Mod for posting as alternate users?
 

SMF has a cool mod for anyone who is starting a new forum where you can post a thread or reply as an alternate user.

its really helpful for starting conversations on new forum as you can create a batch of users and have your own conversation to make it appear the forum is active

is there anything like this for vbulletin?

That's a good idea - I'm not sure if it exists, but there is a "log in as another user" mod: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=228077 . But I guess the point is not having to change users, so that mod isn't a lot better than just logging out and back in as another user. It would be good to be able to choose when posting.

ye i saw that but as you said its not really that helpful

damn was hoping vbulletin would have something like this, was super helpful when my forum was on SMF

It just had a box above the title box and you would just type in the first few letters of the name and a list would pop up showing you all the members containing those letters, click what one you want and then post away

Someone please create this for vbulletin

I might look at doing that, it doesn't sound too difficult. Is that an SMF mod or a built-in feature?

its an SMF mod

http://custom.simplemachines.org/mod...x.php?mod=2626

please do, ill send you $5 if you have paypal :)

bump because i really need this

Yeah, sorry about that - I was actually almost done a couple weeks ago and got distracted then never got back to it. Do you want to test it for me? (I know if you're trying to pretend to be multiple users, testing it a bit risky).

ye dude im happy to test, let me know what to do :)

There was this mod for 3.8: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=217771
But it was never upgraded to 4.x.

Thanks, I'll look at that. I did a search before starting on it but didn't think to search for any of those words.

That one puts a BIG security hole in, if you don't add the code to it I posted in that thread.

send me a pm when you want me to test it

and thanks in advance for the work you put into it (if you do get round to doing it :))

Yeah, sorry, keep meaning to get back to it. It might be ready to test, I can't remember where I left it.

I looked at the other one linked above. It's different because it switches users instead of just posting as another, so it's not the same approach that I took. But it might be a better approach, I don't know. A couple weeks ago someone else was working on one that would let you choose from a list of users to post as, which also seems like it would be a good idea, but I guess he hasn't released it yet either.

OK, I'm really sorry it took so long. I'm just posting what I have for now (it's attached here). Look in the settings at the end of the "Message Posting and Editing Options" section for the options. You need to set the users and/or groups you want to have access to this mod. Also, it only appears on the full editor page, so you have to "Go Advanced" to see it. If you try it, let me know how it works.

Cool dude!! i will try it when i get some tonight

oh my... ;)

What's her name?

BTW, the mod I posted has the same issue - there's no restriction on which members you can post as so you have to make sure you configure it to be used only by trusted people. (Although you can only post so I guess it's not a lot of risk).

The other one had it to where any super mod or admin could link any other account to his own, including the super admin account!

My patch allows only the super admin to link any accounts.

Oh, I see, so anyone with access could become superadmin. That is kind of a problem.

Yes, kind of. They could literally jump into the super's account without leaving any trace of having been there - no IP, nothing. Unless of course they were dumb enough to post with the account.

This includes reading the super's PMs, access to SA-only functions, you get the picture.

Then all they have to do is UN-link themselves from the account, and no one's the wiser!

So, exactly where would you add it in Kevin's mod?

I didn't examine it at all. Not sure if it's even the same thing.

I don't think this would be an issue in kh99's mod.

I think you're right. Mine only lets you post, and so you'll have the ip address. But it might be useful to be able to set up users or groups that you can't post as.

ok have installed it and it works fine, the only thing that this doesnt have that the smf did have (and it was a great feature) was then when you started typing it listed the users starting with that letter

its very helpful when you control lots of usernames and cant remember how to spell them all correctly.

not sure what kind of work is needed to include that

update

Ah cool, i just realised that it does show the names after you type the first 3 characters, its a little slow and would be better if it should up after typing the first character

I copied the existing username lookup (used in registration and sending pms) so I'm not sure. I can't do anything about the speed, but I'll look and see if I could change it to work after one character (I think probably it doesn't do that because a lot of forums have too many users for that to work).

What I was thinking about adding is a list of users that you previously posted as so you can choose from a drop-down.

That's what the other one has, a drop-down menu by your username in navbar where it says, "Welcome, kh99."

so in kh99's mod you need to set the userid that you want to use this mod. I have set it to only my account id.

Is there still a security hole in it if you only set it to your id?

I welcome other people's responses, but I'd say no. It doesn't really have the same problem because this mod only lets you post. The other mod mentioned above actually logged you in as the other user, and any mod or admin could become a superadmin. However, my mod does allow anyone with access to the settings in the admincp to change who's allowed to use it, so if you have other admins they can probably add themselves to the list of allowed users. I'm not sure how to get around that - I guess if I made it it's own option menu instead of adding to the existing options then I could restrict it to superadmins. Or I could just put settings in the config.php.

Using code to "lock out" super admins is only effective if the regular admins don't have access to edit the plugins, since if they did they could easily remove the code anyway...

That said I also feel this mod is safe to use. If you don't trust someone they shouldn't be an admin to begin with.

Good point.

yes good point and most people will be using this mod at the beginning of their forums life to post as multiple users to encourage conversation so its most likely that there will just be the one admin

if you havea big forum with lots of admins etc chances are you wont need this mod

great job kh99

one last thing - how do i change the characters needed to be inputted to show the drop down list?

The only way I can see to do this is to edit 2 files: in clientscript/vbulletin_ajax_suggest.js, look for
"this.min_chars=3;" and change it to 1. In ajax.php, look for this (line 138 or so):

and change 3 to 1. Of course this will change it everywhere there's a username "suggest".

(I'm guessing there's some way to do it without editing the js file but I couldn't figure it out right away).

I don't have any trust issues with my one SA, I just have issues with other people installing a Mod that violates their security to the degree that Mod does.

Is it possible to post an announcement as another user with this mod?

Also, when I set a usergroup that can post as another user it won't work. It does work when I specify users based on userid though.

Now that I upgraded to 4.2.2 I'm getting this error circled at the top. Any ideas?

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/external/2013/10/13.jpg