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
***

[giovannicosta]

installed, do I HAVE to add a cron job manually?

[djbaxter]

No. It should have been done automatically with the product import.

[arossphoto]

I just installed and did a manual test. It seems to be working properly, but the email that was sent to my test account went into my spam mailbox. I'm sure there are a lot of variables to this stuff, but is there anything that can be done to minimize the chances of these emails being treated as spam?

Thanks,

Andrew

[YLP1]

Originally Posted by raven3d

uninstalled sorry.

last night the host turned my site off, because this script was hammering the server, also and this is strange over the last few days i hadn't been recieving any email for this particular address and now i've uninstalled this the email has returned.

I can confirm raven3d's issue. I have had to disable the cron because the product sent out the entire inactive list at the same time (well it took about 4 hours for it to get through the 500 or so Inactive members) - verified via the cron log.

My mail batch is set up to 10 emails at a time and the log is showing the emails from the hack going out one right after the other.

I attached the first three pages of the cron log -- there are over20 more pages following these with mail going out one right after the other.


I hope this issue can be resolved as it can be a very beneficial tool to the board.

[Andyrew]

Same here, i tried this hack and it sent all the emails at once.
My host does not allow hundreds of emails at once so bounced them to my catch all.

[djbaxter]

I assume that those of you reporting this issue are using version 1.10 or version 1.11.

I strongly recommend that you uninstall that version and install version 1.09 instead.

[arossphoto]

Originally Posted by djbaxter

I assume that those of you reporting this issue are using version 1.10 or version 1.11.

I strongly recommend that you uninstall that version and install version 1.09 instead.

According to the developer's notes above:

"Update 1.1.0 - Changed the way that emails are sent out by adding the emails to vbulletin's mail queue"

So isn't this working properly? Any comments from the developer?

I've installed this, but it's currently set up for testing with the admin group only. I have over 400 inactive members, so I want to make sure it's working properly before I use it with registered members.

Thanks,

Andrew

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by arossphoto

According to the developer's notes above:

"Update 1.1.0 - Changed the way that emails are sent out by adding the emails to vbulletin's mail queue"

So isn't this working properly? Any comments from the developer?

Prior to version 1.10, emails were sent out in batches with a configurable batch size using a cron job. Starting with version 1.10, all emails were added to the vBulletin mail queue. I think with a mod like this, that's a mistake, and certainly it seems to have caused a number of problems for different forum installations - that's why version 1.09 is still available for download. The author, Chris, is working on the bugs in 1.11 as he gets time but my advice is to consider version 1.10 and 1.11 as Beta versions, with 1.09 as the latest stable release.

[C Braithwaite]

i can understand that emails will be sent out regular with the latest version, and tbh i think 1.09 is the better option.

i really wish i had more time to work on this, and when i do ill start from 1.09 and scrap later versions.

[Andyrew]

I have now installed v1.09 and it's working great. :up: