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AboutToday - Bring RSS Feeds and Daily Events to Your Site! · **Released**: 02-05-2006

What is AboutToday?

AboutToday provides a central place to bring daily items of interest to your forum visitors. It includes two main components: an RSS Reader System and Local Events database System.

Please NOTE: This mod has been modified for vb ver 3.6.4. It should work on vb ver 3.5.4 and 3.6.x.

An RSS Reader system where the admin can enter RSS feeds that will then be displayed on the page. RSS feeds can be set to AUTOMATICALLY create threads or be set so that users can easily create a thread from a feed.. Feeds can be read via fopen or cURL.

The RSS Feeds are fully intergrated with vbAdvanced and could actually be placed anywhere you want!!
A database system that can hold unlimited categories of "AboutToday" events. For example, you could have a history category (like a Today in History) with sub-categories for different eras in history. Or, you could have a daily joke or software tip of the day, etc.

The "Add Event" feature is intended to help you if you want for example - Sports: Today in History. With the vb calendar, you cannot have categories and you are restricted with how far back the dates can go.

So with the "Add Event" feature, you could have a category tree like:
- Hockey
  - Professional
  - College
  - High School
- Football
  - American Football
  - The Rest of the World (Soccer)
- Baseball
with the normal calendar feature, you cannot have categories. And with "Add Event" you can have any date. So, if you want an event like "Jan 1, 132 B.C. - the first ball was invented", you can do that. But, that isn't possible in the normal calendar. Also, the events in "Add Event" are fully searchable.

Installation

Copy the following files to your server in the forums directory:

abouttoday.php
includes/class.csv.php
includes/class_abouttoday.php
includes/cron/cron_abouttoday.php
includes/xml/bitfield_abouttoday.xml
includes/xml/cpnav_abouttoday.xml
admincp/abouttodayadmin.php

From the admincp, import the product file product-abouttoday.xml (Manage Products - Add/Import Product).

REFRESH your admincp window. You should now see a listing in the left column of the admincp for "AboutToday".

Getting Started

NOTE - if this is a new install, a Yahoo RSS Feed and CNN Entertainment Feed have been automatically added to give you a feel for how the product looks.

If you plan to use the RSS Feeds:

1. From the admincp, select AboutToday - RSS Feeds. Add an RSS Feed.
2. From the admincp, select Usergroups - Usergroup Manager. Add permissions so the Administrator group can use the product.
3. From your forum directory, bring up the file abouttoday.php.
4. If you want the feeds to AUTOMATICALLY create threads, go to admincp - abouttoday - settings. There you must set the userid of the account to use to create the thread. Then, edit the RSS Feed with the forumid of where the threads for that feed should be created!

If you plan to create your own "today in history" type of database:

1. From the admincp, select AboutToday - Categories. Add a category.
2. From your forum directory, bring up the file abouttoday.php. "Add" your first event to the category you have created!

Version Status
I've tested this product extensively but ... use this totally at your own risk!

Credits
I learned a lot about how to code this and used a lot of the code from what Ron1n did with ecDownloads. What I've learned from his code while helping to support ecDownloads has been invaluable.

Sites Using this Product
Visit www.armchairgeneral.com to see this product in action.

Click Install!
Please Click Install if you are using this product. Thanks!

CyberRanger · #**102** 03-04-2006, 01:58 AM

I screwed up an sql in ver 1.2. Please be sure to update to ver 1.3

Sorry!

ubblite · #**103** 03-09-2006, 08:42 AM

Version 1.3 has some nice upgrades - the layout is now even nicer on the forumhome display & text size is the same, regardless of the RSS feed. Keep up the good work, Westpointer!

Dennis B · #**104** 03-13-2006, 01:32 AM

westpointer,

Nobody asked about $myfeeds yet in this thread. I tried to get something out of it but so far nothing. I've tried 1 and 2 in the rowsacross setting in the ACP and then I put $myfeeds in the right column I set up in my index page, but it's empty. I've tried refreshing the feeds several times, so that's not it. And I'm using 1.3.

Any hints? Thanks.

CyberRanger · #**105** 03-13-2006, 12:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dennis B

westpointer,

Nobody asked about $myfeeds yet in this thread. I tried to get something out of it but so far nothing. I've tried 1 and 2 in the rowsacross setting in the ACP and then I put $myfeeds in the right column I set up in my index page, but it's empty. I've tried refreshing the feeds several times, so that's not it. And I'm using 1.3.

Any hints? Thanks.

Did you assign any RSS Feeds to $myfeeds? If yes, please load the attached script into your forums directory and let me know what you see. It will display the contents of the three myfeeds variables.

MorrisMcD · #**106** 03-13-2006, 12:48 PM

I like the change on the abouttoday page, but is it possible for us to do something to slim down the look on the forum home?

Its a tad bulky looking on my page

CyberRanger · #**107** 03-13-2006, 12:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorrisMcD

I like the change on the abouttoday page, but is it possible for us to do something to slim down the look on the forum home?

Its a tad bulky looking on my page

Could you post a pic of what your forum home looks like and another that shows what you would like it to look like?

Thx!

MorrisMcD · #**108** 03-13-2006, 01:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by westpointer

Could you post a pic of what your forum home looks like and another that shows what you would like it to look like?

Thx!

See the first feed named Cincinnati Enquirer - Local Sports....

That is how they all used to look.. After the upgrade (which improved the about today home page immensely imo (good job)) they looked like this...

If I can get them all to look like the first one on the forumhome, I would be a happy camper... Thanks for the hack btw... The cmps module also looks like this and its great to have realtime news on my front page... Excellent hack

CyberRanger · #**109** 03-13-2006, 01:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorrisMcD

See the first feed named Cincinnati Enquirer - Local Sports....

That is how they all used to look.. After the upgrade (which improved the about today home page immensely imo (good job)) they looked like this...

That is weird. Can you try deleting the "Cincinnati Enquirer - Local Sports" feed, see what the forum home looks like, then add the feed back and check forum home again?

Thx!

MorrisMcD · #**110** 03-13-2006, 01:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by westpointer

That is weird. Can you try deleting the "Cincinnati Enquirer - Local Sports" feed, see what the forum home looks like, then add the feed back and check forum home again?

Thx!

It said there was nothing to delete... So I disabled it.. Yes.. It still exists.. No idea why it thinks it isnt there

But I did get this

Quote:

XML error: Empty document at line 1

when I tried to edit the RSS to be disabled.. Once I clicked on RSS Feeds again to refresh, it WAS disabled.. But I recieved the above error. When forcing an update, I get this also

Anyway.. Once disabled, it just disappeared and the other stuff remained the same as in the screen shot

I have all my settings the same for the feeds..

Maximum length 0
RSS Summary 1
RSS Detailed 5
updated 60
yes, yes, yes, yes, no, no, no

Then for the $myfeeds variable, its set to 5.. 0 for 2 and 3 though... I didnt quite know if I had THIS part right... :shrug:

CyberRanger · #**111** 03-13-2006, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorrisMcD

It said there was nothing to delete... So I disabled it.. Yes.. It still exists.. No idea why it thinks it isnt there

But I did get this

when I tried to edit the RSS to be disabled.. Once I clicked on RSS Feeds again to refresh, it WAS disabled.. But I recieved the above error.

There was a problem with feeds in an earlier version. I wonder if this is a hangover from that. If possible, can you go into phpmyadmin and manually delete the feed? It is in the table histtd_rss.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorrisMcD

I have all my settings the same for the feeds..

Maximum length 0
RSS Summary 1
RSS Detailed 5
updated 60
yes, yes, yes, yes, no, no, no

Then for the $myfeeds variable, its set to 5.. 0 for 2 and 3 though... I didnt quite know if I had THIS part right... :shrug:

Those settings look good.

On forum home, did you in general prefer the bullet look over the table rows look?

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