Mini Mods - Email reminder for inactive users

Inactive reminder emails. This mod was designed to send out a reminder to inactive members to try and win them back.

***1.2.7 Update***
This update includes built in support for bouncing emails. The script will automatically detect the bounced mail, mark it as bounced so the user is not to be contacted again so as to avoid spam, and then move that user into a seperate usergroup. This plugin is still in it's testing stages, but I have addressed the bugs mentioned previously regarding the emailing side of things.

This is important so keep reading
To install this plugin and take advantage of the bounced email features you are going to need to follow these instructions very carefully. I can not gaurentee that they will work to the letter as this will be based on each persons individual hosting settings.

Step 1: Pre Install
Before you touch this product you need to do the following

• Create an "inactive" usergroup
• Set up a "bounce to" email address
  Pick an email address that you want to use as your bounced email address. Im using "bounce@icora.co.uk". feel free to use whatever you wish.
• Add a email message filter
  This is the hard part. You need to set up a filter that will 'pipe' an email sent to the above email address.
  I am using Cpanel 11 and this is how i have mine set up:
  Rules: 'To' 'Equals' 'bounce@icora.co.uk'
  Actions: 'Pipe to program' with the setting: |/usr/local/bin/php /home/icora/public_html/forum/bounce.php
  This will depend entirely on your settings and structure so you may have to do a little research. It would be very helfull if people who have to use diferent configurations would post them on here.
• Go into vBulletin options, and find the options for 'Emails'. there is a setting asking you if you want to use '-f'. set this to yes.
• While still inn the email options set the 'Bounce Email Address' to your above address.

Step 2: Install
Remove all previous trace of this modification, and upload all the files in the "upload" folder to your base directory of the server.
Go into your product management section and add a new product. upload the XML file with overwrite selected.
Refresh your admin CP to load the new menu items. Just under the "users" group you will find an "Inactive Reminders" group. open that up and click on settings.
Play with these settings and options to suit for the most part. when you come down to the bounce settings you MUST use the same email address as the one you created above.
Set to active and save.

I must re-iterate that this version has not been widely tested, but the simulations i have ran have worked. I look forward to your feedback!

Features:

• Select the period of time before a user is considered inactive.
• Select how many emails to send to each inactive user per inactivity period
• Choose weather inactivity is based on members "Last Post" or their "Last Visit"
• Specify how often followup emails are sent
• Specify alternative emails to send to reduce repetition
• Keep a log of all inactive users contacted

Planned Updates:

• More detail in reports
• ...such as
• Which useres returned
• Effectivness stats
• Email validity

**1.2.1 Update***
Added more detail to the reports section. You can now see the email address, and quickly indicate which emails were invalid. You can link directly to that user to edit as you wish.
I have fixed some errors which have been crashing people's database. Please post any problems if you can.

**1.2.3 Update***
Fixed several problems with escaping strings
Stopped database errors locking up site
***

**1.2.4 Update***
Added a "From Email" so you can specify your own email address to send the reminders from.
Fixed potential bug for people who do not use the mail queue.

Anyone having problems with sending emails out too fast, and multiple emails being sent need to consider changing their email settings in vbulletin options.
People with emails going out too fast - edit Number of Emails to Send Per Batch to a lower amount
People with multiple emails sending - edit Use Mailqueue System to "Yes, with locking"
***

**1.2.5 Update***
Added more stats in the reports page, also added a "Send test email" option so users can test the functionality of the mod
***

[OnyxChase]

Question: If a member is moved into the Inactive usergroup and comes back to the Forum, is he automatically moved back into Registered usergroup?

[OnyxChase]

Wow I just installed 1.2.5 and it is sending 2 and 3 e-mails to all of my users. It is also drastically slowing down my forum. What happened to the old scheduled task style?

[alverde]

I have installed Email Reminder, activated it and the following stats are returned:
Total inactive users: 11697
-of which accept admin emails: 11566
Inactive users left to contact: 11476
Users that have been sent the maximum emails(2): 11536

but no mail has been sent. The email sending from forum normally works, but not with this product. Any idea about the cause of this issue?

[iogames]

When I was saying his enthusiasm for this hack, I never meant disappear LOL

[C Braithwaite]

"Users that have been sent the maximum emails(2): 11536" i think is bugged.

im still enthusiastic.. im just stuck! lol. im trying to figure out the bugs by gathering data. dont worry things will be fixed soon!

[Leo Brazil]

I've just installed the new version and it fixes all the bugs I was getting here.

With the test e-mail option I was even able to include my Forum Image and Adsence using something like <p><img src=image http or adsence link></p> and worked great this way.

With new e-mail header set up I've tested in web accounts like hotmail and yahoo and e-mail sent aren't been sent to spam folder any more.

So far so good.

[C Braithwaite]

Originally Posted by Leo Brazil

I've just installed the new version and it fixes all the bugs I was getting here.

With the test e-mail option I was even able to include my Forum Image and Adsence using something like <p><img src=image http or adsence link></p> and worked great this way.

With new e-mail header set up I've tested in web accounts like hotmail and yahoo and e-mail sent aren't been sent to spam folder any more.

So far so good.

I am glad to know that this plugin is working on some forums without issue. thanks for the positive feedback!:up:

[Leo Brazil]

I tought you're gonna like it. It's easy to see you're working hard to support everybody here and some feedback that things are doing OK sometimes helps a lot.

[riverplate.com]

2 small suggestions:
1) why don't u use the mail feature that vb provides?
2) Can you create a switch for disabling the bouncing headers?

and a question, is it possible to use variables like $username in the subject?

thanks in advance

[C Braithwaite]

Originally Posted by riverplate.com

2 small suggestions:
1) why don't u use the mail feature that vb provides?
2) Can you create a switch for disabling the bouncing headers?

and a question, is it possible to use variables like $username in the subject?

thanks in advance

I am using the mail feature that vb provides - in earlier versions, i was using the mailqueue but inserting it directly as the vbmail function doesn't allow for html. I have however overcome this problem, and now use the vbmail fully now in my latest version.

The reason i didn't add a switch, was because i didn't see the need to do so. if you are not using the bouncing system, there is no harm in the emails having the headers in, and i would never advise not to use the bouncing system anyway, as this mod generates a LOT of emails, which some servers may consider spam if a lot of your emails are bouncing.

and finally - it will be possible shortly to use the $username variables in the subject. i am currently developing the mod for vbulletin 3.7x and once that is working i will convert it to 3.6x for you.