we can certainly consider adding a forum link, but 99% of users have it in their navbar at the top.

check the template tags (see the wiki) for something close to what you want on add topic.

I'm not sure what you mean by the navbar. Perhaps I should have been clearer.

I start the day by checking the WP Admin Dashboard for a quick overview of stats, new blog comments, and new SimplePress Forum posts. It is great to be able to click on new posts and reply to them, but if there are no new posts, I often want to visit the forum and try start new discussions.

Anyway, the first part of my request was easily answered. I changed sf-loader-admin.php.

This was a simple change to the line:

$out.='<p>'. __(“There are no new forum posts”, “sforum”).”</p>”;

which I wrapped in a link to the forum, and now reads:

$out.='<p><a href=”'.get_option(“sfpermalink”).'”>'. __(“There are no new forum posts”, “sforum”).”</a></p>”;

I've started to implement the second part, but I think the issues it raises are probably best in the Coding forum (I'm a PHP newbie), so I'll start a new topic there if I don't find the answers.

I’ve put you one in in 4.1.1 which will come along soon.

lol.  misunderstanding.  I thought you meant our “sidedash” widget on the forum front end vs the admin dashboard.  sorry.  Andy has added the request.