Add-On Releases - Official AddonChat Product

vBulletin 3.7.x Official Integration & Authentication Extension

Product Info
Name: AddonChat Official Integration Product
Product ID: ac80_37
Version: 3.7.0
Author: AddonInteractive (http://www.addoninteractive.com/)
Last Modified: 15 May. 2008
Compatibility: vBulletin 3.7.x

Overview
This extension allows you to fully integrate a AddonChat Free, Professional, Professional PLUS or Enterprise Java? Chat Room with your vBulletin 3.7 forum system. This script provides basic integration for AddonChat Free and Professional customers. Remote authentication (the ability to secure access to your chat room using your vBulletin username/passwords) is available for Pro+/Enterprise customers, as well as a Who's Chatting feature.

Requirements

• vBulletin 3.7 or higher
• AddonChat Free, Professional PLUS, or Enterprise, or AddonChat Professional with the Remote (HTTP) Authentication System. You may register for a AddonChat account at www.addonchat.com. A Professional PLUS or Enterprise account is recommended to take advantage of advanced features.
• (optional, but recommended) PHP with allow_url_fopen directive enabled in your php.ini file or the PHP CURL extension. This is required to download the Who's Chatting list from AddonChat servers.

What's new?
This script is a completely revamped edition of our previous integration script. Installation no longer requires any template or code modifications. Additionally, there are no PHP files to edit when setting up your chat room. We have added an "AddonChat" menu item in the vBulletin AdminCP that allows you to setup and configure your chat room with ease. Most users will simply need to enter their account number and password (as used at addonchat.com) and your chat room settings will be retrieved automatically, with your remote authentication system updated automatically as well. We have also improved character code support through better UTF-8 conversion allowing non-English speakers to use a vBulletin+AddonChat without issue. Issues relating to the Who's Chatting system causing problems have also been addresses; a scheduled task has been added to automatically optimize and repair AddonChat related tables daily in addition to improvements to the re-written Who's Chatting system.

Features

• Seamless integration between your vBulletin forum and AddonChat
• After installation, setup and configure your chat room from the AddonChat menu in your vBulletin Admin Control Panel
• Popup and Embedded Chat room link options
• Automatic (ten minute interval) User's Chatting count updates
• Real-Time Who's Chatting list
• Display the amount of users within your chat room on your main navbar shown throughout your entire forum
• Remote authentication allows you to authenticate access into your chat room based on your vBulletin user database
• Automatic user login option
• Seamless integration with vBulletin Usergroup permissions (remote authentication)
• Remote functions system allows you to tie in vBulletin forum functions into the AddonChat user menu
• Uses the vBulletin XML product import architecture, making installation/uninstallation simple.
• No code or template modifications required
• Automated account lookup - just enter your account number and password, and your information will be automatically retrieved. (allow_url_fopen must be enabled in PHP)
• Multi-lingual (UTF-8) support

Installation
Installaion takes less than five minutes. Download the supplied ZIP file, and extract it on your personal computer. Open the readme.txt file for full installation instructions. No PHP code modifications or template modifications are required. This script makes use of the vBulletin XML Product system for a fast and painless installation.

Support
Support is provided by AddonInteractive for this script provided you have a Professional, Professional PLUS or Enterprise AddonChat account. Read the included instructions for details. Please let us know if you have any problems installing this extension.

[BadgerDog]

Originally Posted by Grim77

What you'll want to do is edit the applet background color from the AddonChat control panel. Login at http://www.addonchat.com/login.html and click over to Look & Feel -> Colors to edit this. Color selection is fairly limited for our free accounts.

Installed free test version... thank you ... :up:

We've been testing various paid chat systems for our site and in this case, have been considering the Enterprise version.

The first thing we're trying to determine is how tightly the "look and feel" integrates to our site scheme and we've been unable to get even the background color to change from control panel. Are we missing something?

Second, the navbar drop down box seems to be available to everyone (even guests) right now and disabling "login" under usergroups doesn't seem to stop this behavior.

Is there a way to turn this OFF and keep groups out under the free test version, so we can do some testing just at the moderators level before we release it to the public?

Thanks...

Regards,
Badger

[BadgerDog]

Originally Posted by Grim77

The vBulletin 4 AddonChat Integration Product is now online at: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=233009

Chris ...

Just looked at function and features in VB4 implementation.

As mentioned in post above, we want to install Enterprise version, but have no intention of implementing VB4, so will the version we buy for 3.x have the same functions.

If not, I assume it's pointless for us to import the VB4 version and see if it runs for us?

Thanks

Regards,
Badger

[owner@SDU]

Has anyone had any problems with bandwidth using this program?

Addinchat looks perfect - but my service provider warned me about using a lot of Bandwidth - any comments please.

Tony

[LanciaStratos]

That's the great thing about it - once the users are authenticated on your site, it doesn't use any of your bandwidth or server resources. All chat communication is hosted by AddOnChat's apparently robust infrastructure. I've had over 160 people in my chatroom at the same time without problem.

[Grim77]

Tony,

AddonChat is fully hosted, so they incur all of the bandwidth, you incur none - sort of like hotlinking to an image.

[owner@SDU]

lanica

Thank you for that - my service provider was concerned becuase of the transfer of chat from one server to the other - but its not that is it - its a link to another site?

Am I right?

Thanks

Tony

[LanciaStratos]

That's correct, Tony. As Chris alluded to above, the chat box is sort of like an image posted on your website that is hosted by another, or an embedded YouTube video. All of the text users input is sent directly to AddOnChat's servers through the chat box embedded on your web page.

[BadgerDog]

It's an excellent service, consumes no bandwidth and their product support has been outstanding.

We use them for not only chat, but their "live support" module as well.

Highly recommended .... :up:

Regards,
Badger (Doug)

[socialvisionsbcn]

Current issue with the NPAPI flag activation at Chrome browsers impacts very negatively on our forum's usability.

Is any expected date for AddonChat-X vBulletin 3.X integration solution ??

[Grim77]

We'll be announcing the launch of AddonChat X (http://www.addonchatx.com) within the next two days. The expect launch date at the moment is the 16th of this month.

Shortly thereafter I expect announcements to follow regarding vBulletin integration. VB 3.x integration is already in development with VB 4.x. The company has also purchased a VB 5.x license so I expect VB 5 integration to be available shortly as well.