So this step:

Adding index to post table. Please standy by.... this bit can take a few...

Has now been running for over 30 hours.

I am running it in a browser window from my server. It hangs on trying to create an index apparently. What is your suggestion? I am half tempted to remove this step from the product and create the index in mysql on my own. The post table has over 2 million rows and is myisam.

Alright, I finally got AME working (and it's great!) but I have one more n00b question. I went ahead and created a custom BBCode entry for AME through the AdminCP. The button is up on my post editor toolbar and it correctly adds the BBCode tags. When I submit a post it displays correctly and works fine but when I hit preview or go to edit the AME tags simply revert to URL tags the message field itself.

Meaning that if I preview something and submit my AME tags switch to URL tags in the message editor box. Or if I go to edit something they'll switch to URL and screw up the post unless you manually change the URL tags back into AME tags.

In the "replacement" field I currently have:
What should I stick in here to prevent this from happening?

I am not sure why you would do this? AME was designed so that you and your users just had to paste the URLs in the post. AME will do the rest.

That would indeed work, but you wouldnt have to take the step out of the product file, ame will silently skip the step if the column is already there.

I lay money on the fact that something is being overlooked. The most common mistakes centred around the 'it doesn't work' arena are:

1- Users install product and go 'refresh' a page that has a media URL in it. AME doesn't work this way. AME will sprinkle its magic onto a post only when AME is installed and the post is saved (or rebuilt using the tools)

2- Users are pasting a youtube video into a post, but the video they are posting has external embedding disabled so AME just links to the video instead of showing you a broken one ;) (in other words, it is actually working)

3- Usergroup permissions are wrong

4- Cache setup wrong (disable the file cache to test).

5- They are trying to install on phpBB. Fail.

Thanks.

AME only works for me when I surround the media's URL with AME and /AME (bracketed, of course).

1. I didn't refresh a page to see if it worked. I created a new post with several links from various video tube sites (G4TV, YouTube, Google Video).

2. Like I said, I posted multiple videos from multiple sites.

3. I've checked and rechecked usergroup permissions. Everything is kosher here (as mentioned in a previous post this was the first thing I checked for troubleshooting).

4. Cache setup is not wrong. It's currently set as enabled, the folder is place in the correct directory, and it is CHMODded to "777." There are no cache alerts at the top of the AME CP options page.

5. My site utilizes vBulletin 3.8.3.

Are there any known issues concerning AME and the vBBlog?

I just tried posting to our blog, and got the following database error, which would seem to involve AME?

any ideas here?
Thanks in advance. :)

That means AME was installed before vbBlog. Check the AME tools menu in the admincp. There is an option to add the ame_flag column you need ;)

Do you have vbseo running and if so, are you using it to track outbound links? Or maybe any other link modifying hack?