Non-registered users can reply - but are asked to sign up to save their reply

[Ted S]

Well now things are getting more complex...

Any other thoughts/ features on this one from the community?

[tpearl5]

any new thoughts about this?

[Ted S]

I was hoping to get more input from the community on this (or just interest) before putting any work into it...

Building the basic structure (guest makes post, post gets saved in temp table, post gets made when they register) isn't that big of a task. It gets more difficult when you want to deal with things like email validation first and what not but even then it's fairly straight forward.

That said I'd want it to be useful for as many people as possible so additional input would really be nice.

[tpearl5]

I just noticed one site that does this well - it's not really a forum, but a q & a site: http://fixya.com It's simple, and straight forward - you type an answer or 'I have the same problem' before you give them info. They reeled me in!

As a side note it looks like new forum platforms are starting to include better q & a support, like community server, and even answer forums for vB. Something like this would work even better with a proper q & a setup.

[tpearl5]

FYI, if anyone is interested in this modification for vb4, please let me know. I had it custom made and it is working pretty well.

[RSNF]

Originally Posted by tpearl5

FYI, if anyone is interested in this modification for vb4, please let me know. I had it custom made and it is working pretty well.

I would be interested in it and if you have a link where I might be able to see it in action that would be great as well!!!

[tpearl5]

Originally Posted by RSNF

I would be interested in it and if you have a link where I might be able to see it in action that would be great as well!!!

Both of the sites in my signature have it enabled. I'm using a solve media CAPTCHA, but it should work with any CAPTCHA you choose. Here are the features:

• Compatible with 4.1.7 + (untested on lower versions but it should work without a problem down to 4.1.4, when CKEditor was introduced)
• guest posts are saved in the moderation queue under 'unregistered' until the system automatically removes (admin setting) the post or the user registers
• works with quickreply
• has settings to change which editor is displayed, including a basic text box (without loading large CKEditor files) to cut down on page load time for guests
• e-mail verification compatibility
• when gust post is published (before or after e-mail verification)
• CAPTCHA on/off for quick reply/advanced reply & post
• user is only asked to enter one CAPTCHA - they will not have to enter another one on the register page
• header message to users that they have a 'saved post', even if they come back later (cookie based)
• If a user posts, creating new posts is disabled until they register - notification of this is in the header
• compatibility with spam-o-matic
• reporting feature that tracks total posts / replies, abandonment (users create a post but never register), posts marked as spam, and successful posts / replies (register)

So far with the mod being enabled for a month and a half I've seen a 9% increase of new registrations. Results will vary depending on your traffic and subject matter.

Since I paid a lot of money have this modification custom made I will be selling it for $49.99. I will provide support when necessary (upgrades and unforeseen bugs). Please PM me for details.

[downloadfound]

$50 one time is not bad if it's actually updated to work the billion times VB makes updates.

--------------- Added [DATE]1327064251[/DATE] at [TIME]1327064251[/TIME] ---------------

After messing around with it, I see why you spent some money to have it developed. It would be MUCH easier if the ajax autosave functions worked for guests. Without that, it takes quite a bit of modifying.

It's fairly easy to create the quickreply for guests and one captcha after posting to register, but retrieving their post is a whole other problem.

For the time being, I'm just going to create the quick reply and have it go to the register page, LOL. We'll see if it increases registrations despite losing their post.

[tpearl5]

yeah I thought of that - I would think losing someones reply would just make them mad and leave your site though.

with the autosave it's not really viable to use for guests and more trouble than it's worth to change things around in CKEditor. Besides, loading CKEditor js resulted in 4gb more bandwidth a DAY for my site. That's really silly considering it does around 6gb a day of static files.

[tpearl5]

added a section of my site to support the mod. Check my sig for details.