Administrative and Maintenance Tools - Commbull (Community Bulletin) 5.1a for vBulletin 4.01

This not the CommBull product itself. This is simply instructions for adapting it to work with vBulletin 4.x.

Download CommBull from: Commbull (Community Bulletin) 5.1a for vBulletin 3.8x

grandeur_69 has released his latest version of CommBull as a free add-on, indicating that he no longer has time to continue developing it. I am posting this here for the benefit of other vBulletin 4.x who don't want to lose the newsletter feature (grandeur_69 has approved this).

At https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....6&postcount=71 a member asks:

Hi, the version 5.1a work fine with vbulletin 4.0.1 ?

My response is posted at https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....5&postcount=72 and reproduced here...

I have the previous (commercial) version, 4.5f, which does run successfully via a cron job, running on 4.01. It required some modification of the installation instructions but it does work. I expect you should be able to get this version running as well, although as the coder noted the cron capability won't work.

1. Edit product-Commbull.xml and find the following line:

PHP Code:

        <dependency dependencytype="vbulletin" minversion="3.6.0" maxversion="3.8.99" /> 


Change to:

PHP Code:

        <dependency dependencytype="vbulletin" minversion="3.6.0" maxversion="4.99" /> 


2. Upload the files and import the product.

3. Now you need to do the template edits so that members can opt-in or opt-out of your newsletter. The current instructions are as follows:

4. Template modifications
--------------------------------------

Template: "Modify User Option" -> "modifyoptions"

After:

PHP Code:

                    <tr>
                        <td><label for="cb_adminemail"><input type="checkbox" name="options[adminemail]" value="1" id="cb_adminemail" $checked[adminemail] />$vbphrase[receive_email_from_bulletin_board_staff]</label><input type="hidden" name="set_options[adminemail]" value="1" /></td>
                    </tr> 


Add:

PHP Code:

                    <tr>
                        <td><label for="commbull"><input type="checkbox" name="commbull" value="1" id="commbull" $checked[receivebulletin] />$vbphrase[receive_email_from_commbull]</label><input type="hidden" name="set_options[receivebulletin]" value="1" /></td>
                    </tr>
                    <tr>
                        <td><br />$vbphrase[newsletterformat]<br /><label for="commbull_type"><input type="checkbox" name="commbull_type" value="1" id="commbull_type" $checked[receivebulletin_type] />$vbphrase[type_email_from_commbull]</label>
<input type="hidden" name="set_options[receivebulletin_type]" value="1" /></td>
                    </tr> 


Now, obviously this won't work in 4.x. These need to be modified as follows:

1. Edit Template: "Modify User Option" -> "modifyoptions"

FIND:

PHP Code:

<vb:if condition="$show['friend_email_request']">
                    <li>
                        <label for="cb_receivefriendemailrequest"><input type="checkbox" name="options[receivefriendemailrequest]" value="1" id="cb_receivefriendemailrequest" tabindex="1" {vb:raw checked.receivefriendemailrequest} /> {vb:rawphrase receive_friendship_req_email}</label>
                        <input type="hidden" name="set_options[receivefriendemailrequest]" value="1" />
                    </li>
                </vb:if> 


ADD AFTER:

PHP Code:

<vb:if condition="$show['receiveemail']">
<li>
    <label for="commbull"><input type="checkbox" name="commbull" value="1" id="commbull" tabindex="1" {vb:raw checked.receivebulletin} />{vb:rawphrase receive_email_from_commbull}</label>
    <input type="hidden" name="set_options[receivebulletin]" value="1" />
</li>
</vb:if> 


That first part (above) is the option to receive or not receive the newsletters.

Next would be the option for HTML or plain text emails, which should be:

PHP Code:

<vb:if condition="$show['receiveemail']">
<li>
    <label for="commbull_type"><input type="checkbox" name="commbull_type" value="1" id="commbull_type" tabindex="1" {vb:raw checked.receivebulletin_type} />{vb:rawphrase type_email_from_commbull}</label>
    <input type="hidden" name="set_options[receivebulletin_type]" value="1" />
</li>
</vb:if> 


Update:

This now works. I had a ( instead of a { on the previous code. Thanks to grandeur_69 for pointing this out!

Notes:

1. The product is not mine so I can't offer any support for CommBull itself. However, I have been using the paid versions of this mod for some time and I'm happy to offer what support I can for making the changes necessary to get it running on 4.x.
   
   
2. I have been in communication with grandeur_69. He has indicated that he has no objections to this thread and that as he gets time he will be trying to develop this add-on further as a free product.

Update July 12, 2010: Product XML file provided by grandeur_69 for vBulletin 4.x.

NOTE:

1. If you have already done the manual edits, do NOT use the XML file. And if you import the XML file, you should not need to do the manual edits.
   
2. Some people are encountering problems using the XML file. If you are one of them, uninstall the product and use the manual edits. Those seem to work just fine.

Update July 14, 2010: Error in XML file corrected.

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by SilverBoy

It is working with me, but the most read threads or most replied threads blocks always grab data from the day one of the forum, and the date that we entered to select only threads starting from it don't work any more !!
for example if I select the date as 1 September, it displays threads written in 2003 and the last reply was in 2006 !!
How I can solve this???

Yes, the date not updating has been a longstanding problem and I never found a fix for that.

What I do is periodically between mail-outs I go into the AdminCP and adjust the date and then click on preview mailing. After that it will use the new date until I go in and manually change it again.

[Calystos]

Yup, totally confirm that it was indeed that cron mail sending system. Works without it enabled, but enable it and it just stops so yeah gonna leave that disabled from now on I think, lol. I reckon its because the commbull system had its cron file removed so its trying to run the cron but can't because of the missing file.

Am gonna look into the issue in regards to why the post to forum option doesn't work sometime soon though. It comes up with an invalid sql query, "query was empty" error. It posts to the forum fine, but then it seems it resets or blanks the query in regards to continuing on to actually email the post. Go fig. Its not an essential feature, but thought it might be handy for a backup log or something. Or maybe for other things.

[Nelson58]

Originally Posted by djbaxter

If you still have one of the older versions (paid versions) try that. Version 5.1 never really worked properly for me but 4.5f is still going strong, week after week, now on 4.2.0 PL2.

Otherwise, please give me details about your settings and I'll try to figure it out.

One recommendation to try is this:

AdminCP >> Settings >> Email Options

Use Mailqueue System = No

Use Cron Based Sending = No

Number of Emails to Send Per Batch = 1000 (tweak this if it creates problems on your server)

E-Mail Send Delay = None (tweak this if it creates problems on your server)

Encode as UTF-8 = No

SMTP Email = No

How would I get one of the older versions, like 4.5f to try it on my 4.20 PL system?

Thanks!

Nelson

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by Allthumbz

How would I get one of the older versions, like 4.5f to try it on my 4.20 PL system?

Thanks!

Nelson

You would have to contact grandeur_69 who created the product. The earlier versions were commercial products.

[SilverBoy]

Originally Posted by djbaxter

Yes, the date not updating has been a longstanding problem and I never found a fix for that.

What I do is periodically between mail-outs I go into the AdminCP and adjust the date and then click on preview mailing. After that it will use the new date until I go in and manually change it again.

Thanks djbaxter for your reply, but really I didn't get the point

I want the date criteria to be applied to most reply and most read threads, is there away to do this?

Thanks .

[djbaxter]

Originally Posted by SilverBoy

Thanks djbaxter for your reply, but really I didn't get the point

I want the date criteria to be applied to most reply and most read threads, is there away to do this?

Thanks .

Not to my knowledge. Then again, I don't know why you'd want to do that.

[SilverBoy]

Thanks again
I want it to display the most active threads in my forum in this week for example, not to show my members 8 years old threads and in the most cases it is dead thread now .

[djbaxter]

From the AdminCP for my version of CommBull:

Show info starting from this date: Day Month Year

Only include threads that have been started or replied to since this date? Yes/No

Note: Only applies to sections sorted by Most Replies or Most Views (others automatically adhere to above date)

Do you see this in your version?

[SilverBoy]

yes but it didn't change any thing !! always getting the same threads !!

[Nelson58]

Originally Posted by djbaxter

You would have to contact grandeur_69 who created the product. The earlier versions were commercial products.

djbaxter,

I don't mean to be a pest, but is there any way you can help me to get this working on 4.2 PL2? I installed the 5.1 on here but no go.

I would be willing to pay for a newsletter app that works with 4.2 since I wont be able to afford to upgrade to 5.0 for a while.

Thanks man!


Nelson
www.Hobby-Machinist.com