all topics in every subforum in the discussion module can be arranged in 3 ways: most recent last, most recent first & most recent post. I needed a fourth: sort alphabetically.
here’s what you do:
in mod.forum_core.php, line 2374, add after
case 't' : $order = "ORDER BY sticky DESC, title ASC";
break;
in mcp_forum.php, line 1554, replace
'forum_topic_order' => array('d', array('d' => 'descending', 'a' => 'ascending', 'r' => 'most_recent_topic'),
with
'forum_topic_order' => array('d', array('d' => 'descending', 'a' => 'ascending', 'r' => 'most_recent_topic', 't' => 'alphabetically_ascending')),
in lang.forum_cp.php, line 600, add after
"alphabetically_ascending" =>
"Alphabetically Ascending",
save your files and you’re done. you can now select this sort method for every subforum in the forum management cp. the above method only adds ascending sorting but you can see how easy it is to make it descending, or to add both or a custom sorting method.