What a piece of crap

Sorry you think of bbPress the way you do. I think you will find much more info regarding bbPress on its ‘official’ site https://bbpress.org/.

If you have any questions ask a on the forums https://bbpress.org/forums/

Too bad you didn’t find the bbPress codex before dropping this 1 star rating in here. Theming bbPress can’t be much simpler than it is, and there is tons of great documentation in there.

https://codex.bbpress.org/

Hi John and Stephen,

The rating I gave this plugin wasn’t just ranting off, I’m sure you guys had put a lot of time and effort in this software and, I know that it stings, but this doesn’t change the fact that documentation is beyond poor.

Take the following line for example:

““bbpress” contains template files; copy any you want to modify into a directory named “bbpress” in your theme’s root. eg. /wp-content/mytheme/bbpress/”

Now there is no directory whatsoever anywhere called “mytheme”, or if it refers to the installed theme on the WP, the path is wrong as WordPress themes don’t reside just in the wp-content, or if it suggests that a directory should be made with some name, it’s dauntingly unclear.

This is just one example not counting the countless grammatical oddities and errors throughout the documentation which just compound the bad experience. Quite frankly, any software is just as good as its documentation. If the user can’t understand the flow or its purpose, it serves no purpose rather than frustrating the user.

It’s common to lump the plugin together with the documentation. I think a more positive outlook is that in the time it takes to write these reviews, users can share what they learn on our codex, and improve the documentation for everyone else. Better to do good than be critical, imo.

External resources are something that takes time to fill in. If you’re not comfortable opening up the code and looking around at the documentation in there, that’s totally okay — I don’t usually go digging around the packages installed in OS X either, so I understand how you feel there.

Regarding documentation/users/experience/etc… Trust me, I totally understand. I’ve presented on the very idea at WordCamps and other conferences, it’s just a constant work in progress. Some people enjoy helping out, and others like the convenience of everything being available to them right off the bat. I like both in certain conditions, and with WordPress plugins, I generally enjoy giving back and being helpful.

Your rating doesn’t sting; you’re completely entitled to your opinion, and we always welcome the feedback, positive or negative. Hopefully you decide to give it another shot later, and if so, I’m sure our community of users would appreciate the opportunity to learn from your experiences with bbPress.

P.S. – I’ve updated the codex page in question to be more clear about the theme name and location.