Miscellaneous Hacks - Ultimate Side Columns 2.2

Ultimate Side Columns
By Kerry-Anne www.peterska2.co.uk

Welcome to Ultimate Side Columns 2.2 !

USC 2.2 has now been released!!!!

Introduction

Following the success of the left and right side column modifications, and building on their weaknesses, the Ultimate Side Columns system was born.

Ultimate Side Columns (USC) is your one stop shop for all your side columns needs. It is an easy to configure, all in one solution.

USC 2.0 was born through the evolution and bug fixing of USC 1.0 for vBulletin 3.6 and is for vBulletin 3.7.0 RC1 and later only. It is not supported with earlier versions and may not work with them.

Features

USC 2.0 is fully customizable, can use conditions and variables (not available in USC 1.0), has greater flexibility in where it can be omitted from (after requests received), and contains new functionality of both independently collapsible columns and user defined custom links to be displayed on a per user basis in the column location of the administrators choosing.

A maximum of 20 blocks spread over the two columns are available at this time. However, if more are required then an expansion pack will be provided. The blocks can be reordered and moved between the templates with ease through simple template edits.

USC 2.2 Change Log:
Fixed bug with profile.php?do=editattachments
Added All Pages options

USC 2.1 Change Log:
Fixed blank page caused by missing template in the XML
Added compatibility with 3.7.0 Stable/Gold
Manual Template Edit instructions added to package
Enhanced the display page choices to allow exact selection of the pages where USC is to be displayed
Added usergroup permissions in addition to the global options for viewing the left column, viewing the right column, and using the custom contents block.

USC 2.1 has additional files. You need to upload the files first BEFORE importing the product

Upgrading from USC 2.0
Upload the contents of the upload folder, except the admincp directory, then import the XML.

Go to vBOptions > USC Options and set the display pages using the new options
Go to Usergroups > Usergroup Manager and set the permissions for each usergroup as desired. By default no permissions are given to any usergroups.

Upgrading from USC 1.0

USC 2.0 has been rewritten from the ground up and therefore all the blocks have been moved from the settings into the templates. Therefore, a unique upgrade script has been provided which must be run before importing the new product. Importing the new product first will result in the loss of your existing USC contents.

The upgrade script is located in the admincp directory after uploading the USC files and is ran by pointing your browser to admincp/usc_upgrade.php

Full upgrade instructions are included in the upgrade readme file in the zip.

Installation Instructions

Download the zip, unzip it and upload the contents of the upload folder to your forum directory. Import the product, all done.

Full instructions are included in the install readme in the zip.

Support

This modification has limited support only and is therefore flagged as unsupported. Support will be given when possible although it is always preferable when users of USC support each other. This was very successful with USC 1.0 and therefore is continued with USC 2.0

If you have any other combinations of pages that you would like to see available for the column options, please post them in the support thread ensuring that you add the title "USC Page Combination Request" to your post, or use this as the first line of your post ensuring that it is in bold text. This is very specific as due to the limited nature of support and time, the support thread will only be quickly skimmed through and therefore requests may be missed if it is not clear what they are.


The screenshots attached to this post and the next one show a range of pages with a range of column combinations. They are not labeled but they are pretty self explanatory.

Enjoy USC 2.0.

Kerry-Anne


PLEASE NOTE: This modification is unsupported. You may not receive a reply right after posting. Please try and help each other out.



Problems with your side columns not showing?
For your side columns to show, you need to update your usergroup permissions from the usergroup manager for each usergroup

Problems with errors in your vBOptions?
Point your browser to admincp/index.php?do=buildbitfields then try again

[burlesque]

Could somebody please post the default code for the 'usc_sidecolumn_left' template. I overwrote it by mistake!

[ceciliacelis]

Hi
I'm really a newbie in vbulletin but i need to install and work with USC 2.2.
Please it's there anybody with some patience to explain me step by step how can i install it?
I have a 3.7.0 vbulletin and i'm using small business yahoo as hosting.
I have filezilla to upload the files but i dont know where exactly upload the files!
Thanks a lot!!!
Ceci

[pewa]

Originally Posted by Kerry-Anne

Use manual edits and put the header edit right at the top of the header template and the footer edit in the footer template right after the copyright code.

Thanks! I got it to work. How do i position the column? I would like it to be closer to the site, just outside the white field.

See picture again

[peterska2]

Originally Posted by pewa

Thanks! I got it to work. How do i position the column? I would like it to be closer to the site, just outside the white field.

See picture again

You are using it in an unsupported way. You will need to figure this out for yourself. It is an unsupported modification and as such support is limited and can only be provided for default setups.

Originally Posted by ceciliacelis

Hi
I'm really a newbie in vbulletin but i need to install and work with USC 2.2.
Please it's there anybody with some patience to explain me step by step how can i install it?
I have a 3.7.0 vbulletin and i'm using small business yahoo as hosting.
I have filezilla to upload the files but i dont know where exactly upload the files!
Thanks a lot!!!
Ceci

All the instructions are in the readme file and the first post of this thread.

[Shana]

Hi, for some reason the navbar is too close to my forum; how can I fix this?

[Veronica Vain]

An error occurred while processing the bitfield files, the following information was returned:

I am getting that error in Display Pages For Left Column and Display Pages For Right Column and I do not know where to go to enter the content i want on my sidebars

[pushedx]

Is it possible to have this product work independently in different forums. I.e. let's say you have Forum Section A, Forum Section B, and Forum Section C. The Side Column in A would list quick links to content in Section A. The Side Column in B would list quick links to content in Section B, and so on for C.

Is this possible with this product?

Thanks

[setishock]

Ok I got it working but now the big issue is this:
I'm not a coder and don't know jack about HTML. Does any one have modules they have created they would like to share?
Maybe start their own thread about that.

[Flep]

Originally Posted by Kerry-Anne

You need to enable it in the usergroup permissions as well as in the vBOptions and add some content or nothing will appear.

perfect,
thank you.

[dilbert]

Hi Kerry-Anne,
Something to consider for the next release.

I am using vBadvanced Links Directory. It does not work correctly. The strange thing is that I use all of their products, and the Links directory is the only one with an issue.

Brian provided a solution.
Product: USC Alignment Fix

Add the items in red.

if (VBA_SCRIPT != 'links_directory')
{

$vbulletin->templatecache['header'] = $vbulletin->templatecache['header'] . '";$spacer_open="';
$vbulletin->templatecache['footer'] = $vbulletin->templatecache['footer'] . '";$spacer_close="';

}