Part 1) Yep, I thought it would be a good idea to write an xml based forum a)To learn to work with confidence around any xml (this helped me the other day when I wrote some javascipt using the DOM) b)To learn better OO coding practices c)To be able to handle a large (at least for me) code base and code for the future.anyway...The first thing I did was download the scoop, everything, slash and any other open sourced portal or message board system I could lay my hands on and install them. This helped heaps.

Part 2) Letting your users use HTML? I got around this problem by turning everything to >'s etc. Then turning back only the tags I allow them to use everything else just gets printed out.

Part 3)Regarding intergration with your news system, Isn't your news system just a flat or limited node depth forum? If you write your own forum system allow the administrator to set the depth on any node, that way you can restrict if for some parts and not for others. At least thats how I did it.


Even if you dont use any of the code it's a good idea to at least get a good look at how others before you have done it :)