• What is Icy Phoenix?
  
• Icy Phoenix is a CMS based on phpBB (a fully scalable and highly customisable open-source Bulletin Board package PHP based) plus many modifications and code integrations which add flexibility to the whole package. The official home page for phpBB is www.phpbb.com. Icy Phoenix has some features originally developed for phpBB XS Project which has been founded by Bicet and then developed by both Bicet and Mighty Gorgon. Icy Phoenix has been created by Mighty Gorgon after he left the phpBB XS Project.
  
  
• What are the main features of Icy Phoenix?
  
• Icy Phoenix has many features, most of them are listed in the Features Page and in the Credits Page. The main ones are:
  
  • phpBB bulletin board and permission system
  • CMS features allowing the creation of new pages and blocks
  • Overall template integration among all site sections
  • Many ready to use features: Photo Gallery, Downloads, Knowledge Base, Links, Chat...
  • Multi-language and multi-template ready
  • Almost 100% XHTML and CSS W3C compliant
  • ...and many others...
  
  
• Is Icy Phoenix supported for bugs, security issues, improvements?
  
• Icy Phoenix is an open source project. As like many open source projects it is developed by people using their free time. At the moment there are several persons in the staff willing to help and to contribute to this project. We hope the community will continue to grow and be able to provide all the necessary support to all the users who may need help.
  
  
• Is Icy Phoenix easy to install and upgrade from other platforms?
  
• Icy Phoenix has its own setup procedure which guides the user through the steps of the setup process. An upgrading file is provided to upgrade the package from standard phpBB and phpBB XS. Hopefully an upgrade procedure from any other platform will be written in the future: at the moment the only way to upgrade from another platform is by downgrading to phpBB and then run the provided upgrade procedure.
  
  
• Does Icy Phoenix have many templates?
  
• Yes, at the moment there are some free templates (some of them with multicolour variations) and we are working to create new ones. If you are interested in new templates you should regularly check the support forum and Styles Section.
  
  
• Is Icy Phoenix multi-language?
  
• English is the main language of Icy Phoenix, but it has been translated into other languages (alphabetical order): Arabic, Catalan, Dutch, German, Italian, Spanish... and more to come! If you don't find your language listed here, please ask at the support forum, maybe someone else is working on the translation you need and you would be welcome to join the translation team to give your contribution.
  
  
• Will Icy Phoenix be upgraded to phpBB 3?
  
• The matter is quite complex. Even if the starting core was phpBB 2, many phpBB 3 features and core functions have been ported to Icy Phoenix: this means that currently Icy Phoenix is based on a version of phpBB which is an hybrid between phpBB 2 and phpBB 3. The code is highly optimized, it uses cache extensively, you shouldn't miss phpBB 3.
  
  
• May I join the Icy Phoenix Project?
  
• Of course. Icy Phoenix is an open source project, and anyone who is willing to give his own contribution on a stable basis may then apply to join the Team.
  

Before trying to install Icy Phoenix make sure you have the following STRICTLY NEEDED requirements:

• At least 20 MB of free space in the folder you would like to install the package.
• Web server with PHP (5 or higher) installed and running (works best on Linux + Apache).
• MySQL (5 or higher) database with at least 5MB of free space (of course the space needed depends on how big your site will be... 5MB is enough for a basic empty setup).
• Ability to set CHMOD permissions.

These other requirements (even if not strictly needed) are suggested for optimal performance of Icy Phoenix:

• Hosting Services with .htaccess capability.
• Apache Rewrite Mod installed and running.
• GD Libraries (at least 2.0.28) installed and running.
• Register Globals set to OFF.