Compose External Javascript [Archive]

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Bernd Glasstett

01-05-2004, 10:00 PM

vB Compose External v. 1.0.3 (Updated)

This hack provides an easy way to generate JS-Code for the Javascript syndication system on vB 3. It has been tested with VB 3.0.0 RC 1 and higher.

Features:

Complete control of the HTML-code before, after and in between the links to the threads
Possibility to enter a maximum-value for the count of threads to be displayed by the administrator
Users can choose more than one forum to be displayed
Users can choose how many threads to be displayed
Users can choose how many characters in the thread title should appear (new in version 1.0.1)
Users can choose from three pre-made styles (new in version 1.0.3)
Integration into forumdisplay and navbar-templates (new in version 1.0.4)
Complete integration in the look and feel of vB 3
Phrase-compatibility
Plans for future versions:

Option to choose the forums from a pulldown-men?
Option to add it to the forum-tools (in order to be able to have the JS-Script created for this specific forum)
Options for creating the URLs for XML- and RSS-feeds
Adding new features when external.php will be updated with new features ;)
These are the instructions how to install it:

New templates: 1
Templates to be changed: 2
PHP-files to be added: 1
Phrases to be added: 23
Step 1:
Insert the phrases using the XML-files. There are phrases for some languages. You can of course translate them to other languages using the phrase-system. If you do so, please send me the XML-files for these translations. I will add them to this ZIP. Right now there are:

German
English
Please be sure to save the language in the phrase system BEFORE you do so!

Step 2:
Upload the file composeexternal.php in the root of your forum.
Upload the files in the folder /images/composeexternal/ on the server.

Step 3:
Add a new template with the name "composeexternal" and add the content of composeexternal_template.txt (in this zip) to it.

Step 4:
Search for the following code on template forumdisplay:

<div><img class="inlineimg" src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/subscribe.gif" alt="$vbphrase[view_parent_forum]" vspace="1" /> <a href="forumdisplay.php?$session[sessionurl]f=$foruminfo[parentid]">$vbphrase[view_parent_forum]</a></div>
</div>
</td>


Replace with the following code:

<div><img class="inlineimg" src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/subscribe.gif" alt="$vbphrase[view_parent_forum]" vspace="1" /> <a href="forumdisplay.php?$session[sessionurl]f=$foruminfo[parentid]">$vbphrase[view_parent_forum]</a></div>
</div>
<div><img class="inlineimg" src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/subscribe.gif" alt="$vbphrase[composeexternal_categorystrip]" vspace="1" /> <a href="composeexternal.php?$session[sessionurl]do=composecode&f=$foruminfo[forumid]">$vbphrase[composeexternal_categorystrip]</a></div>

</td>


Search for:

<if condition="$show['adminoptions']">

Add above:

<tr><td class="vbmenu_option"><a href="composeexternal.php?$session[sessionurl]do=composecode&f=$foruminfo[forumid]">$vbphrase[composeexternal_categorystrip]</a></td></tr>

Step 5:

Search for the following code on template navbar:

<if condition="$show['wollink']"><tr><td class="vbmenu_option"><a href="online.php?$session[sessionurl]">$vbphrase[whos_online]</a></td></tr></if>

Add below:

<tr><td class="vbmenu_option"><a href="composeexternal.php?$session[sessionurl]">$vbphrase[composeexternal_categorystrip]</a></td></tr>

Credits go to Ypsfanpage.de - a user of our forum. He coded the initial php-file. I ported it to the VB-system and created the php-file and the template.

See the screen-shots below, how it works, or visit our testsite. (http://www.comicforum.de/comicforumtest/composeexternal.php)

Version-History
v. 1.0.0 - Initial release
v. 1.0.1 - Added character-limitation
v. 1.0.2 - Got rid of a small bug, occuring in MSIE, happened when there where too less threads, genereal optimization of the code
v. 1.0.3 - Added three pre-made templates
v. 1.0.4 - Added support for forumdisplay-template and navbar-template

Please click on install, when you choose to use this hack :)

FleaBag

01-06-2004, 01:13 PM

This is a great idea, might use it on my site when I get to vB3.

gldtn

01-06-2004, 02:30 PM

Very nice.. Do you think you can add some type of option to limit the amount of characters to show.. something like:

<script type="text/javascript"src="http://www.cogumelosmagicos.org/forum/external.php?forumids=30,31,32,38,40&type=js">
</script>
<script type="text/javascript">

</script>

Thank You

Bernd Glasstett

01-06-2004, 04:27 PM

I am incorparating that at this moment, will soon post the new file :) Plus, I already have some new ideas. Will post them also soon :)

Bernd Glasstett

01-06-2004, 06:22 PM

Ok, here we go, just updated the file. The old version - if someone doesn't need the character-limitation - is still available for download.

Two more phrases have been updated with the new release:
- composeexternal_charlimit
- composeexternal_charlimitdescription

gldtn

01-06-2004, 07:23 PM

Bernd Glasstett

01-06-2004, 07:52 PM

Got it.. It works fine.. Thanks a lot.. I hope you'll add more feature to it on future releases... features such as pulling polls, etc..

Also a link to the poster would be nice..

* gldtn clicks install :)
We (Ypsfanpage.de and me) were already thinking about hacking the external.php too. That's because the options are limited there. At the moment we will extend the hack to have also XML and RSS supported. It might look then like the user-panel when we are done :)

And if by then it is foreseeable, that Jelsoft is not going to extend the external.php, we will look into that. I would love to see some more things to appear there too. Polls, postings, poster. They are all not covered right now.

gldtn

01-06-2004, 08:19 PM

Awesome, I'm looking forward to this, If my scripting knowledge was any good I would've be willing to help you guys out.

Thanks once again for this great hack :D

eva2000

01-06-2004, 08:53 PM

nice script you got there :)

seems what ever is generated when used on a web site generates a javascript error in IE 6.0.2800.1106

Error: 'threads[...].title' null or not an object
Code: 0

eva2000

01-06-2004, 09:23 PM

okay so that error is due to having less than 15 threads in the forum being called :o

i got it working with this code thanks to your generator

saved the below code in a file named last15.php

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<TITLE>Example code</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://forumdomain.com/external.php?forumids=<?php echo($fid); ?>&type=js"></script>

<b>Last 15 threads :</b>
<ul>
<script type="text/javascript">

</script>
</ul>

</BODY>
</HTML>

then used last15.php?fid=XX

where fid is the forumid i want to call

dede1

01-06-2004, 09:24 PM

very nice :)

Bernd Glasstett

01-06-2004, 10:44 PM

nice script you got there :)

seems what ever is generated when used on a web site generates a javascript error in IE 6.0.2800.1106

Error: 'threads[...].title' null or not an object
Code: 0
Ok, this bug is confirmed. Problem will be: There is no way using the Javascript to verify, whether there are as much threads in this forum or not, because this would require a database-query. What would be possible is making such a query before the script generates the code. If there that much threads -> go on. If not, get the number of threads and use this as a value for maximum-threads.

BUT: This would not help, if after the creation of the JS-code, there would be less threads (through deletion) than priorly confirmed in the forum. So... we need to find a way to eliminate the JS-error, rather than making a workaround in the PHP-file. I might have an idea, but will look into it tomorrow err - today, as it is already 01:46 a.m. here in Germany ;)

Interesting: Mozilla doesn't have problems with the Javascript. Oh well... MSIE ... Nah, I don't say more :D

gldtn

01-07-2004, 02:01 AM

Had no javascript errors here with Monzilla and neither with I.E. There is only one thing bugging me.. the delay to update the threads.. I get new threads in the forum but sometimes it don't even updates it for some reason.

Bernd Glasstett

01-07-2004, 07:17 AM

This might be because ot the JS being cached. Adding the following code to your Header might help:

<meta NAME="revisit-after" CONTENT="0 days">
<meta http-equiv="expires" content="0">
<meta HTTP-EQUIV="Pragma" CONTENT="no-cache">

gldtn

01-07-2004, 02:23 PM

+K for you, too bad Karma is not turned on in this forum :/. Its working flawless now, thanks to you..

Oh.. one more question, not sure if this is possible due to the limitation on the external.php, but is there a way to get the topics to update when there is a new reply to it.. rather than only when a new topic is posted?

Bernd Glasstett

01-07-2004, 03:53 PM

At this moment this is not possible and would require hacking the external.php - but comes time, comes solution :D

Bernd Glasstett

01-07-2004, 05:32 PM

Here we go: On our new developing system, my co-coder Ypsfanpage.de optimized the code, redrucing some clutter and got rid of the bug in the JS on MSIE. So here we go with version 1.0.2 :)

Work is in progress for the following features (which will then be version 1.0.3):
- Having some predefined styles at hand - for the ones who have problems coding ;)

Bernd Glasstett

01-07-2004, 08:00 PM

Now, version 1.0.3 is online. We added three pre-defined styles - which you can change on composeexternal.php if you wish. The download is now bigger and containing previews of the pre-defined styles.

Work is in progress for the following feature (which will be in version 1.0.4):
- Adding the possibility to generate the code for a specific forum changing forumdisplay-template and adding a new point to the forum-tools popup-menu.

Bernd Glasstett

01-09-2004, 07:48 AM

Latest installment: version 1.0.4, which offers direct support of forumdisplay and navbar-templates, giving you instructions how to integrate it in these templates. We had to change our template and the php-file a bit, so please redownload the package.

The next release will be a while away, as we are now working on the conversion of our big production-board. But the support of course continues and should there be any bugs, we will eliminate them of course :)

eva2000

01-10-2004, 09:38 PM

eva2000

01-11-2004, 06:20 AM

Bernd Glasstett

01-11-2004, 08:49 AM

for some reason i keep getting 'threads.. is undefinied' on first load of page but if i hit ctrl+F1 it loads the threads on external page ? i.e. at http://animeboards.com/showthread.php?t=55535 the 3 example sites i used all don't show threads on first load only on refresh
I checked the first site. It's loading perfectly. I checked the second site. It doesn't load. The third one loads too. But one thing is not that good: Placing the following described part of the code in the <head>-Tag. It might not get loaded right. Place it in the <body>-Tag.

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://animeboards.com/external.php?forumids=3&type=js">

Try it, if it still fails to load, I will take a closer look into the JS-script. But it should work...

Bernd Glasstett

01-11-2004, 08:53 AM

also would it be possible to make composexternal.php an admin only viewing page/function
We don't plan this to do. It's designed to be used by the users in order to allow them to make the syndication as easy as possible.

If you would like to use it on your own, without adding it to the templates, then add a bookmark or favorite to your browser ;) You don't have to add a link to composeexternal.php to your site. :D

eva2000

01-11-2004, 01:14 PM

We don't plan this to do. It's designed to be used by the users in order to allow them to make the syndication as easy as possible.

If you would like to use it on your own, without adding it to the templates, then add a bookmark or favorite to your browser ;) You don't have to add a link to composeexternal.php to your site. :D
yeah i renamed and edited the admincp/index to include your script inside

i found via website code validator some of the close tags in the javascript aren't escaped... but fixing that doesn't solve my problem - it seems to be just me as others can see it

Bernd Glasstett

01-11-2004, 05:03 PM

Have you tried to put the code into the body-tag, as I said?

wacnstac

01-12-2004, 12:11 AM

Step 1:
Insert the phrases using the XML-files. There are phrases for some languages. You can of course translate them to other languages using the phrase-system. If you do so, please send me the XML-files for these translations. I will add them to this ZIP. Right now there are:

Can you explain in more detail how to do this?

Erwin

01-12-2004, 12:17 AM

This is a very cool hack. :) Well done!

eva2000

01-12-2004, 01:12 AM

Have you tried to put the code into the body-tag, as I said?
tried both ways same result for me only not seeing threads on first click with javascript error 'threads is undefined' but other members on my site see it fine

Bernd Glasstett

01-12-2004, 07:02 AM

Can you explain in more detail how to do this?
What do you need to be explained? The insertion, the translation of the phrases, or how to export them? Or all of them ;) Just want to be sure to explain the right thing :)

Bernd Glasstett

01-12-2004, 07:20 AM

tried both ways same result for me only not seeing threads on first click with javascript error 'threads is undefined' but other members on my site see it fine
Strange thing. I tried alle examples again. This time the first two are working fine, the third produces the error. Then I tried again. This time the second one came up with the error.

So I looked into the code and found the first big problem: The code is never the same. It seems, that you have used different versions of the script. Can you please do the following:

- Use the latest version of the script on all three sites.
- And add all code produced by the script only to the body.

When you have done so, please tell it to me, and I will test all three of them again. And if the error still occurs - it doesn't do it on our testsite with the latest script - then I will try to find the error. :)

wacnstac

01-12-2004, 04:03 PM

What do you need to be explained? The insertion, the translation of the phrases, or how to export them? Or all of them Just want to be sure to explain the right thing

The whole process in general on how to add phrases. I only see a menu option to upload/download a whole language in the control panel.

eva2000

01-13-2004, 12:36 AM

Strange thing. I tried alle examples again. This time the first two are working fine, the third produces the error. Then I tried again. This time the second one came up with the error.

So I looked into the code and found the first big problem: The code is never the same. It seems, that you have used different versions of the script. Can you please do the following:

- Use the latest version of the script on all three sites.
- And add all code produced by the script only to the body.

When you have done so, please tell it to me, and I will test all three of them again. And if the error still occurs - it doesn't do it on our testsite with the latest script - then I will try to find the error. :)
done but really anime_news.php is the only one i care about right now i have the following in that file

<?php
if ( is_numeric($fid) ) {
$fid = $fid;
} else {
$fid = 224;
}
?>

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<meta NAME="revisit-after" CONTENT="0 days">
<meta http-equiv="expires" content="0">
<meta HTTP-EQUIV="Pragma" CONTENT="no-cache">
<TITLE>Anime News - Animeboards.com</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<p>
This is a example of some javascript code you can add to your own anime web site to display anime news reported by Animeboards.com. Display, font, color etc are all customisable to fit into your web site's design and color scheme.
</p>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://animeboards.com/external.php?type=js&forumids=<?php echo($fid); ?>"></script>
<b>Last 15 Threads :</b><br><table width="60%">
<script type="text/javascript">

</script>
</table>

</BODY>
</HTML>

eva2000

01-13-2004, 12:39 AM

daFish

01-13-2004, 07:45 AM

Bernd Glasstett

01-13-2004, 07:58 AM

one thing though when i uploaded your stock composer on my site the generated code made external.php's link as

www.animeboards.net/external.php

since animeboards.com is a domain alias for animeboards.net
That is something, which we cannot resolve generally. We use the following code to generate the address:

$server2_url = $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];
$folder_url = str_replace("/composeexternal.php?do=composecode", "", $server2_url);
$server_url = "http://".$_SERVER (http://".$_SERVER)['SERVER_NAME'];
$forum_url = $server_url . $folder_url;

It takes the request_uri, which is the whole URL, including the /composeexternal-Part and without the http://www-Part. Than it takes the http://-Part and combines the two. What you can do is, search in our script for:

$server_url = "http://".$_SERVER['SERVER_NAME' (http://".$_server['server_name'/)];

and replace it with:

$server_url = "http://animeboards.com (http://".$_server['server_name'/)";

We wanted it to program as universal as possible, but domain-aliases are almost impossible to get dynamically. The variable above always gets the main domain.

Bernd Glasstett

01-13-2004, 08:00 AM

Hi Bernd,

great hack. I have installed this on my testboard and when i generate the code for one specific forum, the preview alawys shows me the latest 5 threads from the whole forum.
The generated external.php link is ok (external.php?forumids=44&type=js) i think.

Is there a way to solve this?
Hacking the external.php that would be. We noticed the bug. It is located in the external.php. The strange thing is: it doesn't appear always. As it also bugs us a little, we are currently looking for a solution - always thinking about: What if Jelsoft gets rid of the bug in a future version? ;)

Bernd Glasstett

01-13-2004, 08:12 AM

done but really anime_news.php is the only one i care about right now i have the following in that file

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://animeboards.com/external.php?type=js&forumids=<?php echo($fid); ?>"></script>

ok, first things first: Please use

<script type="text/javascript" src=http://animeboards.com/external.php?forumids=<?php echo $fid; ?>&type=js></script>

Instead of the above code. So that it uses the same code, as we are currently using on our development-board ;) We noticed that while & should work out it sometimes doesn't. That's why we use & again. Let's see if the problem is solved with this :)

daFish

01-13-2004, 08:13 AM

Hacking the external.php that would be. We noticed the bug. It is located in the external.php. The strange thing is: it doesn't appear always. As it also bugs us a little, we are currently looking for a solution - always thinking about: What if Jelsoft gets rid of the bug in a future version? ;)

Thanks for clearing this up. :)
Let's hope they'll fix this bug in RC3/Gold version.

daFish

01-24-2004, 11:47 AM

Hey Bernd,

i finally got it working after i upgraded my live board, but after the code insert, the XHTML compatibility was broken. Is the code XHTML-valid?

Bernd Glasstett

02-05-2004, 02:46 PM

Hm for xhtml-compatibility the code has to be with low-characters. A far as I can see, everything is in that way, but I will take look asap. :)

daFish

02-05-2004, 03:05 PM

Hm for xhtml-compatibility the code has to be with low-characters. A far as I can see, everything is in that way, but I will take look asap. :)
Good news. Danke Bernd. :)

Natch

02-05-2004, 07:16 PM

ok, first things first: Please use

<script type="text/javascript" src=http://animeboards.com/external.php?forumids=<?php echo $fid; ?>&type=js></script>

Instead of the above code. So that it uses the same code, as we are currently using on our development-board ;) We noticed that while & should work out it sometimes doesn't. That's why we use & again. Let's see if the problem is solved with this :)
U need to use & IF AND ONLY IF the & will be decoded by a browser - if you are generating a link using document.write, you need only use & ...

(I think this is accurate ... HTH) ;)

Natch

02-05-2004, 07:17 PM

Oh - and GREAT JOB!

Wow - you guys have created something excellent here :)

Bernd Glasstett

02-06-2004, 05:58 AM

Ok, about the xhtml-compatibility: As you can see here:

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://www.comicforum.de/comicforum/composeexternal.php

The major problems are resolved. What remains is the begin of the form - and I have to say, I dunno how to resolve it - and the contents of the textareas, which is the example-code. I will discuss this with my co-developer. What would be most likely is that we might show the example in simple text, while leaving the textareas blank - which would make them xhtml-conform.

We will release the next version as soon as we resolved the issues :)

If you would like most of the problems already resolved, please download the new template. However there is one small issue left in the phrases. Search for <br> and replace with <br/> in the composeexternal-phrases. This is NOT a new release yet. New release will have version 1.0.5 ;)

Bernd Glasstett

02-06-2004, 06:09 AM

daFish

02-06-2004, 06:58 AM

And some good news: We are working on implementing to generate the URLs for XML and RSS-feeds at this moment. So, if they are active, the user can choose whether he would like to have RSS, JS or XML and then generate the appropriate code :)
That sounds pretty good. I'll switch over to XML output when the new version of your hack is ready. :)
That should solve the resulting XHTML-valid problems.

Bernd Glasstett

02-06-2004, 09:52 AM

Err... keep in mind, we only make it easier to make the link. We don't offer - at this moment - a parser that could be downloaded ;)

But the parser could be a nice idea. Welllllll, let's see :D

Smitty

04-03-2004, 10:43 PM

Err... keep in mind, we only make it easier to make the link. We don't offer - at this moment - a parser that could be downloaded ;)

But the parser could be a nice idea. Welllllll, let's see :D
Has this been updated (or does it need to be) for vB 3 Gold?

Bernd Glasstett

04-04-2004, 07:45 PM

Not yet - but it runs on Gold perfectly. We use it on our production-board :)

Smitty

04-04-2004, 08:00 PM

Not yet - but it runs on Gold perfectly. We use it on our production-board :)
OK. Thanks! I've been watching for a while and now that things are stable I may try it on my testbed.

Your contribution is appreciated!

johng

04-29-2004, 03:22 PM

The whole process in general on how to add phrases. I only see a menu option to upload/download a whole language in the control panel.

Can anyone answer this question? It probably seems self evident to most of you, but for the life of me I can't figure this out either.

How do you get the provided XML file into the phrase manager?

eva2000

05-07-2004, 02:39 AM

Not yet - but it runs on Gold perfectly. We use it on our production-board :)

Confirm the code still works for me on vB 3.0.0 :)

YLP1

08-15-2004, 06:37 PM

Hi all, I installed this mod but I am not getting to work. Nothing shows for the preview.
http://www.yourlincolnpark.com/lpsforum/composeexternal.php
I went through to make sure that I installed correctly but I still get no preview. Any help is greatly appreicated

PS: I be a noobe....and one other question.... I can use this generated code to put in a non VB/PHP webpage correct?

trackpads

09-04-2004, 09:41 AM

Yes you can put thin in a non-vb page. You need to run it from the Navbar link or from the Tools dropdown in the Forum Display, not call it directly.

-Jason

YLP1

09-06-2004, 12:42 AM

Hi Jason,
Thanks for the response but I don't understand when you say I need to run it from the navbar link or tools dropdown....There is a link to create external JS but when clicked, it doesn't provide the code (it's blank).

I have attached a graphic so that you can see that it's generated the JS but the code shows no preview nor does it appear when added to a page:

YLP1

09-09-2004, 04:38 PM

Ok I finally figured out what the problem was..... the composeexternal.php wasn't pulling my full path to the forums..... It's working now.....

But no matter what changes like reduction in title characters, specific forums that I choose.... the max 15 show for all forums. Any ideas how I can fix this?

Also, is there a way to use this to pull members that are online?

youthgas

09-23-2004, 03:42 AM

Hi folks,

Sorry if this is a silly question, but where and how exactly do I insert the phrases (step 1).

Thanks,
Richard...

GetGamer.com

02-01-2005, 09:01 PM

Is there any way to include n characters from the description (the thread content)? With that addition, this could be a great way to put news feeds on non-VB pages with not only the Subject but a few sentences or so to hook people in.

Neobud

05-23-2005, 03:13 PM

Hello. Fantastic product!

I have just installed and re-checked my installation. All works great expect that I have to manually input the forum ID(s) seperated by a comma in the text box on the 'composeexternal.php' page. The text box will not populate with my forums as I expect it should do (assumed becasue your text reads "Hold Ctrl to select"). I wondered if this was a common problem. I have no idea.

Running 3.0.7.

Any help would be appreciation thank you.

Bernd Glasstett

05-23-2005, 03:52 PM

Sorry for answering late, but I had many things to do.

All works great expect that I have to manually input the forum ID(s) seperated by a comma in the text box on the 'composeexternal.php' page. The text box will not populate with my forums as I expect it should do (assumed becasue your text reads "Hold Ctrl to select"). I wondered if this was a common problem. I have no idea.

The script never populated the forumids. So this is quite right :)

Is there any way to include n characters from the description (the thread content)?

I am afraid that vbulletin itself doesn't give this possibility on the external.php. Would be some feature that could be provided with a hack of external.php.

SHANE-D-PAIN

05-24-2005, 06:41 PM

Can anyone answer this question? It probably seems self evident to most of you, but for the life of me I can't figure this out either.

How do you get the provided XML file into the phrase manager?

Your not the only one, this hack would be just what i am looking for but sadly i am lost!!! I have not got a clue how to add phrases through xml files!!!!!

Neobud

10-01-2005, 08:46 AM

Are there compatibility problems with this product and vB 3.5?
Thanks guys.

digitalSite

01-18-2006, 03:22 AM

Are there compatibility problems with this product and vB 3.5?
Thanks guys.

I would also like to know if this works in 3.5...please?