How can I integrate a forum with a website?

[HrtOfSword]

How can I integrate a forum with a website?
The best example I can think of off hand is this forum.
When you register and create an account at the main www.Bakabt.com, you also get an account created over at the forums forums.bakabt.me.

How can I achieve this?

A more ambitious idea would be to be able to integrate a forum and a wordpress (self-hosted) blog together with the website, such that when an account is created on the website, it is also created for the forum and the wordpress blog.

[kostya]

The easiest way to do it would be to have a shared database between them and have a common user list. The harder way would be to set up something behind the scenes so that whenever a user makes changes to one account, it is replicated on the other, but this runs the risk of having the two accounts get out of sync (you would have to figure out every way that a user can make changes to one account and have the changes be made to the other as well).

[Duki3003]

Become or hire a professional like Jarudin?
A bit simpler method would be to grab CMS like PHP-Fusion or Joomla which have it integrated...

[Neco]

The official term for this would be a  Portal.

You gotta find a portal mod for your forum software, or go with a Content Management System, like has been mentioned.
I've been thinking of moving my site over to a portal system as well..  just waiting for  SMF to release a final of their newest beta, so I don't have to screw with theme changes and whatever else.

[Xiong Chiamiov]

The official term for this would be a  Portal.

I'd actually call it a unified login system, although the terms are slightly different.

If you don't know that you're going to be running some sort of perl/php/python/ruby/etc. script behind the scenes to do this, you aren't up to the task of implementing it.

[Tatsujin]

I remember asking the same question long ago. I didn't get much information. I can do an in-line frame with a small blog which is pretty easy, but not as sexy as the frontpage as Bakabt's.

[Duki3003]

If it were easy why would you need web developers...

The easy solution is CMS... Content management system as it name suggests where you can run a website, forum etc all from 1 place.
And you notice our blog is run separately...

[HrtOfSword]

Thanks for the replies 
How many different types of CMS are there? Which would be best for integration with wordpress or a wiki?
Any tips on where and how I can start learning about web-developing? I know a bit of extremely basic html.

[kostya]

Thanks for the replies 
How many different types of CMS are there? Which would be best for integration with wordpress or a wiki?
Any tips on where and how I can start learning about web-developing? I know a bit of extremely basic html.

Definitely start off by learning HTML and CSS. These are the two most important languages for any sort of web development work, they are not too hard to learn, and yet few people bother learning them right. If you want a good book about it, I recommend Visual Quickstart Guide to HTML, XHTML, and CSS by Liz Castro.
Beyond that, all CMS systems are built in some language (probably PHP, Perl, Python or JSP) so once you choose the CMS, learn the language that it was built in so you can tweak the functionality if needed.

[Duki3003]

Like I said it's not integrated with wiki and blog (Wordpress), those are run and installed separately... (Maybe there is some way, but none that I know of)
And most popular CMS are written in php, but you publish articles, news etc using basic html - and like kostya already mentioned start off with practicing html and css.
CMS comes with news, articles, forum, comments, download and user management... In fact have a look at PHP-Fusion or Joomla
If you need wordpress and wiki just set them into a separate web folder, and if possible add a subdomain which will lead to them.

[Petrus]

Depends on what you are looking for in a CMS,
These days regular people use Wordpress to edit very fast and keep up-to-date.
I also use it myself for personal use and for my co-workers to exchange files.
This CMS has a low learning curve and has most plugins and addons that alot of people use.
I say stick with it till you learn the basics of XHTML/CSS and PHP.

While I use Joomla for our costumers since I find it more stable and has more options.
Also I just like Joomla, perhaps because I know alot about it.

So I would recommend you to look for different Wordpress plugins on the internet.
I have to say that Joomla would definitely work with what you are looking for.
But most people find that is has a difficult learning curve. (Not really that difficult).

If you can't really find nothing or are having issues, I would gladly help.