Miscellaneous Hacks - SocialForums for vB3.8

SocialForums for vBulletin 3.8

Created by Marius Czyz aka Phalynx.

This mod will work *ONLY* with vBulletin 3.8 or higher. It will not run on vBulletin 3.7. Please use the version for vBulletin 3.7

Support will be only given for people who clicked Mark as INSTALLED.

Description
Not satisfied with vBulletin social groups messaging function? With SocialForums your social group leaders can create a standard forum for their group.
A group leader can only create a forum if the group has at least 5 members - this can be changed via settings. Optionally the group leader can be a moderator of such a social forum.

What about old discussions?
Via AdminCP, SocialForums, you can transfer all discussions and messages to a new forum. No post would be lost.

Permissions
There are advanced permissions (Forum and Archive). This includes read/write public and private (moderated/invite only) socialforums and creation of forum. As this needs two additional queries on every page you can disable this.

Demo
None, see screenshots

Installation
This product is fully phrased and uses template hooks. No file changes or manual template edits needed.
1. Upload bitfield_socialforums.xml to existing folder /includes/xml/
2. Upload functions_socialforums.php to existing folder /includes/
3. Fresh Installation: Just import the product. Upgrade: Import the product, allow overwrite. No forums get lost!
4. Check settings, especially for parent forum. Don't forget to set permissions via usergroups!

Troubleshooting
Q: I don't see a link to create a forum. Why?
A: Check permissions for the usergroup, espacially if the user is allowed to create forum.
A: Check if the usergroup meet min users requirement, see AdminCP/Settings/SocialForums.

Q: My users see the forums, but they shouldn't!
A: Check permissions for the usergroup, if the users usergroup is set to "can see".
A: Did you disabled the restriction mode? Enable it.

Todo
- By deleting a group the forum should also be deleted/archived. Currently this has to be done manually.

Known Issues
- On big boards with hundreds of social groups this mod can really impact the performance because of the mass of new created forums. If you still want to use this mod use the "Minimum Members" feature with a higher value. Using the permission check there are additional two queries on every page.
- With activated option to add owner as a moderator the transfering leads to removing all moderators of the linked forum

History
2.1.0, 11th August 2009
- Social Groups without a forum are listed in AdminCP and can be automatically converted with few clicks.
- Fixed errors converting bigger discussions
- Minor changes and fixes

2.0.1, 05th March 2009
- Convert ignores now deleted discussions
- Threads on Groups equipped with mark on new

2.0.0
- First official release for vBulletin 3.8
- Possibility to transfer Social Group Discussion into a real Forum
- New layout for threadlisting, similar to a real threadlist in a forum
- Possibility of a notice in Forums associated with a Social Group
- Discussion/Message counter is showing Thread/Reply counts. Phrase "Discussion" and "Message" cannot be changed to "Thread"/"Reply".
- Transfering a Group to another user updates now also the moderator
- Minor changes and fixes

[DieselMinded]

/me undownloads not quite what i had in mind

[SuperJETT]

Excellent mod.

[Varsh]

Didn't realise you released it for 3.8 already, cheers Phalanx! Tagged and will install later this week.

[DellaMorte]

We are developing a gaming community website for gaming clans. We want to offer them there own custom forum with moderation functions etc.

Is it possible to give every clan (social group in the forum) to possibility to create there own sub forums?

If yes, what kind of impact will this have on the server load etc?

Thanks in advance!

[Kaelon]

Re: whether queries are made on all forums:

Originally Posted by Phalynx

On all, because I have to find out if this forum is linked to a social group. For next version I will eliminate this query by storing this info in the forumcache.

But this is only if you enable the SocialForum Notices, right? If you disable the notices, there should be no queries at all?

[wtb]

Ok, it's installed and ready to be activated but your instructions don't mention the file in the admincp directory (in the zip file). What does it do and do we need it? I uploaded it but only because it was there.

[GHC Webmaster]

Originally Posted by wtb

Ok, it's installed and ready to be activated but your instructions don't mention the file in the admincp directory (in the zip file). What does it do and do we need it? I uploaded it but only because it was there.

I asume it provides the page under vBulletin Options voor this mod. But that's just a quick guess.

[Phalynx]

Originally Posted by DellaMorte

We are developing a gaming community website for gaming clans. We want to offer them there own custom forum with moderation functions etc.

Is it possible to give every clan (social group in the forum) to possibility to create there own sub forums?

If yes, what kind of impact will this have on the server load etc?

Thanks in advance!

This depends on how many clans you have. Each group will have one additional forum. If you enable the option to display notices in each social forum, you will get 1 additional query on each forum. If you enable permissions for private groups, you will have 1 additional query.

Originally Posted by Kaelon

Re: whether queries are made on all forums:



But this is only if you enable the SocialForum Notices, right? If you disable the notices, there should be no queries at all?

Yes.

Originally Posted by wtb

Ok, it's installed and ready to be activated but your instructions don't mention the file in the admincp directory (in the zip file). What does it do and do we need it? I uploaded it but only because it was there.

Originally Posted by GHC Webmaster

I asume it provides the page under vBulletin Options voor this mod. But that's just a quick guess.

Yes, it's the file that is beeing accessed via AdminCP/SocialForums. It contains the discussions->forum converter

[y2krazy]

I need help, please. I have a social group and created a forum after setting the correct permissions; however, the forum does not show up where it should, but I can still access it from the "Visit the forum of this group." link in the group's main page. How can I get it to show the forum where it is when browsing the forums? It is a Private group, but I am the Group Leader, so I should be able to see the forum without having to go through the group's page every time. Thanks in advance!

EDIT: It might help if I put the "Visibility of social forums. This can only be set for new forums and does not modify existing one." to ON.

~ Sean

[Phalynx]

Great you sorted this out