Calendar Enhancements - vB Event Forums

Introduction

This is a continuation of my Event Forums plugin/addon from 3.5. You can find the old version here. The original plugin was developed by Endquote, and I have since taken it over to bring it to what it is today. I hope you can find it useful!

What is this addon?

This is a plugin which allows you to create relationships between calendars and events, giving each event a thread of its own for users to discuss. I have tested this alot, and I am running it myself on a live board.

Sure, so whats it do?

Some examples of the features this plugin offers

• When a new event is created in a calendar, an associated thread is created in the linked forum.
• Links to events in the calendar are forwarded to the associated thread, or optionally a seperate New Event button can be added with a minor template edit.
• New thread links in the event forum are redirected to a new event form.
• A summary can be shown at the top of the event forum which shows the up and coming events over the next 'x' days.
• The date and time shown in the thread and post title, is calculated on the current viewing users timezone. In other words, times always show in the users timezone, not forced to GMT.
• Full moderation support.
• Editing a thread or event, will update its associated event/thread.

Screenshots

Some screenshots of this plugin

• Admin Options
• Event Thread
• Event Thread with Reply
• Thread List

How do I install it?

For upgrading, please see the section below.

Summary

• 1 xml import.
• 1 (optional) template change.
• 1 (optional) gif file upload.

Step 1

Install the product
Download the product XML file.

Goto your Admin CP at your forums, then goto Plugin System -> Manage Products. Click [Add/Import Product] at the bottom of the page. Browse to the location where you downloaded the xml file and then click the Import button.

Step 2

Calendar ID:
Goto your Admin CP at your forums, then goto Calendar Manager. Find the calendar you want to link to a forum, then click Edit.
Right at the top of the page you should see:

Calendar: NAME (id: ID)

Make a note of the ID, you will need this soon.

Forum ID:
Goto your Admin CP at your forums, then goto Forum Manager. Find the forum you want to activate as your event forum, then click Edit Forum.
Right at the top of the page you should see:

Forum: NAME (id: ID)

Make a note of the ID, you will need this soon.

Link a Calendar to a Forum:
Goto your Admin CP at your forums, then goto vBulletin Options and find Event Forums.
The first option you should see is Calendar/Forum Map.
Enter in your IDs into the box, as CALENDARID:FORUMID.
Example, my Calendar is 5 and my Forum is 14:

5:14

Click Save.

Step 3

Base permissions check:
You will need to check that users using the Event Forums, have basic permissions to both the Linked Forum AND Calendar.
Basic Permissions include: Can View Forum and Can Post Threads and possibly some others.

Step 4 (Optional template edit)

Add the New Event button:
You only need todo this if you want to show a seperate New Event button next to the New Thread button.

First of all, upload newevent.gif to your images/buttons folder. NOTE you will need to upload this to any custom image folders too for different styles you might have.

Second, open up FORUMDISPLAY template for each of your styles you want to show the button, find and add the highlighted code below:

<td class="smallfont"><if condition="$show['newthreadlink']">
<a href="newthread.php?$session[sessionurl]do=newthread&amp;f=$foruminfo[forumid]" rel="nofollow"><img src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/newthread.gif" alt="$vbphrase[post_new_thread]" border="0" /></a>
<if condition="$show['neweventlink']">&nbsp;<a href="newthread.php?$session[sessionurl]do=newevent&amp;f=$foruminfo[forumid]" rel="nofollow"><img src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/newevent.gif" alt="$vbphrase[lv_vb_eventforums_phrase_post_new_event]" border="0" /></a></if>
<else />&nbsp;</if></td>

Lastly, go into the Event Forums options, and change the option Show the New Event button on the thread list to yes.

Step 5

Install on VB.org:
Browse back to this thread, and click the INSTALL button so you can recieve updates whenever I update this plugin.

How do I upgrade it from an old version?

Step 1

Import xml
Download the product XML file.

Goto your Admin CP at your forums, then goto Plugin System -> Manage Products. Click [Add/Import Product] at the bottom of the page. Browse to the location where you downloaded the xml file. Make sure the overwrite option is set to ON and then click the Import button.

Can I give you money to make this?

This isn't a commercial plugin, and can be used by anyone for free. However, a few people have said to me that they would like to donate some money for my time working on the plugin and for picking it up and continuing the development of new features etc. If you do want to donate some money my way, then you can do so through paypal by clicking this link. Thanks!

Bugs / Support

If you find a bug, then please post in this thread and let me know. There are a few bugs that haven't been fixed since the old version, so i'm hoping that we can fix these soon. I will do my best to support the plugin as much as possible, however I also have a busy job which takes up alot of my time.

Known Bugs

Here is a list of known bugs to date

• Soft delete actually hard deletes the thread.
• Search doesn't search the first post of an event thread.
• Inline ajax edit bugs thread title. Need to remove date and time from it before edit.

Feature request list

Here is a list of the requested features. Please note that because it makes this list, doesn't mean it will be added.

• Intergration with the event attendance plugin.
• Customisation of the order of the custom fields in the thread title.
• An option to "import" all the previous events from a Calendar into threads.
• Extra post options support (Attachments, Post Icons, Sticky etc).
• Custom ordering of the %datetime variable.
• Custom ordering of %custom variable.
• Better handling of recurring events.

Credits

Thanks to endquote for originally creating the plugin.
Thanks to the Ninja :ninja: for helping me infiltrate the vb code and finding those hidden hooks!
Thanks to anybody that helps test this plugin.

Changelog

Version: 3.3

• Added Farcasters Event Attendance patch to the mod. I've added a self check so it will only run when the Event attendance mod is installed and active.

Version: 3.2

• Fixed a bug which was prevent the thread from being deleted when you try to delete an event.

Version: 3.1

• Fixed a bug which would cause an error with undefined function on the forum display page when summary is turned on.

Version: 3.0

• Version now compatible with 3.6. Please note this plugin will no longer install on a board older than 3.6. I would recommend you upgrade your board as soon as you can!
• Added an optional template edit to show a New Event button next to the New Thread button.
• Plugin no longer in BETA. I feel this has been running enough stablely to take this out of BETA. There are still some bugs which need fixing, but as a whole it works and is used by quite a few people.

Version: 2.7 and below

• See the old thread here

[CypherSTL]

Originally Posted by mAnimal85

I have installed vB Event mod. It works great.

Is there any way to automatically move expired events from one board to another ?

Just create a prune to move it to an archive cat or something.

[ragtek]

i took the recycle add-on https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...recycle+thread and changed it so, that it is just shown in the event forum

[Ronseal]

Originally Posted by Ronseal

Is there a way of changing the format event title to exclude the time?

The default format is %title%custom: %datetime however all I want to appear in the title is the %title and the date, without the time? I don't have any custom fields.

I just find the title's can be huge and difficult to read at first glance, for example: My reoccuring event at the local pub on the corner: 20 Aug 07 07:30 PM - 20 Aug 10 11:00 PM

Sorry to bump my own request, but after three months I thought I'd ask this question again if anybody is available to help.

Many thanks
Ron

[justchil]

I haven't even had time to install this yet but it looks very cool.

Has anyone thought of integrating some sort of gmap to show the locations of events/upcoming events?

[justchil]

Also can anyone help me with an if statement so I only see the "new events" button on the events forum? I want this to happen only on forumid 24.

<td class="smallfont">
<if condition="$show['newthreadlink']"><a href="newthread.php?$session[sessionurl]do=newthread&amp;f=$foruminfo[forumid]" rel="nofollow"><img src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/newthread.gif" alt="$vbphrase[post_new_thread]" border="0" /></a>
<if condition="$show['neweventlink']">&nbsp;<a href="newthread.php?$session[sessionurl]do=newevent&amp;f=$foruminfo[forumid]" rel="nofollow"><img src="$stylevar[imgdir_button]/newevent.gif" alt="$vbphrase[lv_vb_eventforums_phrase_post_new_event]" border="0" /></a></if>
<else />&nbsp;</if></td>

[justchil]

If anyone else runs into this...

<if condition="$forumid == 27">
// your code just for specific forum or categories here
</if>

You get the idea... Now I just have a new events button at the top and bottom for only the events forum yay!

[jonbaker]

how do i actiavte the RSVP feature?

i am looking thru the post now, but cannot seem to find it. thank you

[Ronseal]

I've installed this mod and it works great but now I'm editting the basic vBulletin Calendar to improve this mods intergration with my board and its intended use.

Although users do set a date range for 'Ranged Events' how can I turn OFF the default to set a time for a 'Ranged Event'?

If you don't set a time for a Ranged Event it brings up the following error:

Incorrect time chosen. Make sure that a valid from time and to time is set. Make sure to either choose a pre-defined time or set your own.

Now what I've done to my calendar so far is take out the options for a reccuring event by editing the CALENDER, calendar_yearly, calendar_monthly and calendar_weekly templates.

So now I want to take out the time settings from the 'calendar_edit' template. This I've been able to do however when somebody tries to enter a 'Ranged Event' without the 'Times' specified they get the above error.

Anybody help.... surely this is something simple???? :up:

[Caerydd]

Originally Posted by jonbaker

how do i actiavte the RSVP feature?

i am looking thru the post now, but cannot seem to find it. thank you

The RSVP feature is done using Farcaster's Event Attendance, and the bridge hack that enables these two to work with each other.

Originally Posted by extremesanity

I can't get these two hacks to work together. The vbadvanced module does not work on events created by this hack. Once I turn this hack off the vbadvanced module works fine.

I have this problem as well. Despite all settings and permissions being correct, Calenders with Event Forums mapped will not show up either in forumhome, or on the vba standalone upcoming events module. If they show up on the forumhome, then they will show up on Upcoming events module.

This sucks, as it basically renders Event Forums pointless to me now I'm going over all my Calenders to make sure they have the correct permissions and settings, and the module itself is set to display events from all Calenders or events from one Calender from the next 30 days. Anyone have any idea on how to fix this? It's almost deal breaking for me. I'm using 3.6.8 PL 2

After reading a post in this thread: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...15#post1430715 it seems event forums doesn't cache events to the datastore.

And to be honest, the whole shebang apparently needs to be recoded I wish I had the time or the skill. I can offer donations to anyone willing to wack this whole project - Event Forums+Event Attendance+Cut down on queries.

Or even just making the upcoming events function work

[Caerydd]

UPDATE - RE: Events not showing on Upcoming Events.

After fiddling around with it, I found that disabling the dynamic event titles (e.g. showing date & time, and custom fields) meant that events in Event Forums showed up on the Upcoming Events on forumhome and the vba modules. To disable this, simpley remove the %datetime and %custom type variables from the relevant option in the Event Forums administration. Hope this tip helps someone.