Miscellaneous Hacks - Rotating Banner System

With the Rotating Banner System software, you may publish literally anywhere standard banners and advertising, with no restriction but your imagination. Unlike many other products, it allows to show an unlimited amount of banners and advertising, which are randomly shown at the places you choose, and you may refer generically to an Ad by using specific placeholders.

Also the management is straight-forward and simple to use. Forum administrators with maintenance rights may add, edit and delete records from the Administration Control Panel (ACP), one of each representing a banner. After saving the new banner settings, they are immediately visible at your board.

Compatibility: from vBulletin 3.6.5 onwards

By the way, I do also install the hack on your boards, but since I am very, very busy, it may take some time (weeks) until it gets done.


Tutorials:

• How-to create my first banner (Flash).

Updates:

• 2.0.1: Simple click tracker added, HTML help included.
• 2.0.3: Small bug fixes; additional banner list, navigation bar, E-Mail field for banner event notifications and automatic save on scroll setting; absolute URL to rbs_banner.php in order to allow click tracking on non-standard pages; supported languages: English, Italian; Help file clean-up.
• 2.0.5: Small bug fixes; additional details in banner list; email notification for epired banners.
• 2.0.6: vbCMS compatibility bug fix; additional banner lists.
• 2.0.7: Usergroups filter: now it is possible to define a list of usergroups which may show a banner; additional vbCMS compatibility bug fix.
• 2.0.8: Various fixes and most of all, inclusion of the right files: admin_rbs.php, cpnav_rbs.xml
• 2.0.9: Extra comma fix in new record creation.
• 2.1.0: Fix for an occasional banner type selection bug, when the sample banners have been deleted or disabled.
• 2.2.0 (Major upgrade): Up to 10 different banner locations. Requires changes to your existing placeholders in your templates, since a more generic format has been chosen. If you don't need more than 2 different locations, you don't need to upgrade. Changed files: rbs_banner.php, admin_rbs.php
• 2.2.1: Minor bug fix in files: admin_rbs_h_banner_list.php, admin_rbs_v_banner_list.php
• 2.2.1: Hotfix for Max Clicks saving bug.
• 2.2.2: More listings and less files. PDF Help. Separate Italian add-ons and help. Duplicate button.
• 2.2.3: Minor bug fixes. Changed files: product-rbs.xml
• 2.2.4: Flash Banner support (beta). Changed files: product-rbs.xml, rbs_wrapper.swf, admin_rbs.php, English Help.
• 2.2.5: Hotfix for vBulletin 4.0.2 compatibility bug.
• 2.2.6: Checking for installed Flash Wrapper rbs_wrapper.swf; A few English FAQ; Help files. Changed files: product-rbs.xml
• 2.3.0 (Major upgrade): New modules: Delete Expired Banners, Disable Expired Banners; Detail Banner Statistics with unique access key for your customers; Updated help; Changed files: all.
• 2.3.1: Hotfix for missing field in rbs_hist table. Changed files: none, just update product.
• 2.3.2: Added: Unsupported option for setting any number of available positions between 1 and big bang. Fixed: Small bug and speed issues. Removed: Italian translation. Italians may now request support at www.vbulletin.it. Changed files: admin_rbs.php.
• 2.3.3: Fix: Copy selected forum ID's during banner duplication. Changed: start and end hours for new banners are set to 0:00 and 23:59 respectively. Changed files: admin_rbs.php.
• 2.3.4: Option: Send Mail Before. This option allows to schedule expiring banners differently. New variables for emails: $rbs_enddate: This variable holds the formatted banner ending date and time based on the standard formats for date and time in vBulletin settings; $rbs_name: This variable holds the banner name. EMail Notifications option description: Added direct links to the email phrases for quick changes. Changed files: rbs_mail_cron.php.
• 2.4.0 (Major upgrade): Removed: Option to enable or disable mailing. Banners with email addresses to notify are handled. Setting to reset mailing in single banners. Now, if mailing should be repeated, you will have to edit the banner from phpMyAdmin. Added: Order links in lists. The initial state is ordered by ID, as before. By clicking the titles, the other voices can be ordered. Clicking twice inverts the order. This works in all lists. Options to prevent counting and reducing thus a tiny bit of load. A new bunch of demo banners for new installations. Demo banners are locked into database in order to avoid 30% of the questions because of the 'experts' deleting them before trying the product. They can be disabled and modified though. The true experts can delete them after all testing from the database by using phpMyAdmin without side effects. Changes: Phrase for emailing about expiring banners, now also with direct links to the phrases. Demo banners. Our old publisher ID is replaced with the new ones, and old demo banners are updated with the new ones, if found. The functions have been exported to includes/functions_rbs.php. This makes the product code smaller and easier to maintain, and runs faster on sites where caching/acceleration is enabled. Changed Files: all *.php
• 2.4.1: Option Likelihood. This new option adds a weight to banners and allows thus to show one banner more often than another. The default weight is 100%. We also make sure that the final date of the default banners falls into a valid range. Changed files: includes/functions_rbs.php and rbs_stats.php.
• 2.4.2: Workaround for update sequence problems.

Hacks and unsupported add-ons:

• Banner Rotator Widget To CMS
• Rotate banners in-place
• Italian Translation

[y2ksw]

Ok, let's try to trace it down.

I have a clean installation and for me it works at any place for any placeholder, ranging from <!--@vbbanners:0@--> to <!--@vbbanners:9@-->. I do have also several production sites where it works perfectly well with any combination of rules, some of which are very complex.

Together, we have found that vbSEO may clean HTML comments, thus the standard placeholders won't work at all, and would have to be replaced by a different one.


(1)
In order to catch all possible errors, please make sure, your placeholder in the options looks like <!--@vbbanners:%d@--> or like @vbbanners:%d@ (if you have vbSEO or other software which cleans HTML). It may have any other combination of characters, as long as a %d appears inside. %d is replaced with numbers between 0 and 9 at runtime.


vbSEO or HTML cleaning software users:
vBulletin Options - Rotating Banner System Options - Nth Placeholder: @vbbanners:%d@

All other users:
vBulletin Options - Rotating Banner System Options - Nth Placeholder: <!--@vbbanners:%d@-->


(2)
Now put a:


vbSEO or HTML cleaning software users:
<div align="center">@vbbanners:0@</div>
<div align="center">@vbbanners:1@</div>

All other users:
<div align="center"><!--@vbbanners:0@--></div>
<div align="center"><!--@vbbanners:1@--></div>

in the template: ad_navbar_below


(3)
and enable the default banners, moving the second banner to position 1. Both banners should appear, one below the other.

---

On a standard installation, this combination of settings works 100% guaranteed on 4.0.2 PL1. I have set it up once again from scratch just to be sure. If it doesn't work for you, I'll install a test board with these settings on, in order to demonstrate the facts.


Possible issues:
- You are using a style which does not implement ad_navbar_below, or which comments out that template. In this case, no banner appears.
- Your system caches pages (e.g. Apache mod_cache). Unless you refresh the page explicitly, the banners don't seem to rotate or won't even appear.
- Your vBulletin Options - Rotating Banner System Options - Nth Placeholder is setup like: <!--@vbbanners:0@--> or @vbbanners:0@. In this case, only banners at location 0 appear. You should have set: <!--@vbbanners:%d@--> or @vbbanners:%d@ instead.

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by y2ksw

On a standard installation, this combination of settings works 100% guaranteed on 4.0.2 PL1. I have set it up once again from scratch just to be sure. If it doesn't work for you, I'll install a test board with these settings on, in order to demonstrate the facts.

I don't dispute that you got it to work on a clean install. It may well be that there is a conflict with another add-on somewhere but I have done and double-checked all of the things you list above - still not working reliably.

I am using vBSEO but I don't use (and never have) the "HTML cleaning" option.

Originally Posted by y2ksw

Possible issues:
- You are using a style which does not implement ad_navbar_below, or which comments out that template. In this case, no banner appears.

No.

Originally Posted by y2ksw

- Your system caches pages (e.g. Apache mod_cache). Unless you refresh the page explicitly, the banners don't seem to rotate or won't even appear.

No.

Originally Posted by y2ksw

- Your vBulletin Options - Rotating Banner System Options - Nth Placeholder is setup like: <!--@vbbanners:0@--> or @vbbanners:0@. In this case, only banners at location 0 appear. You should have set: <!--@vbbanners:%d@--> or @vbbanners:%d@ instead.

Set correctly.

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by djbaxter

I don't dispute that you got it to work on a clean install. It may well be that there is a conflict with another add-on somewhere but I have done and double-checked all of the things you list above - still not working reliably.

I am using vBSEO but I don't use (and never have) the "HTML cleaning" option.



No.



No.



Set correctly.

Thanks.

So the next questions are:

- Do you have a product or plugin which disables or jumps over the global_complete hook, or changes existing hook code? Since banners are rendered there, it is the only place I would look at.
- Which of your products / plugins are working with this hook?
- Do some of the other global_complete hooks call a PHP: die; or: exit(0); command? I suppose not, else no banners would be rendered...

... out of other options and ideas ... :erm:

[silencio2222]

Just wanted to share...I am new to this forum and to vBulletin and am just figuring out how to edit the templates and css....but I needed a rotating banner system...and really like the features in this mod. I have the latest version of vb 4.02 pl1 and after not being able to figure out how to edit the templates I decided to try adding the required code to the build in banner ad setup....and it worked like a charm.

I used the code <div align="center"><!--@vbbanners:0@-->&nbsp;<!--@vbbanners:2@--></div> and created a new ad "below navbar" and "above footer" and they work perfectly....so far. I wanted to banners side by side.

Maybe it's a good shortcut and maybe it's not but right now it's working...really good, tracking the impressions and clicks just like it would otherwise...so maybe this could help someone else...until code changes and causes it not to work...

Hey a guy has to be creative right?

Check it out if you want to here and please let me know what you think.

[vortodox]

I would like to put rotating banner instead of default vbulletin logo. Is this possible?
I have putted code in ad_header_logo, and removed image of vbulletin logo, but there is space between image and navigation bar.
You can see it here: http://www.bg-anime.com/forum.php
Can someone help me with this?

[Videx]

Originally Posted by vortodox

I would like to put rotating banner instead of default vbulletin logo. Is this possible?

Hm. You mean use this as a logo rotator? Yes, I guess you could. In your case I'm not so sure it's the space below that's messing you up, it's the lack of space above to balance it out. Have you tried adding a <br> in there to move it down a bit? Beyond that I have no clue; it's all in the CSS somewhere.

[Tettinntil]

Originally Posted by Tettinntil

Using this with success on 3.8.4 and working fine on normal forum pages. But when integrating PhotoPost (Gallery), the banners I have put in the left column do not show. I see <!--@vbbanners:1@--> in the source, so it definitely calls for the code (which shows correctly on other forum pages). Any idea why it does not work?

Any help with this?

[vortodox]

Originally Posted by Videx

Hm. You mean use this as a logo rotator? Yes, I guess you could. In your case I'm not so sure it's the space below that's messing you up, it's the lack of space above to balance it out. Have you tried adding a <br> in there to move it down a bit? Beyond that I have no clue; it's all in the CSS somewhere.

I tried but that didn't helped...
But, with your help I have found Logo rotator, which will resolve my problems
Thanks!

[skol]

Guys if your adding adsence it could take up to an hour for it to show have patience...

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by skol

Guys if your adding adsence it could take up to an hour for it to show have patience...

That's only true when you're creating a new banner. I'm using existing banners and those should show up immediately, just as they do if they are added via hard coding.