Zoints LOCAL: Social networking, enhanced profiles and MUCH more

What is Zoints Local?

Installed on your forum and under your control, Zoints Local is what you want it to be. If you want to provide your members with a homepage they can personalize, you can. If you want members to share more about themselves via greatly enhanced profiles, you can. Blogs? Networking? Resumes? Photos? Video sharing? No problem. Via Zoints' page and block management system, you can do what you want, how you want, with ease. Learn more about pages and blocks

Zoints Local takes your forum's basic profile and turns it into a portal where a whole new world opens up, all on your website. As you can see below, your members can have everything from a personal homepage to enhanced profile, blog, network, pages to show off their vehicle (pictured) and anything else that can be dreamed up. And don't worry, we even include a page that shows the entire default vBulletin profile if you want it.





Some sites using Zoints Local

Hundreds of forums are currently running Zoints Local. Here are just a few:

Forum: http://www.writersbeat.com
Zoints Local: http://www.writersbeat.com/z/DFischer/

Forum: http://tntu.net
Zoints Local: http://tntu.net/z/Dave/

Forum: http://sportbikesite.com/forums2
Zoints Local: http://sportbikesite.com/forums2/z/Adrian/

If you would like your forum featured above, please PM me!


What will Zoints local bring to my forum?

Zoints Local brings a new level of possibilities to your website. There are so many features and options that it?s impossible for us to list them all here. As a community based platform that allows forum owners to share blocks, the opportunities to expand your site with Zoints Local continue to grow every day ? there?s just no telling what feature, block or idea will come out next. At the Zoints Development Forum you can download blocks posted by other community owners and developers. This way, if you own a writing forum, a software forum, a nursing forum, or a forum dedicated to any other topic, you can contour pages and blocks to specifically fit the needs of your community. Learn more about sharing blocks

A few of the blocks and pages packaged with Zoints Local:

About Me, My Discussions, My Links, Instant Chat, My Photos My Interests, My Communities, My Network, Quick Comments, Ratings, My Blog, RSS Feeds, Social Actions and many more. Virtually any existing "widget" shared on the internet can quickly be converted into a block, many in just a few minutes.

What else does Zoints Local offer?

Zoints Local is a state of the art product with all sorts of amazing features that go beyond the normal website.

Drag and Drop technology - Do you want to move a block from one part of your profile to another? Do you want to change the order of your pages? No problem, just drag and drop!



Social Networking - Forget just friends, Zoints Local allows your members to create as many "Groups" as they want. We all have friends, family, colleagues, forum friends, and various other people in our lives.

Comprehensive privacy controls - Your members can create a variety of groups and show each group different content on a page by page basis. Zoints allows you to show what you want, when you want, to whom you want. Learn more about Zoints' Privacy Controls

Style Sharing - When your members create custom styles, they can easily share them with other members of your community via the Styles Database.

Global Search - Zoints Local includes a global search that bridges that crerates a virtual freeway between the forums of the internet. Searches conducted through Zoints return results from every community that uses Zoints Local. Think of it as Google, for people. Google sends you a lot of traffic, and so can Zoints People Search.



The best part about Zoints Local is that you pick what to let your members use and what not to let them use.

What sort of administration options exist?

The Zoints Local system gives you extensive control of how your Zoints profiles should behave. You can turn features on and off, determine if you want your members to be able to edit/create/manage styles of their own, define default styles, add your own customized header and logo to the pages and much more.

Here?s a couple screenshots from the admin control panel:






How do I get started?

Getting Zoints Local running on your site is a quick and painless process. Just follow the simple steps below and you can have your site running Zoints Local in a matter of minutes. Once you have the system setup, it?s completely up to you to decide how you want things to work. Customize, add on or leave the system exactly as it comes out of the box ? Zoints Local gives you the power to choose!

Step 1 ? Download both of the attached zip files and unzip them.

Step 2 ? Upload the /z/ folder to:

yourdomain.com/z/ or
subdomain.yourdomain.com/z/ or
yourdomain.com/forumdirectory/z/

Step 3 - Run the installation script found at /z/install/index.php and follow the directions

Step 4 - During the installation you will need to register your forum with Zoints to obtain a token and authentication key

Step 5 ? Once installation is complete, log in to your vBulletin Admin Control Panel and upload the plugin product file found in the second zip file.

Step 6 ? Configure Zoints as you see fit!

Promoting your forum through Zoints

Along with all of the features, tools and added functionality Zoints Local offers for your site, the Zoints is also interested in bringing you more traffic. Here?s how:

1. Add your forum to the Zoints directory at http://zoints.com/communities after you install. More information can be found in this thread.

2. The Zoints network will include your site in searches and other relevant results bringing you qualified traffic without any additional effort.

3. If you install Zoints Lite on a Big-Board, please email us at big-boards@zoints.com with your url so we can get you added to the Zoints Enabled directory on BigBoards.com

Support

Due to the scope of this software, we ask that help requests be submitted at http://network.zoints.com in this specific forum so we can provide quick, efficient support.


Upgrade Instructions

1. Download the new zip file and overwrite the existing files

2. After uploading the new files, access /z/install/manager.php in your browser

3. Click "Upgrade Zoints" and then click on "1.0.1"

That's it!


Changelog

2006/11/29: 1.0.1
* Avatar maximum size restriction
* Avatar display issue fixed
* Pulling headinclude template for vBulletin
* Pending friends issue fixed
* Media block fixed
* Various streamlining of text / names
* Blocking users fix
* Various misc bugfixes
* Removed various references to "Zoints"

2006/11/28: 1.0
* Version Tracking - Keep up with what the latest version is
* Global searches (through zoints.com) now display members of searcher's own community first
* Ability to lock certain pages, so they show up on every profile, with the same content everywhere
* Ability to include the forum header and footer dynamically
* Ability to restrict image filesizes and space available per user
* Zoints Local now uses forum's avatar
* Users have the option of PM or Email notification for everything
* Users are taken to their own profile upon login from login page
* Removed ability to upload BMPs
* Usernames are now reflected in Zoints Local when that user uses Zoints Local again
* New tab: Old forum profile
* Various bugfixes

2006/11/10: 1.0 RC 3
* Custom footer in admin area
* Ability to disable network join request PMs in settings
* Added Simple Editor mode (Non drag and drop)
* Ability to login as users for moderation/editing purposes
* Tons of bugfixes (open_basedir, various whitepages, xml bug, etc)

2006/11/07: 1.0 RC 2
* ImageMagick settings pulled from forums
* Fixed bug with cURL redundancy not returning proper data
* Fixed bug in CFPLS handler
* Can now properly add custom blocks for other tabs
* Search age bug
* Quick Comments block fix
* Media block fix
* Misc additional bugs

2006/11/06: 1.0 RC 1
* Initial release

[Zoints]

Changelog

2006/11/10: 1.0 RC 3
* Custom footer in admin area
* Ability to disable network join request PMs in settings
* Added Simple Editor mode (Non drag and drop)
* Ability to login as users for moderation/editing purposes
* Tons of bugfixes (open_basedir, various whitepages, xml bug, etc)

Upgrade Instructions

1. Download the new zip file and overwrite the existing files

2. After uploading the new files, access /z/install/manager.php in your browser

3. Click "Upgrade Zoints" and then click on "1.0 RC2"

That's it!

[Zoints]

I just changed the first post to better reflect this system. Thanks for the continued feedback.

[simalert]

Hi,

This looks great and possibley something I'd implement on my forum, but I am just curious to know if this is totally self contained or if it merges our database with the Zoints one?

The test sites that I've seen all have a Join Zoints button on the top of the profiles and when looking at user's profiles it takes me to a Zoints.com page.

Are these profiles /pages created and kept on our own server and database or do they just link to the Zoints.com site and database?

And can the global search be turned off on a site so that users of that site can only search for users of that site and not all other sites using Zoints Local?

[simalert]

Hi,

Sorry to pester, but any chance on some info on my above post please?

Thanks

[Zoints]

Ack, please accept my apologies for the delay in replying!

Originally Posted by simalert

This looks great and possibley something I'd implement on my forum, but I am just curious to know if this is totally self contained or if it merges our database with the Zoints one?

This is self contained. It is installed on your forum and under your control and you do not in any way merge your database with Zoints.

Originally Posted by simalert

The test sites that I've seen all have a Join Zoints button on the top of the profiles and when looking at user's profiles it takes me to a Zoints.com page.

Hmm, can you link me to that please? There should not be such a button on Zoints Local. You may have seen people using Zoints Central which is a totally different system.

Originally Posted by simalert

Are these profiles /pages created and kept on our own server and database or do they just link to the Zoints.com site and database?

They are created and kept on your server and in your database.

Originally Posted by simalert

And can the global search be turned off on a site so that users of that site can only search for users of that site and not all other sites using Zoints Local?

Only with an "autonomy license". However, we're improving the global search system in a manner where your site and your partners will always be listed first. I realize that having a global search may be bothersome to some, but it works both ways. The more forums that utilize this system, the more traffic everyone gets, which, in the end, benefits all forums involved. Think of it as Google Search in its infancy. When Google first started, you might have been weary of adding this new company's search to your website since it leads your members elsewhere. But in the end, it benefits you and Google sends you additional traffic.

We wanted to put our more than a cool modification. We wanted to put out a modification that can help solve the three salient problems most forum owners face:

1. Member acquisition
2. Member retention
3. Profitability

As time moves forward and we continually improve this system, I have little doubt that we will accomplish just that.

[simalert]

How do I go about getting a

Only with an "autonomy license".

?

Thanks

[Zoints]

Hi simalert,

As vb.org is for free modifications, let's be respectful to the powers that be and take that discussion to http://network.zoints.com - please register and PM me there. Same username. Thank you.

[yoyoyoyo]

I did the edits and it came up with 2 zoints links on my navbar. I checked the edits and it still shows 2 - any ideas?

[Zoints]

Originally Posted by yoyoyoyo

I did the edits and it came up with 2 zoints links on my navbar. I checked the edits and it still shows 2 - any ideas?

If you ended up with two after doing the edits, that means you didn't need to do the edits. The automated installer attempts to place those links automatically. Go ahead and reverse the manual edits you did and all will be well

[yoyoyoyo]

thanks