or blog (since it has a competely different URL) with your domain on OLSB. As you may be aware, blogs and forums generate an enormous amount of content and are updated frequently, and saerch engines just love indexing through them.

So, be aware of the pitfalls. If a forum is just a nice addition to your website and not something you would consider as important, then it's fine to use an IFRAME. But if it's optional and you don't expect a lot of traffic to it, then why have it at all? 

Royster

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

Thanks a lot for the infos!

Is someone here using the www.informe.com? Just want to ask for some tips coz I just started it yesterday.  I'm still lost there.