E-Friends Review

E-friends is online social networking software that allows users to create their own social networking website.  The software was created to be versatile enough to serve several uses such as serving as a family center of communication, buying and selling goods, finding jobs, and much more. 

E-friends offers all of the standard social networking features that would be expected from any commercial social networking platform, such as blogs, forums, chats, events, and many other tools that allow many people to easily communicate and socialize.  However general input from customers seems to indicate that AlstraSoft E-Friends customer support can be somewhat lacking occasionally in response to customer concerns. Also the affiliate program should be avoided.  Compared to its closes competitor, phpFoX, which is also a commercial social networking software package in the same general price range, E-friends does have the same customer service reputation as phpFoX.

E-Friends' strength and specialty however is its flexibility for users to customize content and create a site using the software that is tailored to the specific needs of the user.  The social networking tools such as blogging, forums, messaging and chats are conducive to communicating easily and networking with large groups of people.  However E-Friends provides developers with some additional tools that enhance customization such as customizable widgets including a photo cube, sending cards, a crystal ball, countdown timer, and more.

E-Friends Social Networking Platform

My first impression of E-Friends based on the website is that this is a highly commercialized social networking platform.  For the price, users should expect many more features and functionality than the free open source platforms that are available.  Keeping in mind that the software is not free (in fact it's a bit pricey); our analysis was to hold this software to a higher standard than the free open source platforms.   Upon even a preliminary review immediately after installing the software, it was apparent that many of the open source platforms could easily compete with the E-Friends software, and in some aspects even surpass it - making the price of this software unjustified.

E-Friends appears to be string enough on customization and developer flexibility; however it isn't a platform that I would recommend to non-technical users who simply want a platform they can install on their website from a simple setup script and just start using it.  While E-Friends may offer fairly easy to understand wizards and templates that assist with each step - should any support be required, E-Friend's customer service reputation suggests that those non-technical users will have some difficulty getting help. 

Other than that, the E-Friends software fulfills all of the needs of anyone who wants to set up a fully-functional and interesting social networking website.  All of the features are available, as well as a number of unique tools and widgets that can help social networking website developers add to the "neat factor" of their website by adding controls that are highly interactive and interesting.  E-Friends certainly has that functionality.

Requirements

Most social networking software packages that need to be installed on your web server have a minimum set of requirements for your hosting service.  In the case of E-Friends, the minimum requirements are as follows:

1. Minimum MySQL version 4
2. Existing MySQL database
3. Minimum PHP version 4.2.3
4.  Curl library (for MSN email import if required)
5. GD library for PHP with FreeType enabled

As shown by this list, the requirements are not very stringent, and the E-Friends software will run on just about any web space that supports PHP and has a MySQL database available.

Major Features

The E-Friends software is very flexible, and it is very easy to integrate other tools or widgets into the site.  In fact, while the standard social networking features of the E-Friends software is good, the real strength of this software are the many added features provided by the "Widgets Pack" - which is actually offered free for a limited time to anyone who purchases the software.

The standard features that are initially installed with E-Friends include:

•-          Blogging

•-          Forums

•-          Messages

•-          Search utility

•-          Listings

•-          Groups

•-          Invitations

•-          Articles and comments

•-          Chat

•-          Calendar

•-          A comprehensive administration area

While most of these standard tools listed above are enough for any user to establish a very good social network website, the additional widgets actually provide the heart of what makes E-Friends unique. Developers who want a bit more functionality on their site, E-Friends with the widgets are sure to fit the bill.  Also, the installation of widgets is fairly simple.

Widgets that E-Friends offers include:

•-          Photo Border

•-          Love Cards

•-          Photo Cube

•-          Send Cards

•-          Crystal Ball

•-          Countdown Timer

While some of these sound very simple, the design of these widgets is very aesthetically pleasing, and will add a great deal to the quality of any social networking website.  However, the library of widgets is fairly small at the moment compared to some other social networking platforms out there, in particular the free open source ones, which sometimes have volumes of plugins or modules that can be added to the social networking website.  A couple of my favorites during our testing were the CrystalBall, and the Photo Cube.  These are fairly innovative and fun modules that add a little bit of extra interactive enjoyment to the site.

Performance

Our test run of E-Friends was simple.  I recommend that anyone planning to use this software should try the demo to make sure that the look, feel and performance is what you require for your social networking website.  In our case it ran very fast.  The software is very easy to install and set up - and it's fairly obvious that the software is cleanly written and efficient, despite not being a light weight software package, but rather extensively programmed.  The widgets pack is very simple to install as well.  Our test with five users utilized the software platform simultaneously.  While it is very difficult to test how the system may handle under a very heavy load, the platform was fast and performed well.  Considering the fact that it is a commercially sold package - it should hold up well under heavier load.  We did not notice any bugs or issues with the software during the trial run, and installing the widgets went smoothly as well - all widgets ran as expected after install.

Overview

The latest version of AlstraSoft E-Friends is available from the website (www.alstrasoft.com/efriends.htm#6) for $280.  This package includes a single license for the software, a full year of free updates and a free widget pack of 6 customizable widgets.

AlstraSoft E-Friends is one part of a suite of software products offered by AlstraSoft - so users should understand that AlstraSoft support covers multiple products, not just the social networking platform.  This means that customer support knowledge about the product will not always be specialized. 

Overall, this commercial version of a social networking platform is very functional, flexible, and full-featured.  However given the fact that open-source solutions currently exist that are even more functional and user-friendly, it is not recommended that developers dish out the $280 for this software when the equivalent, or better, can be obtained for free.