Portal Software - WebTemplates 4.x: VB Integrated CMS (Content Management System)

(This hack is for vb version 4.x and above. For vb 3.x, version see my profile for relevant threads.)

"WebTemplates" is a vBulletin integrated Content Management System which allows you to create vb integrated "HTML" pages in your vb admin cp very easily. The pages can inherit your vbulletin skin/style, can recognize logged-in user, can be applied permissions per user or usergroup basis, can keep visit logs, hit counts and do many more.


WEBTEMPLATES 4.x BASIC FEATURES:

• Very Easy Installation : Webtemplates can be installed to your board without modifying even a single vbulletin file. It is coded as a vb product and can be imported very easily.
• Apply VB Permissions: You can ban any webtemplate to any user or usergroups easily. So for instance you can design a webtemplate which only members can see while guests can not, or only user A can not see etc.
• Page Counter : Each webtemplate has a built-in counter and you can display page count to your visitors and you can edit it or turn it OFF/ON per webtemplate basis.
• Visitor Logging&Tracking : You can track certain users' (by usergroup or userid) webtemplate visits to see who visited a webtemplate and when. This is configurable per webtemplate basis.
• Site Contributers (Editor) Support : You can grant editing permissions for certain users or usergroups for your webtemplates individually and they will be able to update these webtemplates using their own editor interface. vB's WYSIWYG editor is supported in Editor interface.
• Page Browsers & Who is Online Display: Webtemplates can display who is browsing that webtemplate while visitor is reading them (like default forum browse display of vbulletin). Webtemplate visits can also be monitored in who is online page.
• Header/Footer Inclusion : Webtemplates can automatically use headers/footers (your default vb header/footer or custom ones)
• Help Documents : The script comes with an extensive help document.
• Admin Panel in Webtemplates : Your webtemplates can include an "admin panel" displayed to only admins and by using them you can access many details and stats of your page while you are browsing them.
• SEO friendly URLs: You can make webtemplate URLs seo friendly in vb settings (Requires apache server).
• XML Import/Export : XML Import/Export feature allows you to backup your webtemplates and use other hack users webtemplates in your board.

ADVANCED FEATURES FOR ADVANCED USERS:

• Webquery Feature : With advanced "webquery" feature you can create dynamic webtemplates which include database query results. For instance you can easily add "last 10 threads forum X", "most active users list" etc. to your webtemplates with default webqueries that comes with installation or you can create your custom webqueries with basic SQL knowledge.
• Multi Parsing : Webtemplates can parse PHP or HTML or TEXT (=smilie/img tags/bbcode parsing like vb posts). This means you can design a page just like vb posts (TEXT parsing), standart HTML (HTML parsing) or even in PHP (PHP parsing).
• PHPINCLUDE per webtemplate : Every webtemplate has its own "phpinclude" field which you can run PHP codes before loading the Webtemplate
• Theme Support : Webtemplates support "themes" which are parent webtemplates which include child webtemplates in them. For instance if you have 20 similiar pages which uses the same visual look, you can make a single theme for all of them, then just insert their content into this theme. If you change theme later, all 20 pages' visual will change automatically.
• Conditionals : Webtemplates supports VB3 template conditionals so you can design webtemplates which change their display under different conditions.
• Default variables : You can use/display certain variables in your webtemplates like username of the visitor, visitor email address, last visit time, page creation time, page last edit time, Last visitor name, last visit time etc.

Sample WebTemplates from Sites using this hack:
(Most are from 3.x versions but WebTemplate look and feel didn't change much so all will give you the idea.)

http://www.worldwideknights.com/view_mission.htm
http://www.theadminzone.com/forums/view.php?pg=aboutus
http://www.hystersisters.com/vb2/view_guidelines.htm
http://www.worldwideknights.com/view_info.htm
http://www.hystersisters.com/vb2/view_books.htm
http://www.worldwideknights.com/view_spread.htm
http://www.makeuptalk.com/forums/view.php?pg=makeuptalk-newsletter
http://www.bklab.com (entire site is designed with Webtemplates only)
(Actually this hack is one of the most popular vb hacks so it is used by hundreds -if not thousands- of vbulletin sites and you can easily find them if you go to google and search "Logician's WebTemplates" WITH quotation marks)

If you use the hack, clicking here will make sure you'll know about updates&bug fixes. It will also help me understand how many people is using the hack so please click the install button if you use it. Thank you..

From FAQ 13: Vbulletin already has a CMS now , why would I need this hack?

If you have CMS license, you might not need Webtemplates. On the other hand, CMS license is paid, webtemplates is free and many forum owners don't have CMS licenses.

Also please note that vb has CMS since 2010. Webtemplates was first released for vb2.x in 2002 and it was around in vb3.x, 3.5.x and above for thousands of vbulletin users who have developed their sites around webtemplates CMS. So regardless of new vb CMS owners might or might not need it, Webtemplates 4.x is still realased and supported as a courtesy to its old users and fans. I personally prefer and use Webtemplates over vb CMS and this hack lives for people who agrees with me.

Version Updates:
12.October.2013 - > Version 4.0.2
* Minor fixes for PHP 5.4.x (Fixes "Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated" errors in new PHP versions.
14.July.2012 - > Version 4.0.1
* Vbulletin changed WYSIWYG editor parsing in vb4.2.x so hack's editor.php is updated accordingly.
9.September.2010 - > Version 4.0.00
* Hack 4.00.00 is released.

[Phaedrus]

Does this work with 4.1.2?

Yes, this works in 4.1.2. It works just fine.

[hugh_]

Hi,

I just upgraded from vbulletin 3.8.5 to 4.1.3 and the latest release of your mod but when I try to access the templates all I get is an empty template page with just a title (see attached). What have I done wrong?

Thanks...

Hugh

[Logician]

Originally Posted by hugh_

I just upgraded from vbulletin 3.8.5 to 4.1.3 and the latest release of your mod but when I try to access the templates all I get is an empty template page with just a title (see attached). What have I done wrong?

Have you followed these steps correctly:


UPGRADE FROM VERSION 3.x.TXT

Just follow "FIRST TIME INSTALLATION README.TXT" to install WebTemplates 4.x.

In STEP 3, make sure "Overwrite?" checkbox is MARKED while importing default webtemplates and webqueries. This will make sure you keep your custom webtemplates and webqueries but defaults are overwritten.

Please remember that your old webtemplates and webqueries might require tweaking before working in 4.x version. This is not about hack itself, it happens because vb styling system has been completely changed in 4.x version so your 3.x tags might not work in vbulletin 4.x. So if you get some "unexpected look" in some of your old webtemplates, please edit them and make sure they use vbulletin 4.x's styling tags.

FROM: FIRST TIME INSTALLATION README.TXT

STEP 3- Close your browser, reopen it, relogin to your admin cp and you should to see "Logician's WebTemplates" in the left menu, expand it and click "Export/Import", then "Upload Webtemplate .XML File", point the file named "webtemplate_export.xml".
(There are 2 XML files, please make sure you import the file named "webtemplate_export.xml"!)
(This step is to upload default webtemplates and webqueries to your webtemplate system)

(Many people are missing step 3 above while installing the hack so please make sure you didn't!)

At this point I can suggest, removing all default webtemplates (and themese) from your installation and then apply step 3 again.

[hugh_]

I hadn't uploaded the second xml file but the problem was with the default themes I'd created...

[Logician]

Originally Posted by hugh_

I hadn't uploaded the second xml file but the problem was with the default themes I'd created...

If you didn't uploaded second xml, this means your installation does not have vb4 webtemplates themese so you are viewing your webtemplates with your old 3.x themes and templates, hence having the problem.

Please remove your old webtemplate themes, upload new themes as described in step 3 and retry.

[BF777]

I just installed this hack. Good stuff.

For my site, I just need this to create simple pages with information. I don't care much for the user stats. Therefore, how do I create a simple page that inherits my header/footer template without all that user stat info? I'd like to create pages similar to this page.

http://www.theadminzone.com/forums/view.php?pg=aboutus

[BF777]

Also, for my Custom Pages, why won't the title save with the first letter as a capital letter?

[Logician]

Originally Posted by BF777

Also, for my Custom Pages, why won't the title save with the first letter as a capital letter?

Your "User Friendly Name" can include a capital letter and it is what user's will see (in other words actual title of the page).

"WebTemplate Name" is a technical key which is used in url so requires all lowercase letters so as not to confuse URLs and browsers

[BF777]

Ok, I was actually able to figure a few things out. I had to modify some code.

[preemz10314]

very very enticing, and I am a CMS owner. This has a very clean look to it. Something I was interested in. Tagged. will install. thank you.