AboutToday - Bring RSS Feeds and Daily Events to Your Site!

What is AboutToday?

AboutToday provides a central place to bring daily items of interest to your forum visitors. It includes two main components: an RSS Reader System and Local Events database System.

Please NOTE: This mod has been modified for vb ver 3.6.4. It should work on vb ver 3.5.4 and 3.6.x.

1. An RSS Reader system where the admin can enter RSS feeds that will then be displayed on the page. RSS feeds can be set to AUTOMATICALLY create threads or be set so that users can easily create a thread from a feed.. Feeds can be read via fopen or cURL.
   
   
   
   
   
   The RSS Feeds are fully intergrated with vbAdvanced and could actually be placed anywhere you want!!
   
2. A database system that can hold unlimited categories of "AboutToday" events. For example, you could have a history category (like a Today in History) with sub-categories for different eras in history. Or, you could have a daily joke or software tip of the day, etc.
   
   The "Add Event" feature is intended to help you if you want for example - Sports: Today in History. With the vb calendar, you cannot have categories and you are restricted with how far back the dates can go.
   
   
   
   
   So with the "Add Event" feature, you could have a category tree like:
   • Hockey
     • Professional
     • College
     • High School
   • Football
     • American Football
     • The Rest of the World (Soccer)
   • Baseball
   
   with the normal calendar feature, you cannot have categories. And with "Add Event" you can have any date. So, if you want an event like "Jan 1, 132 B.C. - the first ball was invented", you can do that. But, that isn't possible in the normal calendar. Also, the events in "Add Event" are fully searchable.

Installation

Copy the following files to your server in the forums directory:

abouttoday.php
includes/class.csv.php
includes/class_abouttoday.php
includes/cron/cron_abouttoday.php
includes/xml/bitfield_abouttoday.xml
includes/xml/cpnav_abouttoday.xml
admincp/abouttodayadmin.php

From the admincp, import the product file product-abouttoday.xml (Manage Products - Add/Import Product).

REFRESH your admincp window. You should now see a listing in the left column of the admincp for "AboutToday".

Getting Started

NOTE - if this is a new install, a Yahoo RSS Feed and CNN Entertainment Feed have been automatically added to give you a feel for how the product looks.

If you plan to use the RSS Feeds:

1. From the admincp, select AboutToday - RSS Feeds. Add an RSS Feed.
2. From the admincp, select Usergroups - Usergroup Manager. Add permissions so the Administrator group can use the product.
3. From your forum directory, bring up the file abouttoday.php.
4. If you want the feeds to AUTOMATICALLY create threads, go to admincp - abouttoday - settings. There you must set the userid of the account to use to create the thread. Then, edit the RSS Feed with the forumid of where the threads for that feed should be created!

If you plan to create your own "today in history" type of database:

1. From the admincp, select AboutToday - Categories. Add a category.
2. From your forum directory, bring up the file abouttoday.php. "Add" your first event to the category you have created!

Version Status
I've tested this product extensively but ... use this totally at your own risk!

Credits
I learned a lot about how to code this and used a lot of the code from what Ron1n did with ecDownloads. What I've learned from his code while helping to support ecDownloads has been invaluable.

Sites Using this Product
Visit www.armchairgeneral.com to see this product in action.

Click Install!
Please Click Install if you are using this product. Thanks!

[CyberRanger]

BTW - if you are a vbAdvanced user, you could add your own site into an RSS feed and then easily display a summary of the last forum posts on your vBa index page.

[chairman miaow]

Thanks - this is a superb mod even if you just use it to display an RSS feed on your homepage (as someone else said , much better than cluttering up your forums with postings)

[tuanluu]

does this mod have a clean up schedule?

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by tuanluu

does this mod have a clean up schedule?

I'm not sure what you mean by that so let me just explain what it does have. One of the plugins is fired by the cron_script_cleanup hook. So, by default, when the "Hourly Cleanup #1" runs, the RSS Feeds are updated. If you check (within Scheduled Tasks) to log the "Hourly Cleanup #1" tasks, the detailed results of the RSS update will be logged.

[tuanluu]

thanks that I got it.

[Dennis B]

Exactly what I was looking for. A few RSS feeds anywhere but in a forum. Thanks!

[Dennis B]

westpointer,

Under "Edit RSS Feeds", the option "Title" [Optional: Leave blank to use the title from the RSS Feed] doesn't seem to be working. It's always pulling the feed's original title...

Thanks.

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by Dennis B

westpointer,

Under "Edit RSS Feeds", the option "Title" [Optional: Leave blank to use the title from the RSS Feed] doesn't seem to be working. It's always pulling the feed's original title...

Thanks.

k, I'll check it out, thx!

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by Dennis B

westpointer,

Under "Edit RSS Feeds", the option "Title" [Optional: Leave blank to use the title from the RSS Feed] doesn't seem to be working. It's always pulling the feed's original title...

Thanks.

I've tried this a few times, changing the Title in the admincp then forcing a refresh. The new title is displayed. When I go back into the admincp to edit the RSS Feed, the correct "Title" is populating the field.

Not sure what's going on with you. If you can point me to a url for your site, I'll sign up and see what I can figure out.

[CyberRanger]

BTW - I plan to release a small maintenance update next week. The main change will be that when a feed is displayed, a summary of other feeds will stay on the left column. I think this will make it easier to navigate the feeds. See the attached pic to get an idea of what I mean.