Members having problems viewing Announcements

[shunut]

I'm an admin on a forum and some of our members are saying that they are unable to view Announcements. Apparently this only happens when the user clicks "New Posts", and tries to view the Announcement from the "New Posts" screen. The error they get, is that they do not have permission to view the Announcement. I've looked through all the settings and can't seem to find anything that would disallow anybody from viewing the announcement. Any help or suggestions would be great.

We are running v3.6.4, btw.

Thanks,

Josh

[vbenhancer]

New Posts never show announcements...

announcement permissions are driven by the forum's permissions... if some groups do not have permission to view threads, it's the same for the announcements... did you check perms?

[jscieza]

New Posts never show announcements...


If 'new posts' is showing announcements, how we can trace the origin of the problem? Thanks in advance.

[shunut]

New Posts never show announcements...

announcement permissions are driven by the forum's permissions... if some groups do not have permission to view threads, it's the same for the announcements... did you check perms?

Yep, went through every group, every forum to check permissions, couldn't find anything there the would disallow a member from viewing the announcements. On our forum, announcements do show up when you click the "New Posts" at the top of the page. I actually talked to some of our moderators and they get the same problem.

[Lynne]

Take a look at the url - what does it look like and how does it differ from the one in the forum? Was the announcement posted from the forum or from the admincp?

[shunut]

It was posted from the AdminCP. I'll have to check the url.

[Lynne]

Actually, I see what the problem is. If I look at the link in the forum, it says "announcement.php?f=2&a=2" . If I see the same one in New Posts, it says "announcement.php?f=&a=1" So, the forumid isn't being shown. This should be entered into the bug tracker (if it isn't already).

[jscieza]

Actually, I see what the problem is. If I look at the link in the forum, it says "announcement.php?f=2&a=2" . If I see the same one in New Posts, it says "announcement.php?f=&a=1" So, the forumid isn't being shown. This should be entered into the bug tracker (if it isn't already).

So are you able to replicate the issue at your end?

But this guy has said (https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost.php?p=2128821&postcount=2) that "New Posts" shouldn't display announcements.

[Lynne]

I can replicate this on my 4.0.8 test site which does show announcements in the New Posts search. I do not have 3.6.4 which is why I was asking the guy to look at the URL. I honestly can't remember if announcement show in New Posts back in that version.

[jscieza]

I'm also able to replicate this issue in my vB 3.8.5 but it's highly customized and have a lot of mods installed so I can't say if this is a vBulletin problem or a problem due to a mod.

Issue is that New Posts is displaying announcements in this way:

http://www.forosperu.net/announcement.php?f=XXX&a=YY

Where XXX is the forumid of a non public forum (Staff only) so that's why people are getting a no permissions error. I don't know why New Posts is displaying the announcement with the forumid of my Staff only forum.

I think that in a default vBulletin 3.8.5 installation New Posts don't display announcements. Anyone can confirm this please? Thanks.

[shunut]

<a href="http://www.spyder.tv/forums/announcement.php?f=75&a=29" target="_blank">http://www.spyder.tv/forums/announcement.php?f=75&a=29</a>

This is the URL I get. When I look in my history it says it is an announcement in a certain forum. The forum it says it is an announcement in is not an active forum and nobody has access to it besides me, it is also the last section on the site. I'm going to play with that section and see if I can fix it.

[jscieza]

So we need to check if this is a vBulletin bug or a issue with a plugin/hack/mod.

[shunut]

So I went to the forum that my announcements say they are from, when you click them in the "New Posts" window. It seems that the admin before me, instead of making it an inactive forum, just changed the permissions so that nobody had permission to view the forum, therefore nobody would see the forum, since it was closed. Unfortunately this still didn't fix the problem. I tested another announcement and when clicked on through "New Posts" it said it was from another section on the forum that is setup just for admins. What is the common thread? When the first forum was active, it was the last active section on the forum. Once that was set to inactive, the admin section was the last active section on the forum. So, it seems that when you click on the announcement through the "New Posts" it pulls the permissions from the last active section on the forum. I created another section and put it at the very bottom of the forum, gave everyone permissions in the section, but made it so nobody could see it. I haven't been able to test this but should hopefully be able to do so this morning.

[jscieza]

Interesting. I can confirm that behavior of the announcements in New Posts. I mean, New Posts is displaying announcements in this way: http://www.forosperu.net/announcement.php?f=XXX&a=YY

Where XXX is the forumid of the latest forum (sort order) when you go to AdminCP >> Forums & Moderators >> Forum Manager

But the issue appears to be that announcements are being displayed in New Posts when they shouldn't be according to vbenhancer (https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost.php?p=2128821&postcount=2). So a stock, unmodified vBulletin 3.8.x installation shows announcements in New Posts yes or not? That's what we need to know :)

[Lynne]

I have a 3.8.1 test site and announcements do show up in New Posts. However, again, on my sites, they do not have a forumid - /announcement.php?f=&a=1 I think that is the problem you guys are having. I'll bet a modification is setting the forumid and it is getting included in the link (a problem of NOT having to register variables is that a variable can get set anywhere and will show up anywhere).

[jscieza]

Hi Lynne, then it's a bug in vBulletin right? I mean, New Posts should properly display the announcement link (registering the variable 'forumid' in the URL)?

[shunut]

I have had my fix tested by many members and everyone seems to be able to view the announcements when they show up in New Posts.

[Lynne]

Hi Lynne, then it's a bug in vBulletin right? I mean, New Posts should properly display the announcement link (registering the variable 'forumid' in the URL)?
I'm not really sure. On both my 3.8 and my 4.x forums, there is no forumid in the announcement link and they work fine for everyone. There is something on you guys sites that is adding a forumid, and a forumid that isn't good for general users at that. If there is no forumid, then the annoucement id is still there - a=yyyy - and the link is valid. I think there is something on your sites that is adding a forumid in there when it should not be.

[jscieza]

Yes it looks like a mod is doing that thing. Issue here is that I have a lot of mods :(

[shunut]

Maybe we should compare mods then, since I only have 3.

I have:

1. AME - Automatic Media Embeding System
2. Forumrunner
3. Cyb - Advanced Permissions Mod

[jscieza]

Good idea shunut! :)

Pretty sure it's Cyb - Advanced Permissions Mod. Try disabling it and let us know if the issue is gone. Thanks.

[shunut]

Sure enough, I disable Cyb and guess what?

http://www.spyder.tv/forums/announcement.php?f=&a=34

No forum selected when viewed from New Posts. Unfortunately, I need the Cyb mod because our members were getting hit hard with PM spam that contained viruses.

[Lynne]

Could always write some code to set f to null if on that search page and using that template?

[jscieza]

Lynne, how can we do that? I'm not a programmer so I don't know what code are you talking about.

[Lynne]

Unfortunately, I know nothing about the modification, so I can't really suggest anything more concrete than that. Have you let the dev know about this issue? He may have a fix he can post for it.

[jscieza]

The dev of that product is Valter (aka Cyb) who unfortunately never replies to members questions in his mods (no support).

Is there any way to fix it by modifying a vBulletin template or file? Maybe we can define that the URL to show for announcements in New Posts should be announcement.php?f=X&a=Y

Where X is the forumid of a public forum that we can manually define.

[Lynne]

It's gonna be the same method to set the forumid to something and have it says f=x that it would be to have it set to null and say f=

Basically, somewhere he is setting a forumid for some reason, and you need to null that out after it is being used.

[jscieza]

When you get a bit of free time (if possible) could you please perform a quick review of the source code of that product in order to see where the problem might be? Here is the link to the product: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=201285

Thanks!

[Lynne]

I just took a quick look at it. They guy has got over 40 plugins for that product and there is just no way I can go through all those. I'd *guess* is may have something to do with a plugin using one of the search hook locations. You can try turning them off and see if that fixes the issue.

[jscieza]

shunut, were you able to find a workaround for this issue?

[Digital Jedi]

Just for the record, I believe we've been able to see Announcements in New Posts since somewhere around 3.6.

[jscieza]

Hope to get this fixed by Valter (https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/member.php?u=108756) this year :mad:

[BirdOPrey5]

In the plugin called search_results_start at the very end of the plugin add the following line:

$foruminfo['forumid'] = NULL;

Seems to have fixed the problem for me...

[jscieza]

Just wanted to say thank you very much!!!

[BirdOPrey5]

:up: