Hi !
I’d like to present corporate customers who sign up in my forum a better way to present themselves per example an extended user profile, adding photo galleries, adding Status… I also would like to integrate an offer / bid system (so this would mean a 3 User Role) Is it possible to extend discourse to make it a platform with such features or is it a better idea to include discourse only as a forum in a Laravel WebApp?
Thank you 
You could achieve all these things in Discourse using plugins.
I think it comes down to how much seamless integration you want and how much time and budget you have. Doing all these things in Discourse will require more time and specific expertise, but the result might be worth it.
One additional consideration is that you have to be careful to write additional functionality in way which doesn’t disturb core updates from the Discourse team. This is a bit of an art and where specific experience comes in handy.
Always check existing plugins for ways you can leverage them: for example I’ve recently added a feature to Topic List Previews that allows users to have a personal photo gallery. It is currently in test.
Hi Robert,
thank you for your answer.
I allready looked into many plugins and there are a few which i can use, but a few i need to create.
The Idea is to place the new features here, i think this would be the Best option.
Yep, FYI my user photos solution re-uses the Activity section.
