Bills PayPal Donations Lite - 4
 

Hack Description

This hack is the easiest way to add the ability to accept PayPal donations for your site.
You simply upload 2 php files, and a couple of images and then import the product XML and thats it!
No messing round with template edits or anything like that, its all done for you! :)


Some features of this hack are:

• No need to modify or edit any vB files!
• Automaticly adds 'Donate' link on Navbar next to the FAQ link if desired.
• Simple once off setup in the Admin Control Panel.
• All PayPal settings such as preferred currency are set in the Admin CP.
• The Donors forum username is on the emailed receipt from PayPal.
• People do not have to be registered on your site to donate.
• You and toggle the PayPal Verified seal on or off.
• Works with default IE settings!
• Configurable Thank you page for donors
• Default / suggested donation amount if desired
• Fully Phrased
  

Well thats about it for the moment. I may add more features later, if there is a demand for them.

Please note that you have to have either a Business or Premiere PayPal account, else you will need to upgrade to one of these before you can accept donations. Its easy to do, just follow the guide on the PayPal site.

Also note that this is a product, not a plug-in. You must import it using the import product feature in the Admin CP.

I will try and offer support, but work and family commitments mean I don't have much free time.

This script has been confirmed as working on

• vB 4.01

Known Bugs

• None

Change log

Version 4.00 (20th Feb 2010)

• First release for vB 4.*
• Will only work with vB 4.* or newer

Click on Install
If you have this script installed then please click on the install link because;

• You will get notified if any security issues are reported.
• You will get notified when there are any upgrades to this script
• It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling and motivates me to develop more :)

IMPORTANT
This is my first real conversion for vB 4.x and as such probably contains some bugs.
I would recommend testing on a test forum first.

Manual Template Edit
(if using modded navbar without the default hooks)

If your using a custom Navbar (or none at all) or just want to have the link to the donations page somewhere else, just add the following code into the desired position in your template.

If you wish to use a button image instead, use this code

+1 reserved

Sounds like just want I need :) - I install this evening and take a look.

Have you any plans for stats tracking? E.g. how much recieved this month, monthly targets etc... I'm sure a great many people would love to see a donations mod with stats tracking :)

yes that would be great.
Also are the Donors moved to a different group on successful completion?

This is interesting....

Great work better than what I had. Thanks.

Pretty neat but i'll wait for VSa paypal donate :D insallted :)

Well it's nice seeing all these donating mods coming out... But the BIG feature they are ALL lacking is the donator bar, IT MOTIVATES people to DONATE.

Without it, a donate button is nothing if the user doesn't know what the goal is or what the site wants.

100% agree with you !

Amen. I never thought it'd be such a hard concept but it seems like everyone that's been coding these keeps duplicating without bringing out new features that we are all missing from Cyb - Paypal Donation module in 3.8

One of the major issues with previous paypal donation "thangs" where there was a leaderboard of paypal donatees...

Was the link grabbed the donation amount before hitting paypal, so forum owners get notified of a donation and then the connection fails for the user, or they have insufficient funds, or they change their mind... and the reality of what got donated bears little resemblance to actual donations.

If someone can code such a mod , I will install it right away, for now this is on my "tagged" list, because of the work the coder has done.

So well done mate. I hate seeing threads detract from what you have done, into begging messages for what they want.

it will be perfect if you add target amount for this month in navbar below

Thanks :D
This was designed as a basic one that does not make any database changes, hence no things that require databases to function correctly, such as goals in this version.

Its not designed to suit everyones needs, It's a basic one that is light and easy for anyone to install and use.

Its not a hard concept, its just designed for a different market that what you (or I for that matter) require.
Truth be told, its not the one I use on my own site, I have ported this from Vb 3.x to give me experience in Vb4 before I tackle anything more complex, more than any other reason.

Thanks :D

And thanks for bringing this point up.
Your spot on with the issue about how to deal with donations that fail for various reasons.

Its a little complex to get around this, as you have to get the response from the paypal webserver before the data is submitted into the database if you want to avoid false results.
This is also an important consideration if you want auto group changes for donors as well.

Its certainly doable, infact Its the way I receive donations on my live website. (Before anyone asks, its not polished, only has the features I want, and has a couple of bugs so was never released as a mod).

But thats getting off topic for this mod I guess.

I have a simple request: Instead of putting the Donate link in the nav bar, why not as a tab instead, which I think would be more prominent? Another PayPal mod does that. How about it, at least as an option?

Peace,
Gene

I can add this as an option for the next release.

Super.

Also an option to change the title, under New Donations.

Right now we have:

The Paracast Community Forums - BPPL Donations

I don't mind your name there, but I'd like to be able to change the former to The Paracast, so we can link to that page from other areas of the site.

Is there a hack that would let us do that now?

Peace,.
Gene

You can chage it by changing a phrase in the XML file and reimporting with overwrite selected.

Like 253 or thereabouts, just change "- BPPL Donations" to whatever you like.
Might be an idea to increment the date field by 1 as well.


I will change this in the next release to just read "Donations" I think.

Two questions.

1. Can I change the CDATA or whatever that refers to the forum name to something else? I tried just replacing that string and it didn't work.

2. This isn't your fault I'm sure since it happened before I installed your mod. But since upgrading from 4.0.1 to 4.0.2, I get a peculiar error message when installing or removing a mod.

See the attachment for what I'm referring to. Any clues what I should do to fix that?

Peace,
Gene

I just installed and it went ok. I did have to edit the bbpl_main template and replace two instances of this:

{$vbulletin->userinfo[username]}

with this:

{vb:raw $vbulletin->userinfo[username]}

I also had to do it once in bppl_donated.

Thanks encryption I had the same problem...used your fix, not all is good!

I did use this with vBH-Add new tabs and put the donate tab on the main navbar like the other main tabs. Now it gets noticed as it should. That was the simplest way I have ever added tabs.

vBH-Add new tabs
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=228507

I was using the 3.7 version of this mod, and was happy to see it for 4.x.

I did notice a couple of problems with it though:

1 - I also had to make the edit mentioned in this post.

2 - In the Admin CP >> Options >> Bills PayPal Donate Lite - 4.0, the setting for "Display Donations Link" keeps reverting back to the default "Text Link on Navbar." I have the link adding to my Tabs using another Mod, so I disabled the navbar link from this mod. A few minutes later I noticed the link was back in the Navbar. It looks like every time I open the options for this mod, it defaults back to "Text Link on Navbar", so if I hit save without remembering to change this, the unwanted text link comes back.

This is a problem because the same thing happens if I choose to show ALL options in my Admin CP. If I am looking for another option somewhere, and open all the options groups, make a change to something else entirely...well, this defaults back to "Text Link on Navbar" and inadvertently gets saved.

As a workaround, I edited the product XML to remove the link entirely.

Dexter...

It is a great mod. I just came in and fix errors on the userinfo; however, I have another question that is, how can I add description under the Welcome message?

Thanks for the mod,

Victor:up:

Also had to add vb:raw to {$vbulletin->userinfo[username]} in bppl_main and bppl_donated

Works great on vB 4.1.10, thanks Bill!

Perhaps, someone can update the first post to include this code update.

hello

i made these changes, but when i get the detail of the paypal donation, the username would not, i have this

Details of the purchase
Donation for my site from {$vbulletin->userinfo[username]}

what should I do to make the user appear correctly

thank you