Major Additions - Synergy by Zoints - A system like Digg integrated into forums.

Index

Installation and Upgrading
FAQ, Changelog and Troubleshooting
Pre-written threads

This plugin is not currently available for vBulletin 3.7.x. Several users have reported serious incompatibilities, and we would not suggest attempting to install it on a forum running 3.7.x at this time.

Foreward

Awhile back, two visionaries by the names of Sal Collaziano and George B realized that a Digg-like system for forums could be highly beneficial. Kudos to those two for their understanding that by working together, we can all benefit.

What is Synergy?

How often does this happen to you? You or a member write a great thread, Google indexes it a week later, but it is buried in the search results so the masses never end up reading it. Frustrating, isn't it? Zoints solves this by taking a system like Digg, then integrating and mirroring in across all forums in a manner that allows great threads to be read by the masses. Synergy is designed to bring you more traffic and inspire your members to create higher quality content in order to obtain "Top Author" status.

Demos (with forums like these using Synergy, you're sure to get some traffic)

You'll notice all the demos look virtually the same except for the skins. This is due to the system mirroring itself across the forums. When a link is clicked, it takes the reader to the originating forum.

Ubuntu Forums
NASIOC
ThumperTalk
LWS


How Synergy Works

You have a lot of high quality threads on your forum. When you (or a trusted usergroup member you permission via the admincp options) decides a thread is worthy of Synergy, you select the "Add to Synergy" link as seen below.




During the next step, you write a short description for the thread and select which category it should go into.




Your thread is then added to a queue on your forum. Once every X hours, the top thread in your queue is added to Synergy.




When your thread is added to Synergy, the system distributes the link and description you wrote to all participating forums. If someone on any forum around the net clicks on your thread link, they are redirected back to your forum to the actual thread so they can read it. If people like your thread, they can vote on it which ranks it higher. Higher ranked threads, especially those that make it to the front page will in turn bring you more traffic.




The admincp settings are as follows:




Proof of Traffic

If you submit good content to Synergy that gets to the front page, you WILL get a lot of traffic. The following screenshot is from a small forum early in our testing. Guess which day it got a thread on the front page?



As more forums join Synergy, more and more people will be reading your threads. Let's work together to remove our reliance on search engines to send us traffic. Our communities are full of great content, it's time for it to be read!

[rootmt]

Product is licenced with GPL so i can modify it to work ONLY locally, am i right? If not, is there anybody know similar but local one mod?

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by rootmt

Product is licenced with GPL so i can modify it to work ONLY locally, am i right? If not, is there anybody know similar but local one mod?

Hi root,

The intention of Synergy is not for a local community, but for communities together to successively share their content and get more exposure for their threads of interest. There is at least one product here at vbulletin.org (I believe it is only for 3.7+ however) that is a more simple +/- thread and post rating system that is for JUST your forum, I also know of a paid modification that works on 3.6x (if interested, PM me and I'll send you the link.)

Best of luck finding a solution that fits.

- Reid

[glennybee]

I'm thinking about installing this product but I'm a little confused as to what Synergy actually is?

Is Synergy a website like Digg?

Where do your posts/links get submitted too?

Thanks

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Originally Posted by glennybee

I'm thinking about installing this product but I'm a little confused as to what Synergy actually is?

Is Synergy a website like Digg?

Where do your posts/links get submitted too?

Thanks

Synergy really isn't a website. The content on it might one day be used in such a manner, but it's not that way right now. In concept, in terms of voting for good threads/content, it is similar to DIGG. It differs however in the sense that the content is shared on forums and not on a central site like DIGG. Let's look at a hypothetical situation:

Suppose site A,B, and C have Synergy installed.
A submits a thread to Synergy.
The thread appears on the Synergy forum for all forums apart of Synergy (when you install Synergy, you created one forum for Synergy to reside in), the members from those other forums can then view and read that thread, rate it and possibly join to comment at that site. The strength (or potential strength) lies in the forums. The content remains on your site, to discuss the content the members have to go to your site, Synergy merely acts as a way for the content to be shared between A, B and C... hopefully increasing the guest views all three forums get for their content. So unlike a DIGG, we hope that all forums can see a benefit from Synergy unlike a DIGG submission where they will be increased traffic, but discussion will stay on DIGG.

I hope this helps.

- Reid

[Tom Shelly]

Just installed, crashed my forum:

Warning: require_once([path]/includes/synergy.php) [function.require-once]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in [path]/includes/init.php(293) : eval()'d code on line 5

Fatal error: require_once() [function.require]: Failed opening required '/home/niggerma/public_html/forum/includes/synergy.php' (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/niggerma/public_html/forum/includes/init.php(293) : eval()'d code on line 5

[Strike3ForumsMH]

Hi Tom,

Please submit a support ticket here:
http://zoints.com/support.z

Thanks and sorry about your troubles.

- Reid

[Tom Shelly]

I went to the link and poked around, seems that people are having problems with Synergy and Vbulletin 3.7.

If you have 3.7 for God's sake, do not install this mod. It totally crashed my forum, I can't even open the tools.php file to try to fix it.

Not sure what I will do.

[Zoints]

Thank you for bringing this to our attention, and I apologize that you've had this trouble. We are researching this issue, and attempting to determine the cause - it's unclear at this point if it's directly caused by Synergy, a result of a conflict with something unique to your site or simply a case of coincidental corruption. At this point, other users have reported problems with the plugin on 3.7.x, but nobody else has encountered as serious an issue as this.

In any case, I'm adding a warning to this plugin that there are known incompatibilities and that we would advise against attempting to install on 3.7.x forums.

-Paul Kemp
Zoints CC Lead

[joe1989]

Can this mod be upgraded for compatibility with the new 3.8 vbulletin???

I sure hope so!!

Thanks Zoints!

[joe1989]

Any thoughts???

This ever going to be updated?!?!? I really want this mod updated!! Please consider correcting the problem and updating for 3.8.1!!!!!