Statistics Modifications - vbTrends - An Enhanced Statistics Box on Forum Home

Note: This product is now being supported at www.catnine.net

Keywords: Statistics, New members, joins, trends, Forum Home, threads, posts

ATTENTION:
If you download the latest version go into your usergroups and set the 'can view trends' permission. SAVE the usergroup even if you haven't changed the setting or things may not work. There is an odd permissions bug I haven't figured out yet.

Also note that overwrite will not work. Please uninstall the previous version before installing the new one.

Description:
Enhances the "YourBBS" Statistics box on the forum home to show trends of posts, threads and new users vs. the overall history of the board. Also allows you to display more than one "newest member".

Version 2.0.0:

1. Calculations exposed and modifiable in admincp.
2. Added ability to delay updates of stats to every x minutes in admincp.
3. Added a style setting for positive and negative trends.
4. Added custom hooks for all aspects of vbTrends, and moved code into said hooks.
5. Changed template to still show total threads when trend is negative and 'positive trends only' is enabled.
6. Usergroup permission to view trends.

Note: You cannot cause an error by messing up the calculations in the admincp. If the calculation you provide contains errors the stat in question will show as N/A.

This is a major rewrite, so I've set the hack to beta for now.

Version 1.2.6:

1. Made some minor tweaks for cleaner code
2. Made change to build datastore call to force serialization

You can just overwrite the product.xml if you are upgrading. Remember vbTrends has an option in the admincp to reset the counters. To see any changes/fixes you'll want to run that, or you'll end up having to wait for a new day before the changes will take affect.

Version 1.2.5:

1. fixed minor bug in auto-replace that was causing it not to work on some boards

Version 1.2.4:

1. fixed bug in percentage of active users
2. fixed bug in limit of queries (added order by)

Thanks to bchertov and Battle_Ring for the testing

Version 1.2.3:

1. Added option to display % of active users.
2. Added option to set the number of previous months to include in the trend data.

Version 1.1.3:

1. Updated for vBulletin 3.6.
2. Fixed long standing problem with stats calculating incorrectly.
3. Added option to only show positive trends.

Version 1.1.2:

1. Added admincp menu to reset cached counters.
2. Fixed a couple of divide by zero errors that occurred when your board had no history (was less than a month old).
3. Fixed so templates are now cached.

Version 1.1.1:

1. Fixed calculation of statistics - should definately be correct now

Version 1.1.0:

1. Fully phrased.
2. Uses templates now so look and feel can be customized
3. Fixed bug so output is valid xhtml 1.0.

Version 1.0.0:

1. Turn on/off in admincp
2. Offers the option to auto replace in templates, or to manually edit templates.
3. Allows more than one 'newest user' to be display.
4. Shows trends for posts, threads and new users - this month vs. the boards average.

Install

1. Download the vbTrends_2.0.0.zip.
2. Unzip and follow instructions in install.html.

[user02934123123]

I upgraded to the newest release today, which has caused the whole mod to cease to work.

On attempting to use auto-replace, as I did with the previous version, no vbTrend stats appear on the page.

On switching off auto-replace and modifying FORUMHOME as instructed in the installation guide, the vB stats box simply appears emply, with all contents removed. (And before this be asked: yes, the vbTrends mod is enabled from its options/settings screen in AdminCP.)

As such, the new release of the mod does not appear to work on my system at all, whereas the previous worked fine.

Any fixes?

[ncweb]

Originally Posted by hambil

It should not have much of an impact on the load times, but, I think I have a solution for this that will also be in this upcoming release. Right now, the stats are realtime. Meaning - every post effects them as soon as someone refreshes. This adds a couple queries to forum home.

I'm putting in a 'delayed' options, where you can set the number of minutes. If set to 0 it's basically the same as realtime. However, if set to 10 for example, then the trends data would only change every ten minutes, and use much less resources.

The option to choose when the trends data is pulled will put this at the very top of my 'favorite hacks' list.

--will test new version later, hope to see it out of beta soon!

Thanks Mark, keep it up

[Deadly Assassin]

Originally Posted by hambil

I can't tell by looking at the forum. I'll need an admin login. If you are okay with that then send my a pm.

PM Sent, thanks

[hambil]

Originally Posted by Deadly Assassin

PM Sent, thanks

It's all fixed. It appears the old template didn't get updated when you installed the new version. I have no idea why that would happen. I think perhaps it might be when people do an overwrite instead of an uninstall and reinstall, but I'm not sure.

I highly recommend anyone installing 2.0.0 do an uninstall and reinstall though.

[hambil]

Originally Posted by monForum

I upgraded to the newest release today, which has caused the whole mod to cease to work.

On attempting to use auto-replace, as I did with the previous version, no vbTrend stats appear on the page.

On switching off auto-replace and modifying FORUMHOME as instructed in the installation guide, the vB stats box simply appears emply, with all contents removed. (And before this be asked: yes, the vbTrends mod is enabled from its options/settings screen in AdminCP.)

As such, the new release of the mod does not appear to work on my system at all, whereas the previous worked fine.

Any fixes?

Try a full uninstall and reinstall of vbTrends from the latest zip, making sure to reupload all files. If the auto-replace used to work it should still work. I recommend reverting the FORUMHOME template as that can't be the problem.

[hambil]

My bad - and interesting note for those using export (from advanced product manager) to create their product.xml files: The template is not exported properly. Even though I've updated the template on the site, the old version is still the one exported. I had to manually edit the product.xml file. The new zip file I just posted has the correct template. I recommend a full uninstall/reinstall of vbTrends.

[KingPin6]

I was on 1.2.5 upgraded 2.0.0 but couldn't get the trends to work... tried uninstalling and reinstalling about 3 times with same results. I finally went into the user groups and saw that it was in fact set to yes for viewing trends but I still couldn't see anything on the front page, but once I clicked save on the user group it started showing up again. PS thanx for the great hack

[hambil]

Originally Posted by KingPin6

but once I clicked save on the user group it started showing up again. PS thanx for the great hack

Interesting... I will look into this. Glad you got it to work.

[encryption]

I got the hack to work after having to uninstall / reinstall it entirely though I have a quick question - on my forum home it shows

Threads: 38,778, This Month: 4 (117%)

What is "This Month: 4" ?

I have set it to retrieve data from the last 2 months

[hambil]

It means that so far this month you've had four new threads. And compared to the last 2 months, that's 117% more than you usually have by this time of the month.