Miscellaneous Hacks - Rotating Banner System

With the Rotating Banner System software, you may publish literally anywhere standard banners and advertising, with no restriction but your imagination. Unlike many other products, it allows to show an unlimited amount of banners and advertising, which are randomly shown at the places you choose, and you may refer generically to an Ad by using specific placeholders.

Also the management is straight-forward and simple to use. Forum administrators with maintenance rights may add, edit and delete records from the Administration Control Panel (ACP), one of each representing a banner. After saving the new banner settings, they are immediately visible at your board.

Compatibility: from vBulletin 3.6.5 onwards

By the way, I do also install the hack on your boards, but since I am very, very busy, it may take some time (weeks) until it gets done.


Tutorials:

• How-to create my first banner (Flash).

Updates:

• 2.0.1: Simple click tracker added, HTML help included.
• 2.0.3: Small bug fixes; additional banner list, navigation bar, E-Mail field for banner event notifications and automatic save on scroll setting; absolute URL to rbs_banner.php in order to allow click tracking on non-standard pages; supported languages: English, Italian; Help file clean-up.
• 2.0.5: Small bug fixes; additional details in banner list; email notification for epired banners.
• 2.0.6: vbCMS compatibility bug fix; additional banner lists.
• 2.0.7: Usergroups filter: now it is possible to define a list of usergroups which may show a banner; additional vbCMS compatibility bug fix.
• 2.0.8: Various fixes and most of all, inclusion of the right files: admin_rbs.php, cpnav_rbs.xml
• 2.0.9: Extra comma fix in new record creation.
• 2.1.0: Fix for an occasional banner type selection bug, when the sample banners have been deleted or disabled.
• 2.2.0 (Major upgrade): Up to 10 different banner locations. Requires changes to your existing placeholders in your templates, since a more generic format has been chosen. If you don't need more than 2 different locations, you don't need to upgrade. Changed files: rbs_banner.php, admin_rbs.php
• 2.2.1: Minor bug fix in files: admin_rbs_h_banner_list.php, admin_rbs_v_banner_list.php
• 2.2.1: Hotfix for Max Clicks saving bug.
• 2.2.2: More listings and less files. PDF Help. Separate Italian add-ons and help. Duplicate button.
• 2.2.3: Minor bug fixes. Changed files: product-rbs.xml
• 2.2.4: Flash Banner support (beta). Changed files: product-rbs.xml, rbs_wrapper.swf, admin_rbs.php, English Help.
• 2.2.5: Hotfix for vBulletin 4.0.2 compatibility bug.
• 2.2.6: Checking for installed Flash Wrapper rbs_wrapper.swf; A few English FAQ; Help files. Changed files: product-rbs.xml
• 2.3.0 (Major upgrade): New modules: Delete Expired Banners, Disable Expired Banners; Detail Banner Statistics with unique access key for your customers; Updated help; Changed files: all.
• 2.3.1: Hotfix for missing field in rbs_hist table. Changed files: none, just update product.
• 2.3.2: Added: Unsupported option for setting any number of available positions between 1 and big bang. Fixed: Small bug and speed issues. Removed: Italian translation. Italians may now request support at www.vbulletin.it. Changed files: admin_rbs.php.
• 2.3.3: Fix: Copy selected forum ID's during banner duplication. Changed: start and end hours for new banners are set to 0:00 and 23:59 respectively. Changed files: admin_rbs.php.
• 2.3.4: Option: Send Mail Before. This option allows to schedule expiring banners differently. New variables for emails: $rbs_enddate: This variable holds the formatted banner ending date and time based on the standard formats for date and time in vBulletin settings; $rbs_name: This variable holds the banner name. EMail Notifications option description: Added direct links to the email phrases for quick changes. Changed files: rbs_mail_cron.php.
• 2.4.0 (Major upgrade): Removed: Option to enable or disable mailing. Banners with email addresses to notify are handled. Setting to reset mailing in single banners. Now, if mailing should be repeated, you will have to edit the banner from phpMyAdmin. Added: Order links in lists. The initial state is ordered by ID, as before. By clicking the titles, the other voices can be ordered. Clicking twice inverts the order. This works in all lists. Options to prevent counting and reducing thus a tiny bit of load. A new bunch of demo banners for new installations. Demo banners are locked into database in order to avoid 30% of the questions because of the 'experts' deleting them before trying the product. They can be disabled and modified though. The true experts can delete them after all testing from the database by using phpMyAdmin without side effects. Changes: Phrase for emailing about expiring banners, now also with direct links to the phrases. Demo banners. Our old publisher ID is replaced with the new ones, and old demo banners are updated with the new ones, if found. The functions have been exported to includes/functions_rbs.php. This makes the product code smaller and easier to maintain, and runs faster on sites where caching/acceleration is enabled. Changed Files: all *.php
• 2.4.1: Option Likelihood. This new option adds a weight to banners and allows thus to show one banner more often than another. The default weight is 100%. We also make sure that the final date of the default banners falls into a valid range. Changed files: includes/functions_rbs.php and rbs_stats.php.
• 2.4.2: Workaround for update sequence problems.

Hacks and unsupported add-ons:

• Banner Rotator Widget To CMS
• Rotate banners in-place
• Italian Translation

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by pitzerwm

Y2, if I do the update, will your sample banners, over-write my present banner positions?

If so, how would I delete them before update.

Thanks again for a great mod.

The sample banners are installed only at the moment you install this product first. No banners are touched when updating. However, it is always a good idea to keep a backup somewhere

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by jaribas

Hello.
First Sorry for my english, i am spanish and i not learning english in the school.

My question is.. i need to put more than 2 banners in the header of the forum. Now i have 2 banners when i install the plug, and i like minimun 3 banners in the header. Is posible this?

Thanks

Originally Posted by pitzerwm

I don't think that would be a problem.

You would either do <!--@vbbanners:0@--><!--@vbbanners:1@--><!--@vbbanners:2@-->

or <!--@vbbanners:0@--><br>
<!--@vbbanners:1@--><br>
<!--@vbbanners:2@--><br>

You might need the surrounding tags, as a <div> or a <table>

It's even easier:

<!--@vbbanners:0@--><!--@vbbanners:0@--><!--@vbbanners:0@-->

This way, you have 3 or more banners in position 0, they rotate along with other banners in a single page.

You would use the different positions only where you have different banner types and must have a distinct placement.

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by Cutsizzle

I want to have two different styles that use different sets of rotating banners. Is this possible?

Yes. In this case you make use of banner positions, where for example in Style 1 you store banners in position 0 and in Style 2 position 1.

[SteveV]

Is it possible to have a few banners in the place on the picture i attached ?

And i couldn't find where to set the time for the different banners.
Is that even possible ?

I don't have it installed yet but am reading up on it before i uninstall the other mod i am using.
This mod looks more powerful.

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by SteveV

Is it possible to have a few banners in the place on the picture i attached ?

And i couldn't find where to set the time for the different banners.
Is that even possible ?

I don't have it installed yet but am reading up on it before i uninstall the other mod i am using.
This mod looks more powerful.

1. Yes, but it needs a style modification, because the original header contains room for two small banners side by side, as far as I recall.
2. Each banner can be setup with a starting and ending date, as a matter of facts, they must. By default, a new banner is shown for one year.
3. I believe it is pretty powerful, but it is not up to me to proof this statement

[SteveV]

Hi Y2 thanks for the answers.

What i ment with the time for each banners is the amount of seconds.
I only have animated gif files and some are 10 seconds and others are longer.

Thanks again.

[thieu.bocap]

Originally Posted by y2ksw

This HTML is only an example. You may use any kind of HTML in your templates.

However, for Flash Banners you must choose between two possibilities:
1. You use the "Text" field and paste there the complete banner code, thus including all the <object> and <embed> code, which is then inserted at the <div align="center"><!--@vbbanners:5@--></div>, such as <div align="center"><object ...></div>.
2. You use the Flash wrapper which takes care of inserting the correct code, and as far as I know, handles also correctly the menu issue.

Thanks very much for your reply i will test in my site

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by SteveV

Hi Y2 thanks for the answers.

What i ment with the time for each banners is the amount of seconds.
I only have animated gif files and some are 10 seconds and others are longer.

Thanks again.

Ah right ... I got it. There is no such field, a banner is shown for the life time of the page. I have been asked several times to add the feature of rotating banners in place while the page is loaded.

Workaround: Eventually you may create a HTML page, which you insert as an IFRAME in your banner space. That HTML may refresh every so time, and would then load a new banner (if there is any). This HTML is already available and has been mentioned a few posts ago. All it needs is to make it work for your specific use, adding e meta tag with the desired refresh period

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=951

[y2ksw]

Originally Posted by y2ksw

Ah right ... I got it. There is no such field, a banner is shown for the life time of the page. I have been asked several times to add the feature of rotating banners in place while the page is loaded.

Workaround: Eventually you may create a HTML page, which you insert as an IFRAME in your banner space. That HTML may refresh every so time, and would then load a new banner (if there is any). This HTML is already available and has been mentioned a few posts ago. All it needs is to make it work for your specific use, adding e meta tag with the desired refresh period

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=951

Here, as an unofficial addon, you get the autorefreshing page (tested). It needs:

- a text editor;
- a refresh time of your choice (see metatag refresh in file, now at 10 seconds);
- a banner location (see placeholder in file, now at position 0);
- at least a banner for that location;
- a global target of a new page aka _blank (RBS options), else you jump into the iframe;
- a template modification for a 468x60 banner:

<iframe src="rbs_iframe.php" align="center" frameborder="0" height="60" width="468" scrolling="no"></iframe>

Please note: with smaller banners you get white borders, with larger than the iframe area, they are clipped.

[SteveV]

Thank you.

I will install the mod tonight together with the unofficial addon.
I hope i get it working the first time