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
***

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by Pamela

Does anyone have this working on 3.7.0 yet?

Do you know that it doesn't work on 3.7? Have you tried it?

[ivanstanchev]

I need help here.Here is what report do i receive
This email shows that the product is installed and working as it should be.


Emails sent to:sveteca didodi themaztiff . We tried to email the following users, but their email address was invalid:

I checked the 'sveteca'`s email and it is sveteca@gmail.com I think this is normal...what should cause this problem?

[Pamela]

Originally Posted by djbaxter

Do you know that it doesn't work on 3.7? Have you tried it?

I'm actually opening a new site, so I have no inactive members yet to try it out on. Just thought I'd ask if anyone on 3.7.0 has this running yet because I would like it in the near future...

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by ivanstanchev

Emails sent to:sveteca didodi themaztiff . We tried to email the following users, but their email address was invalid:

I checked the 'sveteca'`s email and it is sveteca@gmail.com I think this is normal...what should cause this problem?

The report is telling you that sveteca, didodi, and themaztiff were emailed successfully. If noone was listed after "but their email address was invalid", it means no invalid email addresses were found.

Originally Posted by Pamela

I'm actually opening a new site, so I have no inactive members yet to try it out on. Just thought I'd ask if anyone on 3.7.0 has this running yet because I would like it in the near future...

I rarely install betas so I haven't tried it yet but it appears that the majority of add-ons that work for 3.6.8 PL2 are also working for the 3.7 betas.

[Conner85]

Does anyone know if there's any way to get in trouble for spam with this hack?

[Direct Vision]

thanks alot friend for this, i instal it later scince my server is down lol

[Feckie (Roger)]

Originally Posted by ivanstanchev

I need help here.Here is what report do i receive
This email shows that the product is installed and working as it should be.


Emails sent to:sveteca didodi themaztiff . We tried to email the following users, but their email address was invalid:

I checked the 'sveteca'`s email and it is sveteca@gmail.com I think this is normal...what should cause this problem?

This should be two lines, ie:

Emails sent to:sveteca didodi themaztiff .

We tried to email the following users, but their email address was invalid:

What it is saying is it sent NO emails to invalid email addresses...

hope that helps

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by Conner85

Does anyone know if there's any way to get in trouble for spam with this hack?

There shouldn't be although I recommend a modification to the text of the email sent out.

1. You are only sending it to members who (a) registered on your site and (b) left the "Recive email from admins" box checked: that's opt-in.

2. Now add the opt-out part - Make sure that you're outgoing email reads something like this (Admin CP | vBulletin Options | Inactive User Reminder Emails -> Email message:

Hello, $username!

<p>You are receiving this email because you previously registered at the {name of forum} Forum with the following information:</p>

<p>Member name: $username<br>
User number: $userid<br>
Email address: $email</p>

<p>It's been some time since your last visit to our community.</p>

<p>You might be interested in having another look. We have added several features and enhancements to the forums, and many new topics and new members are added every day.</p>

<p>If you don't remember your password, you can request it here: <a href="http://www.yourforum.com/login.php?do=lostpw">http://www.yourforum.com/login.php?do=lostpw</a>.</p>

<p>We hope to see you back soon.</p>

<p>If you do not wish to receive further emails of this nature, please log into your UserCP at <a href="http://www.yourforum.com/profile.php?do=editoptions">http://www.yourforum.com/profile.php?do=editoptions</a> and uncheck the box next to Receive Email from Administrators.</p>

<p>Administrator<br>
<a href="http://www.yourforum.com">{name of forum} Forum</a><br>
http://www.yourforum.com</p>

[Gersfan]

Am I meant to run Cron tasks for something with this? or does it do it all itself..

I created a User for testing, Set the emails to 1 Day, I've waited nearly 48 hours and I'm not got any emails..

Thanks,

[Zaiaku]

Since no one else has stated this I'll go ahead and post it.

Confirmed working on 3.7 beta 6.