Close forums but with access to some groups...
 

When we close the forum for such reason, (not only when the server load is too big and close the forum by itself), I mean when we decide ourselves to close it, is it possible to achieve the following:

Give access to other user groups? Like a group who would have a paid subscription...

I looked for info about this but all I found was that only the admin can access the forums when it's closed.

To do so, do I nedd a hack or it's possible in another way?

you can hack it so other people can view but i dont recommend it.

Only other thing would be to make a plugin and when active make it so that all other groups cant browse, basically it looks like its closed to them and if they can they can continue.

you can keep it simple and just make a 2 setting plugin.

Active
Usergroups allowed to browse when active

active being a yes or no radio
usergroups can be a text field and you input like 1,3,5 with commas.

that would be the logic behind it. as far as coding it though im not sure ,you can take a look at the depository and go over the tutorials there.

This would be too much for my weak php knowledge but I thank you for your answer. If anybody can find a way to code this, let me know. This would be a big help for me and for many other board managers I'm sure.

I'm surprised there is no option like this already built in. Am I the only one asking for such thing? Is this a security matter? I saw this at a couple of boards where they have VIP members that can access the board when it's too busy. They probably have the 3.5.4 hack that I saw because this is the version they use.