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NNTP Gateway for Usenet ( Newsgroups ), Mailing Lists · **Released**: 05-14-2004

The latest version: V2.3.2 (31 Oct 2004)

What is it?

This hack provides a gateway from vBulletin forums to the USENET. It allows forum members to read newsgroup messages as well as to send posts to the newsgroups. In a nutshell, it turns vBulletin forums into a basic function news reader.

For an added bonus, this package also supports mailing list archive and forum to mailing list gateway. The software retrieves messages from a pop3 account and import them into the forums threaded. It also allows a forums user to send messages to the mailing list by the forum posting interface.

Why?

The gateway will be appreciated by forum members who do not know how to set up a news reader, or people who do not have port 119 open in their network. A forum interface to read and post news are often considered to be better than a news reader.

The gateway adds more contents to your forums and allows the members to interact with wider audience. It is common to see new users signing up to use this feature.

History

This hack is basically a hacked vB2 NNTP gateway written by Gilby to work with vB3. The original hack can be found here:

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...7&page=1&pp=15

Features

Some of the features and improvement include:

Handles both newsgroup posts and mailing lists.
Handles MIME encoded messages and attachment.
Handles UUEncoded messages.
Two Admin Control Panels for all settings.
Automated installation.
Correct thread implementation. All imported messages and posts sent to newsgroups will be threaded correctly according to References and Message-ID headers.
Optional setting to thread by subject for mailing lists that strip references header.
Supports TABLE_PREFIX.
Imported messages will be searchable just like normal forum posts.
Similar threads are built when the messages are imported if the system setting is on.
Multiple attachments importing.
Save attachment to database or file according to vB setting.
Thumbnail created while importing image files.
Multiple attachment post to newsgroup is also supported.
Selectable X-No-Archive header honouring system.
Light on system resources.
Global Killfile to filter out unwanted messages. Killfiles can have OR and AND effectiveness.
Strip footer by setting for incoming messages. Strips out repeated message footers.
Built options to disable signatures and footers for out going messages.

Future development

AdminCP interfaces. (completed)
Installation/upgrade script. (completed, coded into AdminCP)
Traditional "> " lead posting interface.

What do you need and do not need?

You do not need to edit vB php files if you use two bookmarks
You need to edit one vB php file to insert two lines of code if you want direct click links within AdminCP.
No need to run SQL.

Installation

Basically the AdminCP interfaces take care of installation as well as upgrade in the background. Back up your database first. The scripts can modify your database without alerting you!

Please follow the instructions in the readme.txt file for more details.

Support

Please post your support questions to this thread. Please check the FAQ in the third post within this thread first.

================== UPDATES ======================
Jul 31 2004 (release version 2.2.0)

Provided option of not importing attachments
Provided option of pause between messages
Provided option of not sending messages to USENET
Provided mechanism to skip importing a message if it was crashed on it
Provided "Default Footer" option
Provided strip_footer function for mailing lists
(written originally by KevinM)
Provided Killfile functions with Header/Body/AND/OR settings
Provided ability to thread messages by subject for mailing lists
Provided ability to use a single POP3 account for different mailing lists
(use prefix)
Merged KevinM's attachment routine, save thumbnail to hard drive
as vB3.0.3
Official support to have the script run by Scheduled Tasks
Many bug fixes

Please note, when you manually run the script, you must turn on the debug mode. Otherwise nothing will be displayed on the screen.

To run as debug mode: http://forums.yourdomain.com/gateway.php?debug=1

25 Oct 2004

Provided the option of sending posts using the real email address
Provided the option of sending posts using a fixed email address for
each group.
Posts are now held back if they are in the moderating queue
Scheduled task log is now working
Provided the option of sending the debug messages to the vB3 cron log
Bug fixes

31 Oct 2004

Fixed bugs running the gateway by the vB3 Scheduled Tasks

1 March 2004

Uploaded the new zip file. It contains one or two bug fixes.

lierduh · #**242** 06-23-2004, 12:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cold Steel

Ok, I made a post http://forums.asiansinc.com/showthre...054#post476054 but for some reason it gave me a 500 error when running gateway.php.

So I disabled signatures and tried again, same result.

See attached.

The error must be your original problem. You may need to do a manual post following the instruction in the first page, ie. ssh, telnet etc. Basically your news server does not know the posting command sent by gateway script. 1) Are you allowed to post? 2) Have you changed the script, especially nntp.php?

Cold Steel · #**243** 06-23-2004, 12:43 AM

I am going to try the SSH instruction on the front now.

1) I should be allowed to post, since some posts have gone through before through gateway.php.

2) The only modifications I made were the ones you suggested to gateway.php.

If you have the time, would you mind getting on some sort of instant messaging client?

fustanella · #**244** 06-23-2004, 12:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AWS

On Windows create a scheduled task.

Just to clarify, did you mean a task within the Windows operating system, or within the task manager built into vB3? I took you to mean the former, and when I tried it I couldn't get it to work; just now, though, I stumbled across the latter and it appears to be doing the trick each hour.

Cold Steel · #**245** 06-23-2004, 12:49 AM

Hmm. Both telnet and Agent tell me that I'm not allowed to post...

Very odd.

Cold Steel · #**246** 06-23-2004, 01:54 AM

Forget it - I signed for a free account with Teranews which is letting me post.

Qwest · #**247** 06-23-2004, 01:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fustanella

Just to clarify, did you mean a task within the Windows operating system, or within the task manager built into vB3? I took you to mean the former, and when I tried it I couldn't get it to work; just now, though, I stumbled across the latter and it appears to be doing the trick each hour.

I find it better to use the one on teh Operating system if you can. The one in VB is based on visitors to your site. If you site has lulls in traffic your task won't be run until someone visits.

Qwest · #**248** 06-23-2004, 02:04 AM

Everyone I found out how to make the posts not count towards your total board post counts.

Note: this hack is totally the work of Wayne Luke. I'm just copy/pasting

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wayne Luke

Should be easy...

Add a smallint field on the database record such as "is_usenet" and set it to '1' for the forums that are.

Then in index.php find the following code (it is near the bottom):

PHP Code:


			
if (is_array($forumcache))

{

    foreach ($forumcache AS $forum)

    {

        $totalthreads += $forum['threadcount'];

        $totalposts += $forum['replycount'];

    }

}

And change it to:

PHP Code:


			
if (is_array($forumcache))

{

    foreach ($forumcache AS $forum)

    {

            if (!$forum['is_usenet']) {

                     $totalthreads += $forum['threadcount'];

                $totalposts += $forum['replycount'];

                }

    }

}

My only addition is that you have to go into your AdminCP and update post counts for the changes to take affect. Try running gateway.php as well.

kkiely · #**249** 06-23-2004, 03:46 AM

Hi, could everyone who runs a board with USENET access reply as to
1. what news account you are using
2. how much it costs
3. how many GB you get/month
4. how reliaable it is

I have a few questions

1. What is your favorite news account?

2. If someone wants to run 2 different web sites using VBulleting with the USENET hack - can they use the same news feed and share the bandwidth?

3. Do most webmasters here find that the cost of the news account is worth the extra traffic, etc?

4. Can you make it so that anyone who posts to Usenet through your board has a signature in their posts that read something like

______________________________
"This was posted at www.ABC.com"

Cold Steel · #**250** 06-23-2004, 03:51 AM

1. I was using Giganews (the link is my referral link). But for some reason, they stopped letting me post.

So I went to Teranews.com. They let me post once, and then none of them were getting through.

2. Giganews is $7.99 a month. Teranews is only a $3.95 setup fee.

3. Giganews is 2GB a month. Teranews is 50MB a day.

4. Both unreliable if you ask me, although I would think Giganews is more reliable than Teranews.

1. No favorite yet.

2. Yes.

3. Just started. Don't know yet.

4. Don't know.

I'm starting to think this is more trouble than it's worth.

Help!!!

KevinM · #**251** 06-23-2004, 04:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by princeton

If I understand correctly you are suppose to add the first line of the footer between { } and it should strip the remaining lines -- is this correct?

There are a couple of things to check first (I'm sure you have, but just to be sure...) as these are insensitive to any tolerance.

Double check that this bit

PHP Code:


			
    //strip the footer from emails only

        if ($grouptype != 'news')

        {

        $message['text'] = stripfooter($message['text']);

        }

has been entered in the right place in gateway.php.

Lastly, check that the new Varname you entered in the controlpanel is called exactly "emailfooter" (without quotes).

Try to keep what you put between the {} as short as possible, but enough that it won't occur naturally in a normal message. What is the phrase you are trying to match? Are there any unusual characters that may cause the script to hiccup?

X vBulletin 3.8.12 by vBS Debug Information
Page Generation 0.07595 seconds Memory Usage 2,329KB Queries Executed 25 (?)
More Information
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