Links and Downloads Manager

LDM extends VBulletin to manage a library of documents, files and links to other web sites. Documents can be stored on your own web site, stored on your server separate from the web site, uploaded by your user community, or held somewhere else altogether. So you can use LDM to provide your user community with access to your own files and allow them to share files with each other.

12/08/06 - Versions that work with vb36 are available and supported in the VB36 thread. Version 2.2.1, which works with VB 3.5 but not with VB 3.6, remains available here.

Thanks to everyone who has helped with all the design, testing, etc.
Translations are provided (thanks dLutt and LeeWicked) into German, (thanks to Allan) into French, and (thanks to Hugo) into Spanish. Harry1951 has handled the Dutch translation.

Screenshots, Instructions and How to Install

Full details and instructions are available as a Wiki at http://www.eirma.org/wikis/index.php...nloads_Manager

LDM installs as a VBulletin product. There are no modifications required to standard VB code.

Basically - upload php files and run the installer through VB's Product installer. No changes needed to VB code. Remember to BACKUP YOUR DATABASE. By default, LDM prefixes its database tables 'local_'. Edit the configuration file, local_links_init.php, if you need/wish to change this.

LDM can handle an essentially unlimited number of categories and nested subcategories, and an unlimited number of entries (hyperlinks or downloadable files). Each entry can be placed in one or several categories. Categories can have styles. Descriptions and titles can optionally include BBcodes, smilies, images and html, giving the possibility to add images, colouring, etc. File types can be flagged using icons and individual entries can also have associated thumbnail images.

Standards templates are provided for libraries of links, files, documents, and photographs.

Users can offer comments and rate the links/downloads. Each user is allowed one rating and many comments per entry, and can freely edit these if they change their mind.

Permission to use specific features is established via the product's admin page, where the administrator specifies which usergroups can add and edit entries, comment and rate these entries, moderate, etc.

By default, all entries are visible to all users. You can restrict visibility/access to links and categories by using the permissions masks from your board's forums.

Moderation of new entries is available but turned off by default.

Users can report bad links to the relevant moderators/administrators.

Each user can flag links as his/her "Favourites".

Modules are provided for VBAdvanced.

Hooks are provided in suitable places in LDM and sample plugins are included in the release (see extras directory), for example to integrate with ID3 tags in mp3 files, for slideshows, to autocreate new threads in your forums, etc.

Plus much more.

[Derekclarke]

Installed 2.13 on my other forum.

When i click on one of the links i get the following error message.

Error - Cannot determine if you can access link: linkid,forumid= 4, 71

I have been through the permission settings in the links admin cp and set them up.

Derek

[AndrewD]

Originally Posted by Ophelia

Andrew,
We are having a huge issue right now.. hoping you can give some insight.

Whenever anyone tries to do something in the download manager, they are getting the following error:

Database error in vBulletin 3.5.4:

Invalid SQL:

		INSERT INTO local_linksdebug (userid, settingtime, message, settings)
		VALUES (
		'2564',
		'1141749185',
		'local_filename:/forum/correctlink/980611410121089844.jpg:returns:/home/webattit/public_html/forum/teamuploads/imageuploads/980611410121089844.jpg:',
		'a:78:{s:17:"title_data_access";s:26:"ll_settings_title_features";s:16:"title_data_entry";s:23:"ll_settings_title_entry";s:14:"title_controls";s:26:"ll_settings_title_controls";s:10:"allow_html";s:1:"0";s:12:"allow_images";s:1:"1";s:13:"allow_smilies";s:1:"0";s:12:"allow_bbcode";s:1:"1";s:16:"allow_null_links";s:1:"0";s:14:"title_moderate";s:26:"ll_settings_title_moderate";s:14:"moderate_links";s:1:"0";s:21:"moderate_email_accept";s:1:"0";s:21:"moderate_email_submit";s:1:"0";s:16:"title_displayopt";s:28:"ll_settings_title_displayopt";s:17:"cat_depth_display";s:1:"1";s:15:"cat_sub_display";s:1:"0";s:16:"cat_cols_display";s:1:"1";s:11:"count_depth";s:1:"1";s:8:"cat_icon";s:0:"";s:12:"cat_icon_new";s:0:"";s:16:"template_linkbit";s:13:"links_linkbit";s:17:"link_cols_display";s:0:"";s:14:"links_per_page";s:1:"0";s:20:"links_show_othercats";s:1:"1";s:18:"default_sort_order";s:1:"d";s:13:"default_style";s:2:"-1";s:13:"title_general";s:25:"ll_settings_title_general";s:25:"categories_seen_on_portal";s:0:"";s:18:"category_jump_menu";s:1:"1";s:13:"database_name";s:0:"";s:19:"days_seen_on_portal";s:2:"30";s:18:"featured_user_favs";s:0:"";s:14:"featured_sites";s:1:"0";s:20:"links_seen_on_portal";s:2:"10";s:11:"mod_rewrite";s:0:"";s:16:"monitor_template";s:14:"links_scantext";s:12:"seo_friendly";s:1:"0";s:15:"show_hit_parade";s:1:"1";s:27:"template_category_selection";s:26:"links_addnewlink_catselect";s:12:"title_images";s:24:"ll_settings_title_images";s:14:"file_icons_dir";s:17:"images/ldm_icons/";s:14:"link_imagesize";s:3:"100";s:10:"thumbs_dir";s:14:"/forum/thumbs/";s:12:"title_search";s:24:"ll_settings_title_search";s:18:"default_search_all";s:1:"1";s:19:"default_search_desc";s:1:"1";s:19:"default_search_keys";s:1:"1";s:16:"match_using_like";s:1:"0";s:19:"profile_searchfield";s:2:"-1";s:14:"title_security";s:26:"ll_settings_title_security";s:22:"allow_remote_downloads";s:1:"1";s:15:"default_forumid";s:4:"-999";s:16:"default_cat_dseq";s:1:"1";s:17:"default_link_dseq";s:1:"1";s:12:"force_accept";s:1:"0";s:14:"force_redirect";s:1:"0";s:15:"local_file_root";s:1:"0";s:22:"local_file_root_prefix";s:0:"";s:19:"profile_ldmactivity";s:1:"1";s:14:"protected_link";s:1:"0";s:15:"robots_meta_tag";s:15:"index, nofollow";s:17:"timeout_hit_allow";s:2:"30";s:21:"timeout_hit_recording";s:2:"60";s:17:"validate_on_entry";s:1:"1";s:11:"title_media";s:23:"ll_settings_title_media";s:18:"musicbox_filetypes";s:44:"mpg, mpeg, wmv, mp3, swf, asf, wma, avi, wav";s:28:"musicbox_filetypes_quicktime";s:3:"mov";s:29:"musicbox_filetypes_realplayer";s:34:"rm, ra, ram, rt, rp, rv, rmvb, rpm";s:12:"title_upload";s:24:"ll_settings_title_upload";s:10:"upload_dir";s:18:"/forum/teamuploads";s:14:"upload_enabled";s:1:"1";s:16:"upload_filetypes";s:0:"";s:15:"upload_maxspace";s:1:"0";s:11:"title_debug";s:14:"ll_perms_DEBUG";s:5:"DEBUG";s:1:"1";s:11:"LDMHomePage";s:41:"http://www.eirma.org/devel/LDM/index.html";s:12:"this_version";s:5:"2.1.3";s:17:"version_installed";s:1:"1";s:15:"bandwidth_limit";s:0:"";}'
		);

MySQL Error  : Duplicate entry '32767' for key 1
Error Number : 1062
Date         : Tuesday, March 7th 2006 @ 11:33:05 AM
Script       : http://www.oursite.com/forum/local_r...4.jpg&size=600
Referrer     : http://www.oursite.com/forum/local_links.php?catid=17
IP Address   : 67.48.75.160
Username     : Ophelia
Classname    : vb_database

We get this when we are trying to view the image, trying to download... anything/everything. Any ideas?

**Updating

Andrew there were over 32,000 entries into the debug table in the database. I emptied this and the download manager works again. However, this might be something that needs looked into.

Has someone turned on the debug switch on the admin page?

[AndrewD]

Originally Posted by sinoeu

Will the hook system be added into the next beta?

Bits of it are already there, but we need to sort out just how many hooks are needed and where to put them. Any thoughts on the sorts of features you will wish to code via hooks?

[AndrewD]

Originally Posted by Derekclarke

Installed 2.13 on my other forum.

When i click on one of the links i get the following error message.

Error - Cannot determine if you can access link: linkid,forumid= 4, 71

I have been through the permission settings in the links admin cp and set them up.

Derek

That error should only be produced if the specified forum doesn't exist, e.g if you have associated a link with a forum and then deleted the forum.

[AndrewD]

I'd appreciate comments on the following...

Recent beta versions of LDM include the option to show an 'Accept these terms' page in between requesting a download and actually getting it. The user is taken through an extra form, to which they must answer 'yes'.

This approach breaks down if the user has a third party download manager installed on their PC. The download manager grabs the download request, gets presented with the 'accept me' form, and doesn't know what to do, so ends up delivering a file of html to the user, who is naturally bemused.

I understand the wish to place an agreement between the system and the user, to remind people that the material they are downloading has some value.

Is there another way to handle this, e.g. how about an agreement before entering the category, rather than before trying to download the link, or an agreement that sets a cookie that's valuable for a period of time, etc?

Appreciate your suggestions.

[AndrewD]

Originally Posted by Slave

I've just tried it AndrewD ..

It seems to have fixed the cat creation problem, and the -999 problem has gone too

On the admin settings page, I can click the ok button and I don't get the error any more .. BUT! .. it doesn't save any of the changes

On the permission page something really funny happens .. it still doesn't save the change .. AND .. the permission setting I'm trying to change jumps out of the table and ends up at the top of the page .. (You'll have to see that one )

Have you still got the details of my test forum?

Slave, OK, I think I have fixed these two problems, code attached. You may have to uninstall then delete the test LDM database (local_links_kill.php), as there will be some corrupt records in your admin table.

BUT - here is the basic difficulty. If you run this code

PHP Code:

$a[-1] = 10;
$a['-1'] = 20;
$a[1] = 50;
$a['1'] = 60;
print_r($a); 


with versions of php before 4.3.3, it will print out 10, 20, 60. If you run it with later verisons it will print out 20,60. In other words, php's handling of negative array indices changed in 2003. I'm trying to find the places in the code where this crops up, but it's not easy. If we can't isolate this pretty quickly, I'll give up, as I am likely to introduce new bugs in the process.

[Firestar.chkn]

AndrewD, awesome mod here.

Got one question, please. I make use of a non-standard (higher than admin) Core Admin group. As this is not group ID 6, I cannot access the admin page when I'm not also added to the Admin group.

Where can I find the "can_admin_links" variable. I've looked through all the files, and all the DB entries, and I cannot find it at all. Please direct me, so that I can add my Core Admin group into this variable?

Also, just one suggestion.
Consider adding some default values into the settings fields. They all can be quite daunting to fill in, and some of them, I cannot figure out what needs to go in there. For example, how do I specify only RAR and ZIP files to be added?

Anyways, great mod. Thanks a lot for all your work.

Cheers
Firestar

[AndrewD]

Originally Posted by Firestar.chkn

AndrewD, awesome mod here.

Got one question, please. I make use of a non-standard (higher than admin) Core Admin group. As this is not group ID 6, I cannot access the admin page when I'm not also added to the Admin group.

Where can I find the "can_admin_links" variable. I've looked through all the files, and all the DB entries, and I cannot find it at all. Please direct me, so that I can add my Core Admin group into this variable?

local_links_include.php

Look for the statement around line 99 that assigns $is_admin. can_admin_links is set around line 221 using this value.

Originally Posted by Firestar.chkn

Also, just one suggestion.
Consider adding some default values into the settings fields. They all can be quite daunting to fill in, and some of them, I cannot figure out what needs to go in there. For example, how do I specify only RAR and ZIP files to be added?

Anyways, great mod. Thanks a lot for all your work.

Cheers
Firestar

I understand - really this has grown to a size that needs a wizard (software or human) .

You say only zip and rar to be added. Do you mean uploaded or handled as downloads. In either case, zip and rar have to have mimetypes specified in the main vbulletin attachments table. Then you can limit uploads to this by setting the value upload_filetypes.

[Firestar.chkn]

Thanks! seems I missed that one.

I do see the upload_filetypes field, but I do not know in which format to add the two values to. They are added to the attachments table.

[Firestar.chkn]

Oh, and can I just re-upload the local_links_include.php file after I've changed it? Or do I need to re-import the product too?