Mini Mods - Inactive Users Email Reminders For 3.7.x

Inactive reminder emails. This mod was designed to send out a reminder to inactive members to try and win them back. Earlier versions of this plugin have had great success, and has been installed on 1000's of forums.

This mod is a revised version of my 3.6 modification.
Someone pointed out that I needed to make a new thread in the right forum for this.

***1.2.7 Update***
Fixed the \ in the message.
Changed the way the mails are processed to try and stop duplicates
Made the bounce management monitor ALL outgoing emails
Added more stats
Added bounced email messaage viewing with management options.
***1.2.7 Update***
This update includes built in support for bouncing emails. The script will automatically detect the bounced mail, mark it as bounced so the user is not to be contacted again so as to avoid spam, and then move that user into a seperate usergroup. This plugin is still in it's testing stages, but I have addressed the bugs mentioned previously regarding the emailing side of things.

This is important so keep reading
To install this plugin and take advantage of the bounced email features you are going to need to follow these instructions very carefully. I can not gaurentee that they will work to the letter as this will be based on each persons individual hosting settings.

Step 1: Pre Install
Before you touch this product you need to do the following

• Create an "inactive" usergroup
• Set up a "bounce to" email address
  Pick an email address that you want to use as your bounced email address. Im using "bounce@icora.co.uk". feel free to use whatever you wish.
• Add a email message filter
  This is the hard part. You need to set up a filter that will 'pipe' an email sent to the above email address.
  I am using Cpanel 11 and this is how i have mine set up:
  Rules: 'To' 'Equals' 'bounce@icora.co.uk'
  Actions: 'Pipe to program' with the setting: |/usr/local/bin/php /home/icora/public_html/forum/bounce.php
  This will depend entirely on your settings and structure so you may have to do a little research. It would be very helfull if people who have to use diferent configurations would post them on here.
• Go into vBulletin options, and find the options for 'Emails'. there is a setting asking you if you want to use '-f'. set this to yes.
• While still inn the email options set the 'Bounce Email Address' to your above address.

Step 2: Install
Remove all previous trace of this modification, and upload all the files in the "upload" folder to your base directory of the server.
Go into your product management section and add a new product. upload the XML file with overwrite selected.
Refresh your admin CP to load the new menu items. Just under the "users" group you will find an "Inactive Reminders" group. open that up and click on settings.
Play with these settings and options to suit for the most part. when you come down to the bounce settings you MUST use the same email address as the one you created above.
Set to active and save.

I must re-iterate that this version has not been widely tested, but the simulations i have ran have worked. I look forward to your feedback!


Features:

• Select the period of time before a user is considered inactive.
• Select how many emails to send to each inactive user per inactivity period
• Choose weather inactivity is based on members "Last Post" or their "Last Visit"
• Specify how often followup emails are sent
• Specify alternative emails to send to reduce repetition
• Keep a log of all inactive users contacted

Planned Updates:

• More detail in reports
• ...such as
• Which useres returned
• Effectivness stats
• Email validity

**1.2.1 Update***
Added more detail to the reports section. You can now see the email address, and quickly indicate which emails were invalid. You can link directly to that user to edit as you wish.
I have fixed some errors which have been crashing people's database. Please post any problems if you can.

**1.2.3 Update***
Fixed several problems with escaping strings
Stopped database errors locking up site
***

**1.2.4 Update***
Added a "From Email" so you can specify your own email address to send the reminders from.
Fixed potential bug for people who do not use the mail queue.

Anyone having problems with sending emails out too fast, and multiple emails being sent need to consider changing their email settings in vbulletin options.
People with emails going out too fast - edit Number of Emails to Send Per Batch to a lower amount
People with multiple emails sending - edit Use Mailqueue System to "Yes, with locking"
***

**1.2.5 Update***
Added more stats in the reports page, also added a "Send test email" option so users can test the functionality of the mod
***

**1.2.6 Update***
Identical to 1.2.5, however EzBounce support added.
***

**Opps Update***
Sorry i somehow managed to not include the file in the zip. My bad.
***

[Seb@]

every day new update of this

LOL

[Gene Steinberg]

Originally Posted by tekguru

Good luck

Based on your latest version as of this writing, 1.2.8, the test email displays as follows:

Hello, Test User! We\'ve noticed that you\'ve not been active on Attack of the Rockoids Forums for quite some time now, and we miss you! Could we not tempt you back? If you don\'t remember your password, you can request it here: http://forum.rockoids.com/login.php?do=lostpw We hope to see you soon. Kindest Regards Gene Steinberg Attack of the Rockoids Forums http://forum.rockoids.com

Something is not yet fixed.

And it's still missing paragraph breaks.

Peace,
Gene

[Gene Steinberg]

OK, I got it to take the paragraph breaks, but the back slashes are still there.

Also, it still refuses to accept the setting for my bounce usergroup, and picks a different usergroup, seemingly at random.

Peace,
Gene

[nesta2006]

i think again you should update that!
remindermail.php this file now write on page!
empty!

[mikelbeck]

Well... this is mostly working.

It's sending out e-mails to inactive users.
It's showing that it's received bounced messages back from a few users.
But the users that were bounced weren't moved to the group that I specified.

Before you ask, yes, I have "Enable usergroup change" set to Yes and have specified "Users Awaiting Email Confirmation" as the "Move Bounced Usergroup". But the users who are shown as bounced are still in the "Registered Users" group.

[tekguru]

I'm also getting reports that users are receiving emails even though they have turned to off the option to receive emails from Admins.

[C Braithwaite]

Originally Posted by Seb@

every day new update of this


LOL

lots to fix

Originally Posted by genesteinberg

OK, I got it to take the paragraph breaks, but the back slashes are still there.

Also, it still refuses to accept the setting for my bounce usergroup, and picks a different usergroup, seemingly at random.

Peace,
Gene

what versions of vbulletin are you using? i forgot to update the test email code. the rest is fine.

Originally Posted by nesta2006

i think again you should update that!
remindermail.php this file now write on page!
empty!

did you update the xml file also?

Originally Posted by mikelbeck

Well... this is mostly working.

It's sending out e-mails to inactive users.
It's showing that it's received bounced messages back from a few users.
But the users that were bounced weren't moved to the group that I specified.

Before you ask, yes, I have "Enable usergroup change" set to Yes and have specified "Users Awaiting Email Confirmation" as the "Move Bounced Usergroup". But the users who are shown as bounced are still in the "Registered Users" group.

Originally Posted by tekguru

I'm also getting reports that users are receiving emails even though they have turned to off the option to receive emails from Admins.

ii will look into this.

[C Braithwaite]

Originally Posted by tekguru

I'm also getting reports that users are receiving emails even though they have turned to off the option to receive emails from Admins.

looking over my code, that should be impossible - EVERY single query that finds inactive users has "options & 16" in which means only users with option to recieve admin emails. are you sure the user isn't just being dumb - have you checkede their status in the admincp?

[tekguru]

Yep I'm afraid it is right, I checked the settings on the users concerned.

Also BIG problems after installing the new update. See attached, I've had to disable the Mod again as if activated it takes the site offline

[C Braithwaite]

Originally Posted by tekguru

Yep I'm afraid it is right, I checked the settings on the users concerned.

Also BIG problems after installing the new update. See attached, I've had to disable the Mod again as if activated it takes the site offline

Sorry i just found an error in the install code. im updating the zip straight away