VB3 Template changes/requests

Sorry if some of this is repeats but when I looked around, I could not tell which hacks were VB2 and which were VB3. I am a brand new user of VB3 just switching over from Discus Pro 2 days ago. I had many of these requested hacks built into my discus board but am not finding easy ways to do them in VB3 though I am sure they are simple and I am just a dunce.

First off, I would like to add a table in the header of all pages that has links to areas of our site and other sites that my users use a lot. In discus, this was a simple enter and click and was called an "Announcement" message. I tried playing with announcements in VB3 but they are like threads and while I can put a picture in my header by replacing the VB logo, I don't see how to center it nor put html code into it. I found a couple hacks for center images and buttons but wasn't sure if they were VB2 or VB3 and suspect they were VB2 since the code to replace didn't look like the code in the header portion of my control panel.

I would like to put the table shown on the entry page here
http://marketswing.com/

in the center of all pages on the board.


I took off the table and added a message pointing to our new board but to get the idea, where the message about the board being down and to use the new one here
http://marketswing.com/cgi-bin/discus/discus.cgi
used to be the table shown in the above link.

I would like the new board to have an area like that that is easily editable also in the middle of the header.

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Second, is there a hack that will enable loading tables into the posts themselves? We are a stock market site and many of the financial reports come out in table form. I don't want to enable html for obvious security reasons and figure there is probably a BBcode that someone has written to enable table loading.

Again I hate to reference the board I discarded for this one, but Discus had a nice feature where you just entered the code /table{ then copied an excel or any other tab delimited entry after the tag and then closed it with a } and you got a perfect table paste. Is there anything like that for VB3? I tried "pre" but that doesn't seem to work.

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Is there a way to make attached pictures go into the meat of the message instead of going to the end?

We do a lot of stock chart attachments and then talk about them. If I post a chart and talk about it then want to post a comparison chart and talk about it, it is confusing if both charts are down at the bottom instead of up where I am talking about them. It seems there should be a way to tack them into the middle of the post where they are relevent.

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Last is there a way to make e-mail notification send out mail for each post and not just one time until you go back? Many of my users work at companies where they can't surf the net to sites like mine but want to see posts real time. They have come to rely on getting e-mailed messages as they are posted through e-mail and now I find that this board only tells you about the first post to a thread you are subcribed to and then stops until you go there. It seems there should be a way to just have each post go out without regard for if the person has visited or not.

Sorry to be a pain but the learning curve for this is pretty big.

Now if someone will just write an import utility to get Discus 4.006 into VB3, I will be in hog heaven. I have 3 years of posting history I need to save so I can kill my old board.

Thanks in Advance (TIA) and Good Luck,

Lee

[Lee Lichterman]

Also - I just noticed that yuou were able to get rid of the temporary buttons in the top right corner and replace them with the actual words for
buddy list
new posts, log out etc

How did you do this.

I went to the templates and styles and did a search for the coding words and couldn't locate them.

Told you I was a newby. -gggg-

TIA and Good Luck,

Lee

[Lee Lichterman]

Wow, not a talkative bunch.

I figured out the temporary buttons to text problems myself now for VB3.06 to make the upper right hand temporary buttons go to text.

For whoever else wants to do it, Go to your Style Manager

Then expand out your template so you can see all the subfiles on the left,

Find Navigation / Breadcrumb templates, double click it and then select navbar

In there you will find the code.......

[sessionurl]do=buddylist&focus=1','buddylist','statusbar=no,me nubar=no,toolbar=no,scrollbars =yes,resizable=yes,width=180,height=300'); return false;"><img src="$stylevar[imagesfolder]/lastpost.gif" alt="Buddy List" title="(temporary button) Open Buddy List" border="0" /></a>
<a href="search.php?$session[sessionurl]do=getnew"><img src="$stylevar[imagesfolder]/lastpost.gif" alt="New Posts" title="(temporary button) View New Posts" border="0" /></a>
<a href="forumdisplay.php?$session[sessionurl]do=markread"><img src="$stylevar[imagesfolder]/lastpost.gif" alt="Mark Forums Read" title="(temporary button) Mark All Forums Read" border="0" /></a>
<a href="login.php?$session[sessionurl]do=logout"><img src="$stylevar[imagesfolder]/lastpost.gif" alt="Log Out" title="(temporary button) Log Out" border="0" /></a>
<a href="javascript:simplesearch();"><img src="$stylevar[imagesfolder]/lastpost.gif" alt="Search" title="(temporary button) Simple Search" border="0" /></a>
</span></td>

Get rid of the

<img src="$stylevar[imagesfolder]/lastpost.gif" alt="New Posts" title="(temporary button)

Sections and clean up the alt text portions so that it reads just what they do such as Buddy List, New Posts etc. Mine ended up looking like this.........

[sessionurl]do=buddylist&focus=1','buddylist','statusbar=no,me nubar=no,toolbar=no,scrollbars =yes,resizable=yes,width=180,height=300'); return false;">Buddy List</a>
<a href="search.php?$session[sessionurl]do=getnew">New Posts</a>
<a href="forumdisplay.php?$session[sessionurl]do=markread">Mark All Forums Read</a>
<a href="login.php?$session[sessionurl]do=logout">Log Out</a>
<a href="javascript:simplesearch();">Simple Search</a>
</span></td>

Someone should probably double check this since I am new to this board and know just enough to be dangerous.

Good Luck,

Lee

PS - If anyone knows where I could start to modify the e-mail portion of this board so my readers can get e-mailed every post regardless of visiting the site or not I would be very very gratefull.

Some of my users are ticked off that this will only e-mail them once until they return to the site. Many work at companys where they can't surf to the site but want to keep up with what is happening in the market.

I already had one guy say to switch to a different board as the e-mail all posts was the most important feature. He is voting to throw VB out and go back to Discus depite the perl and server load problems.

I really need to figure out how to hack the e-mail program portion to just e-mail out all posts if a person subscribes.

[Erwin]

vB3 hacks are not allowed at vB.org yet until RC is released.

For detailed template mods and discussion, visit the template mod official site at www.vbulletintemplates.com

[Dean C]

Also this is the wrong forum for template requests

Moved

[Lee Lichterman]

Sorry - I didn't feel that getting rid of those buttons was a cosmetic thing as much as a functional one since no could tell what they did with them all being the same button.

As for the Vbulletintemplates site. I saw where that site first stood up and it seemed it wasn't a true Jelsoft official site. While I understand that younger people are some of the best hackers out there, if I recall correctly the person standing that place up is not officially affiliated with Jelsoft and was 18 years old at the time. Not exactly the way I want to make official changes to my board, release sensative information to etc. ( Waits for flames) I mean the guy is probably one of the best but I would like to stick with official sites for VB.

As for no hacks allowed for VB3. OUCH!!! My users are screaming to get this e-mail fixed. I mean they are up in arms about it. Take today for example, the Federal Reserve makes a comment to leave interest rates a certain way and the DOW shoots up 125 points. Guess what, no one got the e-mail!!!!!!!!!!!!! About 50 peope just missed out on making about $20,000 in a few minutes.

So now I have to dump my new board and either go back to discus pro or install VB2 and then ask for a hack for that?

It is starting to look like I just wasted $160. This message board software is probably great for gamers, talking about teddy bears and teen idols and other teen pastime things but it seems it is more oriented toward appearance and not functionality of business.

My users need to be able to subscribe to a forum, not just a thread. Threads are added, or get old and go dead. They need to see new questions, ideas and know they are out there from the forum level. I spent all night trying to hack that and can get it to show as an option but cant find the cross check that allows it to be sent. It seems that the cron mail php file that sends forum mail doesnt have it in there but then that file doesn't deal with immediate notification.

They also need to see every answer by e-mail that is posted, not just the first one that happens to be posted. No forum immediate notification is there. E-mail stops after one sending. HUH??? Subscription php has a bunch of stuff there but I have owned this software 2 days and now I am left on my own to figure all this out???

No built in table view?? Code it yourself??

All kinds of pretty ways to put a picture at the top but not a single way to add text for the name of a company, make global announcements. No way to say there is a sale today, the end of the world is coming nothing? Answer, code it yourself?

I am really starting to think I made a major mistake buying this.

Everything I read said this was one of the most stable pieces of software out there and was very customizable. When I saw that it was customizable, I thought it was for function, not appearance only.

I didn't realize that Microsoft, Oracle, IBM, Apple go where they were by telling their customers to code it themselves.