Total Members (Registrations) Hack

TOTAL MEMBERS (REGISTRATIONS) HACK
Version 1.0 ~ 17 June 2003

This is a really elementary hack, but I was surprised that no one had publicized it for people who know little/nothing about PHP to use. (I did several extensive searches and found no mention of this. If someone else has already posted this, please just let me know and I'll defer appropriately.) This is also the first hack that I've decided to publish on vBulletin.org, even though I'm capable of a bit more complex, but probably because I was fairly certain of what I was doing here.

What does it do?
The Total Members (Registrations) Hack will display the total number of people who have ever registered an account, at one time or another, on your forums, next to your forumhome Members count.

Why is this useful?
If you run a very large forum, with tens of thousands of registrations, but you like keeping your database's users table pruned to reflect only active members (e.g., we regularly prune members who don't post every x days and have less than x number of posts), you can still display the total number of people that have ever registered, at one time or another, on your forums.

What is involved?
1 php file edit (index.php) and 1 template edit (forumhome)

Will this slow down my forumhome?
No. It adds only one calculation and adds only one variable, both of which are expunged by vBulletin after use.

Screenshot posted below. Enjoy!

Regards,
Kaelon
www.Alleria.com

[Albasoul]

This hack is not a good idea to install on your boards, especially busy ones, because any sql query that uses select count(*) degrades mysql performance by counting a large number of rows from the user table.

I like the idea, i just don't like to install this because I am sure it will kill performance.

[Crinos]

I regularly prune my member database every month for inactive members who 1.) have never made a post + 2.) have not visited the site in 3 months ... so I probably won't need this hack ... good idea tho, congrats

[Kaelon]

This hack is not a good idea to install on your boards, especially busy ones, because any sql query that uses select count(*) degrades mysql performance by counting a large number of rows from the user table.

Did you even look at the code? There are no added queries in this hack. Specifically, it uses a query already needed by forumhome (the one that generates the newuserid) and simply formats that number using an in-the-box routine.

Our forum has hundreds of simultaneous users, and we have experienced no increase in server load.

Kaelon

[N9ne]

Hehe, I did this in my 4th hack I think, it's really amazing that no one did do it separately. In my hack I did the same for threads and posts (shows posts posted total and threads posted total) and I've done the same for vB3.

Nice work Kaelon, hopefully people will use it, because it should technically be standard vBulletin, to show members total, registered, but that's just my opinion.

[Dean C]

I'm still a little confused as to what this does *confused*?

- miSt

[S.Shady]

Today at 05:59 PM Mist said this in Post #15
I'm still a little confused as to what this does *confused*?

- miSt

i wasl also confused but then i noticed if you put a comma right after (active) it will all make sence


ok if your forum has had a total of 1,287 members since you opend total.

and you prune 500 off because of inactivity

this hac will say

Current Active # of Members: 787
Total To date reg. members 1,287

[Kaelon]

S.Shady is correct; it essentially takes the $newuserid variable and runs it through the format_number routine, and displays it. This gives users an idea of how many accounts have ever been created on a forum (since $newuserid is sequential).

This, of course, means different things for different forums. For my forum, it represents the number of total members registered, but not pruned due to inactivity (since we regularly prune thousands of inactive accounts).

Kaelon

[Floris]

I don't want to spoil your fun, but ... why does this require source code hacking ?

The 'welcome to our latest member' .. his userid is the last one in the database, and therefor also the total amount you want to get right ? Just display that.

Total registrations, ever: $newuserid
Total active members: $numbermembers

[csidlernet]

You have a point: xiphoid, but I guess you still could call this a hack as it does involve file editing.

[Floris]

Then I will rephrase my point: It is an obsolete hack!

vBulletin's forumhome already lets you have this number, why stress the server to re-calculate it ?

Just modify the template and you are done. This way upgrading doesn't have to bother you. The variable is currently the same in vb3 too.