Integration with vBulletin - CFM: Google AdSense for Search Integration

Title: "CFM: Google Search Results"
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Author: Sal Bezos (webmaster@carforummisfits.com)
Date of Creation: September 3, 2006
Version: 1.0 (9/30/2006)
Home: http://www.carforummisfits.com/
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Purpose:
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This product for vBulletin creates a target page for providing Google Search Results within your vBulletin forums. The Google Search Results (AdSense for Search) will appear in a vBulletin page.

Unlike the previous revision of this product, you will now be able to enter code for a Google Search Box for placement in the Search drop-down menu (or anywhere else you would like to place it). Please make sure that your search box code includes a <form> tag that states something along the lines of action="http://<yourhostname>/forums/cfmgoogle.php".


Tested:
-------
This product has been tested on a vBulletin 3.6.1 installation. There is no reason why it should not work in the same manner on any 3.6.x or 3.5.x installation, but it has not and will not be tested by the author.


Included Files:
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- README.txt
- cfm-live-demo.png (screenshot)
- cfmgoogle.php
- product-cfm_google_search_results.xml


Installation:
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1. Upload the cfmgoogle.php file to your forum root, usually located at http://<yourhostname>/forums.

2. Register for a Google AdSense for Search account.
----a. Register for a Google AdSense account if you don't have one.
----b. Visit "http://www.google.com/adsense/".
----c. Login with your e-mail and password.
----d. Click on the "AdSense Setup" tab.
----e. Select "AdSense for Search".
----f. Configure your search box.
--------f1. Select either "Google WebSearch" or "Google WebSearch + SiteSearch" depending on whether you want users to be able to Google search your site or not. If you select "Google WebSearch + SiteSearch", enter the URL of sites you wish to be able to search.
--------f2. For Logo Type, I recomment selecting "Google Logo" and checking the "Logo above text box" option.
--------f3. For "Opening of search results page" select "Open results within my own site." Enter the URL of your cfmgoogle.php file (e.g. http://<yourhostname>/forums/cfmgoogle.php)
--------f4. Click "Continue >>".
----g. Configure the appearance of the results page, then click "Continue >>"
----h. You should now receive two sets of code from Google labeled "Your search box code" and "Your search results code".

3. In your forum's admin panel, go to Plugins & Products/Manage Products

4. Click on Add/Import Product

5. Click "Browse..." and select the "product-cfm_google_search_results.xml" product file. If this is your first installation of this product, select the "No" radio button in the "Allow Overwrite" option. If you are upgrading or reinstalling, select the "Yes" radio button. Click the "Import" button.

6. Go to vBulletin Options/vBulletin Options. Scroll through the list and select "CFM: Google Search Results".

7. In the "Google Search Box Code" option, paste the code provided by Google titled "Your search box code".

7. In the "Google Search Results Code" option, paste the code provided by Google titled "Your search results code".

8. In Styles & Templates/Style Manager go into Edit Templates for your style. Open the "Navigation / Breadcrumb Templates" template group and open the "navbar" template.

9. Find the following:

		<form action="search.php?do=process" method="post">
		<table cellpadding="4" cellspacing="1" border="0">

And replace with:

		<table cellpadding="4" cellspacing="1" border="0">
		<form action="search.php?do=process" method="post">

Find the following:

		</table>
		</form>
	</div>
	<!-- / header quick search form -->

And replace with:

		</form>
		<tr>
			<td class="thead">Search Google</td>
		</tr>
                <tr>
                        <td class="vbmenu_option" title="nohilite">$vboptions[cfmgsr_googlesearch]</td>
		</tr>
		</table>
	</div>
	<!-- / header quick search form -->

10. Pull up a forum page and look under your search drop-down menu for the search box.

11. Enjoy!


FAQ:
----
Q. My search results window is too tall. What's wrong with it?
A. This appears to be a bug in the Google Search Results code. If my assumption is incorrect, please let me know.

Q. Why are the colors all wonky on my search results?
A. The colors of the search results are provided by the search box. Make sure the colors in the search box code are correct.

Q. The background color of the Google search box doesn't match my page -- what can I do about it?
A. If Google's TOS allows it, play around with the settings in the code you pasted in the "Your search box code" option.


Revisions:
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1.0 - 09/30/2006 - Adding instructions and support for the Google search box in the search drop-down menu
0.1 - 09/03/2006 - Initial release


Support:
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Any questions and problems should be reported to the modification's thread on http://www.vbulletin.org. No warranty, express or implied, is granted with this software. Use is at your own risk.


License:
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GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
Version 2, June 1991

[Bulent Tekcan]

Please specify some words or valid user names to search on. There were no matches for those that you specified.

Everytime I received this message.Any idea ?

[Throtex]

Originally Posted by Bulent Tekcan

Please specify some words or valid user names to search on. There were no matches for those that you specified.

Everytime I received this message.Any idea ?

I haven't seen that before, sorry.

[Throtex]

Originally Posted by Hakaslak

Ahhh..

Well, I guess if they use the Google box, it's etter them them heading straight to Google.

My only concern is how to make sure they dont confuse the Google ebox for the real search box. >_<

Well, it can sorta work as a search box for your site if you run the Google search on your domain ... but as far as confusing the users, I think the way it looks on my site shouldn't confuse people -- though I suppose there might be better ways to eliminate confusion.

[Bulent Tekcan]

Your sites working without any problems.What is your navbar settings ? I think wrong code in my navbar.Everytime open search in forum.

[Bulent Tekcan]

Finaly works now....

But I cannot find adjust for results.Every pages 10 result...Is this by design ?

[Throtex]

Originally Posted by Bulent Tekcan

Finaly works now....

But I cannot find adjust for results.Every pages 10 result...Is this by design ?

That wouldn't be affected by my code -- it should support any changes that Google allows. That said, I don't think I've seen a setting to change the number of results on a page. I agree, it would be useful to have greater or fewer results per page to conform better to individual sites.

My understanding is that the search result integration feature is a fairly new offering from Google, and there are still a few glitches (like the height of the results not following the settings specified in the code you have to paste into the Admin CP options.

Google themselves actually provided all the integration code (for a target page) ... I just made it easier to integrate it with vBulletin. Unfortunately, there's not much I can do on my end (and without violating Google's TOS) to make certain things look better.

But I do agree ... hopefully Google will keep adding features to this -- it's a very neat tool.

[Throtex]

Originally Posted by Bulent Tekcan

Finaly works now....

But I cannot find adjust for results.Every pages 10 result...Is this by design ?

btw, don't forget to click install!

[Throtex]

Originally Posted by Hakaslak

Ahhh..

Well, I guess if they use the Google box, it's etter them them heading straight to Google.

My only concern is how to make sure they dont confuse the Google ebox for the real search box. >_<

Hakaslak (and others):

Searching on your site causes a vBulletin error that reads, in relevant part:

Please specify some words or valid user names to search on. There were no matches for those that you specified.

I think you may have used a search form integration hack from this site that is faulty. If you see this message, it should inform you that for some reason the data is being passed to vBulletin rather than to Google.

The typical culprit appears to be placing the Google search form code inside of the vBulletin search form code.

Hakaslak - in your page source, I see that you have a <form> tag to open the vBulletin search, then the <form> tag to open the Google search, then a </form> tag to end the Google search, followed by a </form> tag to close the vBulletin search.

These should NOT overlap, and I suspect that anyone experiencing this error is doing the same thing. Move the </form> tag for vBulletin up to before the Google search form, or move the Google search form down outside the </form> tag for the vBulletin form. When you're clicking the "Google Search" button, it is actually sending data to the vBulletin search, rather than my php file.

Hope this helps, but I do not intend to support the search box itself.

[voteforbird]

Can this product perhaps be modified to have a search bar on the results page…?

[Throtex]

Originally Posted by voteforbird

Can this product perhaps be modified to have a search bar on the results page??

Hmm, don't see why not. Right above the search results?

I envision this:
- Admin CP option to turn on/off the search bar in results page
- Admin CP text entry box to enter the necessary code (it's customized per AdSense member) for the search bar.

That might work. I'm usually pretty busy (hence my unwillingness to formally offer support) (I'm currently at work supposedly "working" right now ) but I can probably get to this. Great idea, btw!

If you can't wait for me to get to it, feel free to modify the template this product installs and simply add the search box code to the top of the template. I don't see why that wouldn't work.