NNTP Gateway for Usenet ( Newsgroups ), Mailing Lists

The latest version: V2.3.2 (31 Oct 2004)

What is it?

This hack provides a gateway from vBulletin forums to the USENET. It allows forum members to read newsgroup messages as well as to send posts to the newsgroups. In a nutshell, it turns vBulletin forums into a basic function news reader.

For an added bonus, this package also supports mailing list archive and forum to mailing list gateway. The software retrieves messages from a pop3 account and import them into the forums threaded. It also allows a forums user to send messages to the mailing list by the forum posting interface.

Why?

The gateway will be appreciated by forum members who do not know how to set up a news reader, or people who do not have port 119 open in their network. A forum interface to read and post news are often considered to be better than a news reader.

The gateway adds more contents to your forums and allows the members to interact with wider audience. It is common to see new users signing up to use this feature.

History

This hack is basically a hacked vB2 NNTP gateway written by Gilby to work with vB3. The original hack can be found here:

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...7&page=1&pp=15


Features

Some of the features and improvement include:

• Handles both newsgroup posts and mailing lists.
• Handles MIME encoded messages and attachment.
• Handles UUEncoded messages.
• Two Admin Control Panels for all settings.
• Automated installation.
• Correct thread implementation. All imported messages and posts sent to newsgroups will be threaded correctly according to References and Message-ID headers.
• Optional setting to thread by subject for mailing lists that strip references header.
• Supports TABLE_PREFIX.
• Imported messages will be searchable just like normal forum posts.
• Similar threads are built when the messages are imported if the system setting is on.
• Multiple attachments importing.
• Save attachment to database or file according to vB setting.
• Thumbnail created while importing image files.
• Multiple attachment post to newsgroup is also supported.
• Selectable X-No-Archive header honouring system.
• Light on system resources.
• Global Killfile to filter out unwanted messages. Killfiles can have OR and AND effectiveness.
• Strip footer by setting for incoming messages. Strips out repeated message footers.
• Built options to disable signatures and footers for out going messages.

Future development

• AdminCP interfaces. (completed)
• Installation/upgrade script. (completed, coded into AdminCP)
• Traditional "> " lead posting interface.

What do you need and do not need?

You do not need to edit vB php files if you use two bookmarks
You need to edit one vB php file to insert two lines of code if you want direct click links within AdminCP.
No need to run SQL.

Installation

Basically the AdminCP interfaces take care of installation as well as upgrade in the background. Back up your database first. The scripts can modify your database without alerting you!

Please follow the instructions in the readme.txt file for more details.

Support

Please post your support questions to this thread. Please check the FAQ in the third post within this thread first.

================== UPDATES ======================
Jul 31 2004 (release version 2.2.0)

• Provided option of not importing attachments
• Provided option of pause between messages
• Provided option of not sending messages to USENET
• Provided mechanism to skip importing a message if it was crashed on it
• Provided "Default Footer" option
• Provided strip_footer function for mailing lists
  (written originally by KevinM)
• Provided Killfile functions with Header/Body/AND/OR settings
• Provided ability to thread messages by subject for mailing lists
• Provided ability to use a single POP3 account for different mailing lists
  (use prefix)
• Merged KevinM's attachment routine, save thumbnail to hard drive
  as vB3.0.3
• Official support to have the script run by Scheduled Tasks
• Many bug fixes

Please note, when you manually run the script, you must turn on the debug mode. Otherwise nothing will be displayed on the screen.

To run as debug mode: http://forums.yourdomain.com/gateway.php?debug=1

25 Oct 2004

• Provided the option of sending posts using the real email address
• Provided the option of sending posts using a fixed email address for
  each group.
• Posts are now held back if they are in the moderating queue
• Scheduled task log is now working
• Provided the option of sending the debug messages to the vB3 cron log
• Bug fixes

31 Oct 2004

Fixed bugs running the gateway by the vB3 Scheduled Tasks

1 March 2004

Uploaded the new zip file. It contains one or two bug fixes.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by john_rsd

After looking at the messages retreived from the pop3 mailbox on a different account to the one used for gatweway.php i noticed that there was a few messages originally in HTML and with gif as attachments.

Could the above error be an issue with trying to insert the attachment?

Attachments are usually frowned upon on mailing lists which is why I failed to notice it when making my last post.

Is there a quick fix to simply drop attachments completely?

Are you using the original gateway.php or you have installed Kevin's mini-hacks? Not easy to find the problem if we are not taling about the same script. Kevin has re-written the attachment routine which I will include with next version.

[alesis404]

Hello, in the read me you mention to change this in the "nav" template if you would like usenet posts from not showing up in new postings

Find:
<td class="vbmenu_control"><a
href="search.php?$session[sessionurl]do=getnew">$vbphrase[new_posts]</a></td>

Change it to:

<td class="vbmenu_control"><a
href="search.php?$session[sessionurl]do=getnew&exclude=22,23,24,25,26,27">$vbphrase[new_posts]</a></td>

I have searched my *nav* template and the closet match looks like this

<td class="vbmenu_control"><a href="search.php?$session[sessionurl]do=getnew" accesskey="2">$vbphrase[new_posts_nav]</a></td>

*Perhaps my templates are newer than when this was released? Can someone please confirm if the code for editing "nav" template has indeed changed ,thanks.

[john_rsd]

Originally Posted by lierduh

Are you using the original gateway.php or you have installed Kevin's mini-hacks? Not easy to find the problem if we are not taling about the same script. Kevin has re-written the attachment routine which I will include with next version.

Sorry for missing information .

I used the original gateway.php from the first post.

I added Kevins mod for thread by subject. The forum is a test one so does not have users accessing at same time as script runs. Script was run directly from browser, the forums only content is the messages imported from the mailing list. Max 20 messages per day, max 10-15 messges per batch.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by alesis404

Hello, in the read me you mention to change this in the "nav" template if you would like usenet posts from not showing up in new postings

<td class="vbmenu_control"><a href="search.php?$session[sessionurl]do=getnew" accesskey="2">$vbphrase[new_posts_nav]</a></td>

*Perhaps my templates are newer than when this was released? Can someone please confirm if the code for editing "nav" template has indeed changed ,thanks.

This is the right one. It used to be "new_posts", the latest vB3 has changed to "new_posts_nav".

[alesis404]

Thank's lierduh!

[chopperp1]

Thanks for quick reply.
I already tried telnet from webserver- no problems. I used FQDN because we host our internal dns servers, anyway I get same error when I specify by IP.
__________________________________________________ _________________
+OK Microsoft Exchange 2000 POP3 server version 6.0.6249.0 (dl360mail3.yamner.co
m) ready.
+OK
+OK User successfully logged on.
+OK 21 32830
__________________________________________________ __________________

Is there anything else I should look for?
Thx

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by john_rsd

Sorry for missing information .

I used the original gateway.php from the first post.

I added Kevins mod for thread by subject. The forum is a test one so does not have users accessing at same time as script runs. Script was run directly from browser, the forums only content is the messages imported from the mailing list. Max 20 messages per day, max 10-15 messges per batch.

I have merged KevinM's attachment routine into the gateway.php. Please try out.

You now need to run

http://forums.yourdomain.com/gateway.php?debug=1

Without the debug=1, the script won't output anything on the screen.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by chopperp1

Thanks for quick reply.
I already tried telnet from webserver- no problems. I used FQDN because we host our internal dns servers, anyway I get same error when I specify by IP.
__________________________________________________ _________________
+OK Microsoft Exchange 2000 POP3 server version 6.0.6249.0 (dl360mail3.yamner.co
m) ready.
+OK
+OK User successfully logged on.
+OK 21 32830
__________________________________________________ __________________

Is there anything else I should look for?
Thx

Please include the exact letters you typed during the telnet session and the response the server returned.

[chopperp1]

Originally Posted by lierduh

Please include the exact letters you typed during the telnet session and the response the server returned.

+OK Microsoft Exchange 2000 POP3 server version 6.0.6249.0 (dl360mail3.yamner.co
m) ready.
+OK
USER <domain>\<user>
PASS <password>
+OK User successfully logged on.
+OK 21 32830

I also tried forward slash or user@domain.com - didn't work

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by chopperp1

+OK Microsoft Exchange 2000 POP3 server version 6.0.6249.0 (dl360mail3.yamner.co
m) ready.
+OK
USER <domain>\<user>
PASS <password>
+OK User successfully logged on.
+OK 21 32830

I also tried forward slash or user@domain.com - didn't work

How long is <domain>\<user> ?

The user name field is limited to 32 characters. If you need longer, you can modify the database to increase the char length.

If you can access the DB directly, eg. using phpmyadmin, check what exactly is stored in the DB for the user name.

Looks like it is either the length or the "\" causing the issue.