chadmg - 6:34 pm on Nov 5, 2004 (gmt 0)

I'd just like to add that you should attempt to test for all errors as well. If you're using php you may want to turn error reporting off. Make sure all errors trigger the proper responses. Try hitting the Back button and resubmitting things. Click the submit button multiple times. Sit over someone who is barely computer literate and see how they navigate your forum. Mark down any changes that need to be made or things that should be added to your help section. Make sure the access you've given to your database doesn't include dropping tables or other disatrous actions. Make sure all special characters, especially those from Word, and quotes are all handled by your forms. I also fill out my forms with a name like John Doe-O'Brien. You'd be amazed, or maybe not, how many forms fail this test. I always try to get a few different people at different levels of experience to run the first few tests.

One more thing, make sure the URLS are exactly how you want them. It's more of a pain after pages are bookmarked and linked to and spidered. WebmasterWorld is smart in that it uses forum9 instead of foo in the URL. That way, if you change the name of forum 9 to "The Foo Bar", all the links still work.