Umm, I see the folder there at /z/. I don't know why you are unable to remove the files completely, consult your webhost though as we've never had an issue with that before. If you followed the instructions to remove it and removed the files, you should be golden.

- Reid

about time :)

When is supposed to go Gold?

Has this been released with a WYSIWYG editor?

We don't have a planned date at this time. Basically we make no qualms about bugs existing and we are sure there are more than we know about that will be found with different server setups, different sized forums etc. So we are taking the stance of we'll be done when we have as many critical and other bugs corrected that we are able to do.

Afraid not. We talked about it a lot and really wanted it as a team (your requests earlier spurred that conversation actually) but it just would have set us back longer and we wanted to release. I wouldn't rule it out but it's not in the plans right now as want to make it as stable and bug free as possible. Sorry. :(

- Reid

That's too bad. It's the only reason I can't get anyone to use Zoints on my forum. How is it that you can get a wysiwyg editor to work on the zoint.com website, but not in the product release.

Also, I can not import the product into vBulletin 3.6.4 It says that compatability begins at 3.6.6 and ends at 3.7 That's a pretty narrow range. I had the 2.0 beta installed and uploaded all the new files and ran the upgrade script. It all still works. Is it really necessar to import the new product file? If so, can I get a product file that works with 3.6.4?

I am speaking purely on some loose chats I've had with the engineers but apparently there is some sort of integration that needs to be made between the vB editor and Zoints Local that is very heavy on the javascript and fairly complex (there is a bug issue actually on the 3.7x version that needs to be addressed in fact.) As for why we have a WYSIWYG editor on the .com, I don't know the specific reason but I am sure if it was possible to port the editor over they would have because it seems like it would have been easier. It's not that an advanced editor WON'T work, but I think they had a lot of trouble with it with the 1.x.x versions and just didn't have the time to get it working. The team really wanted it, but we also really wanted to get this RC out finally and correct the bugs with it.

As for the product, ZL should work fine for you but the new features won't be there in terms of the Community Central and such. I wasn't aware of the product being only 3.6.6 and up, so whether that was a slip-up or by design, I will find out and let you know.

I will let the rest of the guys know about these two issues. I hope the site is going well. :)

- Reid

one thing to improve zoints would be eg: when someone writes a profile message and you get a PM with the link back to your profile, you click the link and it opens in a new window, very annoying for new members.

edit: damn:

The following dependencies were not met:

1. This product is not compatible with version 3.7.2 of vBulletin. (Compatible starting with 3.6.6 / Incompatible with 3.7.0 and greater)

Hi jaycob,

I'll let the engineers about the suggestion.

As for the dependencies, if you are using vB 3.7x, please check out the thread for that:
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=183559

Included with that product is the file for 3.7x. :)

- Reid

lol thanks man i was about to edit my post after just installing zoints 3.7.x

cheers man thanks.

I just edited the dependencies line in the product xml file so that it would import and it seems to have worked fine. Nothing blew up.

I received this from one of the engineers:
Can you tell if any of the new product features are compatible, such as the community central? Thanks JD.

- Reid

There is an error in 2.0.0.5rc1 whereby it disregards the setting for "Show profile link in post bit"

the plugin for postbit_display_complete that displays this information should use the value of the variable $show['zointsprofile'] in its if statement and the other plugin for postbit_display_complete should execute in order number 4 (before the aforementioned one)

the former should be:

I'll post it in our bugs forum right away!

Thanks bc3tech. :)

- Reid

Still no photo album??!

As we figured the primary future of our downloads will be from 3.7x forums, most of which will use the built-in photo album system, we thought it would be pointless to spend time developing an album solution thus why the 3.7x version has album integration into the Community Central and with a profile block.

Where as something like the blog is something that we felt a lot of forums might like who wish to have a free blogging solution.

- Reid

[Vent]At the risk of sounding like a complete jackass, I have to ask what the point of this release is. Why would anyone want to blog with such a cumbersome, and archaic text editor? The lack of an integrated photo album is another thing that prevents this from being a product forum members would want to use. Granted, my forum is currently a small one with a little over 300 members, but in spite of numerous attempts to get them to create personal pages using Zoints, not a single member page has been created on my site in the last year. Why should they? There's no easy to use text editor, and they can't create photo albums. These are 2 features that you have somehow managed to implement on the zoints website, but they are conspicuously missing from the released product. Bottom line is, that without these 2 features, I cannot imagine Anyone enjoying using this system, or why they would want to.

I could be wrong in my assessment, so if there is any forum owner out there that is having any degree of success at getting members to participate, I'd sure like to hear about it, because I'm very close to uninstalling htis product. And please hold the obvious comebacks that I'm getting this product for free, because that wasn't my choice and I'd be glad to pay for something that had all the necessary features.[/Vent]

Pointless? A photo album page that has the same look and feel as the rest of a members pages is pointless?

JD,

I've tried to be nothing but helpful in answering your questions. It's truthful that many of our features came directly from suggestions and common thought among feedback, such as wanting ways to encourage members to have a reason to use profiles. Did we want to add more? Yeah. On the possible to-do list for the engineers was in fact the external WYSIWYG editor. Did we have endless time to complete all of this? No. You might think, actually I know you think, that we didn't prioritize correctly. For you and your forum that may be the case and I apologize if we can't meet your specific requirements but for other forums we might be delivering just what they need. We can never make everyone happy, but it's not for a lack of trying.

We WANT to add one. I think no matter what I say, you're not going to consider it and that's fine as you are entitled to your opinion, but I will make another push for looking into it. I am just a staff member, that doesn't mean it will happen but I can try my best.

As for this "but they are conspicuously missing from the released product," not to sound rude but that is just digging for something. We have added cool things to Local that haven't even made it's way to our network. A lot of people would say that was a pretty stupid move for us, but we wanted to give you guys something cool, whether you want to believe it or not.

Would it have been pointless if we could develop a superior photo album option? Of course not. Did we have the time to do such a thing considering how long we have been going at this? No. And to draw from the paragraph above, an album solution was needed on Zoints.com, we felt that as we weren't planning to release when 3.70 came out, some would already have established photo albums by our release and would be more content with keeping those rather than starting over.

I am really sorry you aren't more satisfied. As a non-engineer there is not much more I can do than to push for the editor issue to be looked into, which I will do.

Have a great weekend JD.

- Reid

The ultimate point I am trying to make is that the developers of zoints local are shooting themselves in the foot by not making the features I mentioned an urgent priority. I realize how much development time must have spent on this product. The plain and simple fact is, that if someone wants to create personal pages that include photo albums, they will go is myspace.com. Whether you like it or not, that is who zoints local is competing with. The myspace concept is completely integrated, and very intuitive. It is what the vast majority of forum members that would even consider creating a detailed profile are used to, and they will turn away from anything that is not as easy to use. As a forum owner, I am not able to present my members with a good reason to create profiles and blog on my site, because there are too many better places for them to do it easier. I have been hoping for the last year that the zoints product would change that.

Whether you believe it or not, I probably want zoints local to be a successful product as much as anyone on the zoints team. That is why I have been so persistent about implementing features that translate into ease of use by forum members. Not to sound too crass, but a lot of forum members or potential members couldn't find their butt if it had a bell on it... they can't even figure out how to complete the forum registration process 25% of the time, so they surely will have a hard time using, an antiquated text editor.

As far as a photo album, it's NOT about who has the better implementation. It's about the end users perception of seamless integration of album pages into their profile. Profile pages are, in fact, a mini-website, and as such should be a congruous collection of pages, including the photo album. If a visitor to any given zoints profile pages must navigate away from the profile to view a photo album, they have in effect, left that mini-website. That's not good because the congruity of profile pages is then broken. I have Photopost installed on my site and it's a better photo album solution that anything built into vBulletin will ever be. Even though it's the best photo forum available, it's useless as far as an integration into profile pages goes... it's a seperate product.

Bottom Line: Integration of features and ease of use is the key to making zoint local a highly successful product. I want zoints local to be a successful product, don't you? This thread had about 10 unique posters in th month of May.... that's a pretty low turnout. This thread should be going nuts with questions if forum members were using the zoints profile system.

First off JD, I appreciate your passion for the product. Secondly and before I possibly bore others with a wall of text, we are looking into it (the editor.) Like I mentioned, this has come up recently again and I think it's something we all want solved. I don't know when or how or even if, but I believe there will be a good effort made toward this.

And I understand your point about photo pages and I agree as a Zoints Local Photo Album would be great. In the future? Who knows. But I think you misunderstood my point a bit. Photo pages to us were "pointless" (probably not the best word) when compared to revamping the blog and developing blocks for it. A lot of of time alone was spent on thinking how an entry would be spaced out or where should the tags go, etc. We felt that as not all forums would have the blog, in fact many do not, that it would be the more heavily desired feature as it is another form of content. So in essence, it was a very utilitarian type of thought, which of the two would bring the greatest joy to the most. With any feature development in the future, I am sure a photo album solution will be heavily discussed (it was discussed in the last round) as we knocked off a lot of potential additions with the 2.0 changes.

- Reid

Here's a simple question. The 'Photo Album' tab on the profile pages links to this file:

/z/album.php (Which doesn't exist)

Where can I change the link that the 'Photo Album' tab points to? Maybe I can hack in Photopost as an interim solution.

I believe the way it is coded it's so that users can specify a gallery to link to, be it on your site or an external site (like FlickR.)

There are also photo blocks from both Photopost and Photoplog on dev.zoints.com to integrate with Zoints, but I don't know if they still currently work as they are both older and I am sure they've gone through updates.

- Reid

I have spent the last 12 hours searching for a place to specify this and it has been nothing but an adventure in frustration. There is nothing in admin or in any of the countless php files I have searched in. Rather than tell me that you believe it is coded so that users can specify a gallery to link to, you would save us both some time by just telling me WHERE to change it.



I did notice the photopost block on dev.zoints.com. If I could ever actually log in on that site, I might have a look at it. The login system on your dev site hasn't worked right for over a year now. Y'all might want to fix that.


Example:

Manual Login
If you have reached this page then the automated login process is not working. In order to log in, please proceed with the following steps:

Copy down the login code
Click the button labeled "Proceed"
Enter the login code into the form on the next page.
0IDV6UXB0LLLJW8USPQU

Clicking on 'PROCEED' returns a blank white page.


How hard can it be to get a login script to work?????????!!!!!!!!!

Hey JD,

I hope your Saturday is going as well as it can be, mine has been fantastic. :)

But I do need to apologize. I know I am probably not your favorite person, but there really has been a lot of work put into the release this week and a lot of support so I've been scatterbrained. I have so many different products I help on and I sometimes get things confused. For some reason, I don't really recall why or even if there was a reason, the album file was left out a few versions ago (I am not an engineer, so I don't know.) But I found the file for you and I PERSONALLY tested it on my forum (you can go to my profile to check it but I will likely remove that page from my navigation soon.)

This is how it functions. If enabled, when the user clicks on it for their profile, it will bring up a screen asking for their album URL. If they click that page, they will always get that screen but visitors and guests will be redirected to the URL that they specified.

And yes, there are certainly blocks on dev.zoints.com to show a user's images and to link to their gallery. On some install work I installed them for a few forums. These are 3rd party blocks so I wouldn't be able to support them but if they work, that would be great to hear.

http://dev.zoints.com/showthread.php?t=119

Again, my apologies. Upload this file to your /z/ folder, enable the Photos page, inform your users on how to use it. I am sure a more elegant and seamless solution can be coded if you sought it from a hacker here, but this is something that does the job.

We actually just got a complaint of this recently (literally last night.) I am thinking it must be a browser issue as while there has not been a ton of posts made there, very few actually, I have been able to login to post simple widget blocks and others have too.

I'll inform someone of this right away though. I'll download the blocks and I will post them you ASAP while that gets sorted out.

- Reid

Here you go JD,

I've also copied over his config instructions into a .txt file for you with a link to the thread for your future reference. From my knowledge of the block, Photopost needs to be installed on the same database to work.

(For all others: This is not my modification nor an official Zoints modification. I am just posting this here to help JD out while we fix things.)

- Reid

When will gold be released?

This block assumes that your vBulletin and Photopost installations use the same database. My installation uses a seperate database for Photopost, so this block doesn't work for me. I looked at the thread for this block on dev.zoints.com and several other people said the same thing and asked for a solution... as far back as a year ago. To date, there have been no solutions offered on dev.zoints.com

I guess I'm just S.O.L.

I'm posting the complet code for the block below just in case someone here can figure out how to make this work with a seperate photopost database. Hope you zoints guys don't mind, but this is my only hope of getting this working. I don't know enough about mysql to do it myself.

I'm also running Photopost 6.1, so this block probably hase more problems than just the database issue

===================Block code below =========================================



# photopost album
# 1.0.2
# mtgmaster (themtgmaster@gmail.com)
# http://lol.zoints.com/
#
# Displays a members photos
class user_photopost_album extends z_module
{
# Set the maximum amount of images any users are allowed to display
var $max_images = 7;
# Set your photopost db table prefix here
var $pp_prefix = 'pp_';
# Set your full url to the photopost directory, with no trailing slash
var $pp_dir = 'http://www.majorleaguetalk.com/photopost';
# Set categories you don't want to be displayed, separated with commas eg. '2,500,501'
var $dis_cats = '';

function contents()
{
$content = $this->content;
$vbulletin = $this->_zoints->external->vbulletin;
$userinfo = $this->_zoints->external->load_user($this->zuser);

# If limit hasnt been set or is over the admin set maximum, set it to the admin max
if(empty($content['max_pics']) OR $content['max_pics'] > $this->max_images)
{
$limit_sql = 'LIMIT ' . $this->max_images;
}
# Otherwise, let them set it
else
{
$limit_sql = 'LIMIT ' . $content['max_pics'];
}

# Generate the sql to get rid of some cateories
if(!empty($this->dis_cats))
{
$categories = explode(',', $this->dis_cats);
if(is_array($categories))
{
foreach($categories as $cat)
{
$cat_sql .= 'AND cat<>' . $cat . ' ';
}
}
else
{
$cat_sql = ' AND cat<>' . $this->dis_cats . ' ';
}
}

# Get all photos the user has
$sql = "
SELECT * FROM " . $this->pp_prefix . "photos
WHERE userid=" . $this->zuser . "
AND approved=1
" . $cat_sql . "
ORDER BY date DESC
" . $limit_sql . "
";
$getphotos = $vbulletin->db->query_read($sql);
$html .= '<div class="' . $this->style['pmain1'] . '" style="padding: 0;">';

# Does the user have any photos?
if ($vbulletin->db->num_rows($getphotos))
{
# Display the top of the table
$html .= '<table border="0" width="100%">
<tr>
<td width="100" align="center" class="phead">
Image
</td>';
# Display the details?
if(!$content['details'])
{
$html .= ' <td class="phead">
Details
</td>';
}
$html .= ' </tr>';

# loop and display all that have been fetched from the DB
while($photo = $vbulletin->db->fetch_array($getphotos))
{
# Display image cell
$html .= '
<tr>
<td width="100" align="center" class="' . $this->style['pmain1'] . '">
<a href="' . $this->pp_dir . '/showphoto.php?photo=' . $photo['id'] . '">
<img src="' . $this->pp_dir . '/data/' . $photo['cat'] . '/thumbs/' . $photo['bigimage'] . '" />
</a>
</td>';
# Display the image details?
if(!$content['details'])
{
$html .= '
<td class="' . $this->style['pmain1'] . '" valign="top" style="font-size: 80%;">';
# photo name
$html .= '<div><a href="' . $this->pp_dir . '/showphoto.php?photo=' . $photo['id'] . '">' . htmlspecialchars($photo['title']) . '</a></div>';
# File size in KB
$html .= '<div>Filesize: ' . number_format($photo['filesize'] / 1024, 2) . ' KB</div>';
# Date uploaded
$html .= '<div>Date: ' . $this->_zoints->external->date($photo['date'], $this->_zoints->external->get_date_format()) . '</div>';
# Dimensions
$html .= '<div>Dimensions: ' . $photo['width'] . 'x' . $photo['height'] . '</div>';
# Views
$html .= '<div>Views: ' . $photo['views'] . '</div>';
# Rating
$html .= '<div>Rating: ' . $photo['rating'] . '</div>';
$html .= ' </td>';
}
$html .= '</tr>';
}
$html .= '</table>';
$html .= '<div class="' . $this->style['pmain1'] . '" style="text-align: center;">
<a href="' . $this->pp_dir . '/showgallery.php?cat=500&ppuser=' . $this->zuser . '">View all of ' . $userinfo['username'] . '\'s photos</a>
</div>';
}
# Nope, tell them they have none
else
{
$html .= '<div class="' . $this->style['pmain1'] . '" style="text-align: center;">' . $userinfo['username'] . ' doesn\'t have any photos</div>';
}
if($this->powner)
{
$html .= '<div class="' . $this->style['pmain1'] . '" style="text-align: center;">
<a href="' . $this->pp_dir . '/uploadphoto.php">Upload pictures</a>
</div>';
}
$vbulletin->db->free_result($getphotos);

$html .= '</div>';
return $html;
}

function update($content)
{
return $content;
}

function edit()
{
$content = $this->content;
if($content['max_pics'] AND $content['max_pics'] < $this->max_images)
{
$limit = htmlspecialchars($content['max_pics']);
}
else
{
$limit = $this->max_images;
}
$html .= '<div class="pmain1">';

# Disable description checkbox
$html .= 'Disable image details? ';
$html .= '<input type="checkbox" name="mod[content][details]" ' . ($content['details'] ? 'checked="checked"': '') . ' /> <br />';
# Max pictures textbox
$html .= 'Max pictures to display ';
$html .= '<input type="text" name="mod[content][max_pics]" value="' . $limit . '" size="5" /> ';
$html .= '<span style="font-size: 7pt; color: #848484;">(max ' . $this->max_images . ' allowed)</span> ';

$html .= '</div>';

return $html;
}
}

Album.php doesn't do me much good. I guess it would be ok for linking to an external site, but I'd rather keep users on my site instead of providing a way for them to leave. This is not a viable solution for photopost albums on my site because each users album pages are a different url, and they would have no easy way to figure out what the url is.

Thanks for trying though.

It is really getting frustrating. I think I'll just go get drunk now.... I've been at this for 18 hours straight now.

BTW, you may not be my favorite person, but I like you just fine. I have to complain to somebody, and you're the only one around.

No planned date as we still have more bugs to find and correct. I would guess the engineers would feel comfortable going gold once they felt the significant/critical bugs have been fixed and the product is stable for a wide variety of forum setups.

Just a thought JD, I don't know if you have any mod rewriting settings on or .htaccess files, but maybe you would be able to code a rewrite to convert their Photopost ID into their username for a more SEO friendly URL like /photopost/joebloe/ (or whatever.) And then inputting their URL would be much more easy to accomplish. I am not an SEO expert so I don't know if that could be done, but I know converting id's into names is possible with vB through vBSEO and such. Just thinking out loud here.

As for the Photopost block, that's just fine to post it. Maybe if you can find enough people currently interested you guys could chip in an equal amount and find someone who could do it if no one is willing to do it for free for the community.

- Reid

Hey, jdelasko!

I just wanted to poke in here for a second and thank you for your feedback and your loyalty. I can tell you've had some frustration with our plugin. However, it's also obvious from the fact that you've still got it installed that you think we've got something going here, and I want you to know that we appreciate the time you've put in and the contributions that you have to share!

-Paul Kemp
-Zoints CC Lead

I'll look for a place to post the block on the photopost site and see what happens. There's only about 150 lines of code in the block, so there's a good possibility that someone on the Photopost site may be able to update the code.

Udate: I decided to import the photopost database into the vbulletin database and reconfiged.

The block works ok now. Still, viewing all of a members photos requires the viewer to navigate away from the profile that was being viewed. A photopost block might be an ok solution if there was better integration and member albums could be viewed without leaving the profile.

When it's ready :D

-Paul Kemp
Zoints CC Lead

PHP Fatal error: Call to a member function date() on a non-object in xxx/z/includes/database.class.php on line 551, referer: xxx

I got this error when i change $config['server_type'] = 'mysql';
to 'mysqli'.

How to solve that?

I'll run that by our engineers - I've never seen that issue reported before, so we'll need to determine if it's a bug in 2.0 or if it's an issue on your end.

Are you able to use the MYSQL wrapper?

What is MYSQL wrapper?

My vbulletin uses $config['Database']['dbtype'] = 'mysqli';
I got no problem with that.

MySQL wrapper is a simple class that encapsulates the functionality of MySQL database access commands.
It establishes database connections, executes queries storing the result set handle in a class variable and provides other functions to traverse the result set an retrieve the data returned by the database server.

Our engineers are researching this issue; they suggested that this might be something you could use as a workaround at this point (and also, if it didn't function, we would have another piece of information to help us troubleshoot).