vbArticles v0.4 -- For your repository of Articles/Tutorials/FAQs etc.

UPDATES
version 0.4 is out

- Now allows for basic VBCODE input.
- Fixed somemore bugs.


Background
Required a section on my site to display articles/tutorials
No such hack in the Hacks Database
Decided to try my hand at it

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This hack uses a lot of code from Arunan Sridharan's vB Links Directory v2.0
I use that hack too and was inspired to code something around that
A big thank-you must go out to him for coding the Links Directory in the first place (I merely modified much of the code to suit my needs for this hack)

Appreciation also goes out to Kars10 for aiding me in this hack
He coded the portion in version 0.3 on number of articles count as well as article hits count
He also suggested several template changes which have been incoporated into version 0.3
A great big special shout out to TheComputerGuy, 97cobracpe, dontpanic for stamping out the bugs with your fixes. Thanks guys


WHATS IT DO ?
This hack allows you to have a database of articles/tutorials etc on your site/forums.

FEATURES

AdminCP
Installer script

Admin options

View Categories
Edit Categories
Add Categories ( category name, category icon, category order, category description )
Delete Categories
Add new article ( title, description, author, date, content )
Edit article
Delete article
View ALL articles in database
Option in vB options to turn validation of articles on/off
Fully template based as to how you wish to display the articles,categories and main article home page.
Addition of articles accepts basic VBcodes

Member options

View Categories
Browse Categories
View articles
Submit new article
Submission of articles accepts basic VBcodes


INSTALLATION & UPGRADING
This Hack should work on ALL 2.2.x versions and v2.3.0
Please read the install_readme.txt file in the package for fresh installation instructions
IMPT: If you installed a previous version pls read the upgrade_readme.txt file carefully for upgrade instructions

HACK DOWNLOAD

Version 0.4 of this hack can be downloaded here

ADD-ONS
i) Add-on for vbHome
ii) Add-on for ForumHome
iii) Add-on to enable only registered members to be able to view the article section


DEMO SITES
http://www.runaked.com/forums/articles.php ( running v0.4 ) - TheComputerGuy's site

http://www.mcseworld.com/forums/infocenter.php ( running v0.3 ) - dontpanic's site


Feel free to submit your sites if u installed this hack so it can be listed as another live demo site

SUPPORT
I cannot promise any support on this as i am pretty new to this but I will try my best.
If you are using this hack , pls click the INSTALL button
to be kept in the loop of any bug reports, add-ons and hack version updates.

Thanks everyone

[cinq]

bitg - Age : 93 ??!! haha

Will consider your ideas, coding time is limited now so i'll take things slow

Glad it works for you !

[Holidazed]

Strangeness. When I try to add an article to any category from the ACP, it does not add the article at all if there is a ' anywhere in any field. It does not give me any errors, it just does not add it.

Now, this is to be expected since this is tying in a database. If I change all the ' to \' it works. However, after I successfully add the article, if I edit it and remove all the \ from the fields, it accepts it just fine.

Another thing, when I add an article via the ACP, it strips all my html from the article field. Yet when I edit the article, I can add the html back in and it accepts it.

This is not mission critical, but I do have to add each article and then edit each article before it is fit to be viewed.

Ideas?

[cinq]

Anyone facing the same problem ?
Weird but i cannot seem to replicate most of the problems reported on my localhost.

Everything works peachy for me....

[Dark_Wizard]

Try this fix:

find in vbArticlesadmin.php (around line 229):

PHP Code:

'".($class->encode($content))."') 


change to this:

PHP Code:

'".($class->encode($content))."' 


[Holidazed]

Dark Wizard, what will this change do?

[Dark_Wizard]

Today at 10:46 AM bitg said this in Post #205
Dark Wizard, what will this change do?

It should fix your problem with the '.
If not I have something else that should work

[Holidazed]

Oh. Cool. Any ideas about the html problem?

[Dark_Wizard]

Today at 03:05 PM bitg said this in Post #207
Oh. Cool. Any ideas about the html problem?

I haven't looked at it and I cannot as I am involved with 3 other hacks right now but if cinq doesn't get to it before I'm done then I will look into it for you.

[gmarik]

Perfect! What's about xHTML?

1) if a mod or admin adds and article no validation needed
2) when I press "Submit new Article" in one of the Categorys, for example a category called "Rock Music", it would be good that in the field "Choose category Bellow" would be selected on "Rock Music" (this code could be taken from add a new sub-forum form cp)
4) date could automaticly added, if user does not selects to add his own date
5) Photos could be adde in certain places and text woul go along them :ninja:

6.1) How it is going on with sub-categorys? :surprised:

[Dolby]

any way to get this to use vbulletins vbcodes instead of using vbcodes.php ?

Also it seems if I use html in the content area it just removes it all together. HTML / XML in the descriptoin works correctly and just displays the code. Many of the tutorials I have will have XML and HTML code for readers to see and try. I figure if it just used vbulletins system it would display correctly.