[RELEASE] Usenet Gateway for vB 2.01

Description:

This hack provides a gateway to selected usenet groups. The entire usenet group is mirrored locally. Posts submitted locally to mirrored newsgroups will also be sent out to usenet. A single perl script is executed via cron that collects news and posts any outgoing articles. Incoming messages are parsed against customizable spam filters and threaded correctly before being placed in your forums. By default, no personal information is sent to usenet other than the posters username and whatever you have globally configured as a footer and organization. The option does exist for a user to include a custom email to use for usenet posts. After initial installation (which involves creating some new tables, adding a few columns to existing vB tables, and entering the database connection information to the news script) configuration is completed via the vB control panel.

• See it in action at dBforums.com (usenet forums are at the bottom)
• Download latest version for vB 2.2.4

Current version is 20020323 for vB2.xx

Current feature list:

• correct threading of outgoing posts on usenet
• full control panel integration
• email notification to usenet replies
• emoticon translation into vb icons
• vb code removal or conversion prior to posting to usenet
• hyperlinked urls in messages
• color coded, italicized & indented quotes
• vB style quote to usenet style quote conversions for outgoing posts
• logging of outgoing posts
• support for multiple news servers
• support for seperate footers per forum in outgoing posts
• multi-language (selectable) handling of quoted MIME printable headers (for all those funny foreign characters)
• handling of mailing archive groups
• flexible spam control and replacement variable options for incoming and outgoing messages
• configurable auto-expire option
• option for users to show email address in their outgoing usenet posts (may be different than normal one in profile
• option to enable/disable user signatures on outgoing posts.
• fully compatible with vB moderation functions

Still to be done:

• canceling of messages after they have been sent to usenet via control message in accordance with RFC1036.
• binary attachment support
• email to PM gateway

Screeshots:
Main Options
More Options
Configuration of Newsgroups
Add New Newsgroups
Spam Control
What an imported usenet article looks like in vB

The latest version of this hack will always be in this first post of the thread.

Before asking questions in this thread, please read all the posts in this thread. If your question goes unanswered, it will probably be because the question has already been answered countless times in this thread.

This hack was created for use on my forums and will only be supported as time permits.


Links to required Perl Modules

• News::NNTPClient
• Net::SMTP
• MIME::WordDecoder
• Text::AutoFormat
• Mail::Address
• URI::Find
• DBI
• DBD::MySQL
• Date::Parse
• HTML::Entities

[WildWayz]

Hi ya - another question (sorry)

If I reply to a usenet thread via this hack, it posts it, but if I make a new thread and post it, it doesn't.

Is it meant to be like that?

James

[fastforward]

Originally posted by WildWayz
Hi ya - another question (sorry)

If I reply to a usenet thread via this hack, it posts it, but if I make a new thread and post it, it doesn't.

Is it meant to be like that?

James

Somebody else had that problem recently. I think it was solved by installing the latest newnews.pl. This version wasn't in the full package until just a few days ago. Try this one and see if it fixes it.

[WildWayz]

Hi again

Thanks so much... I got that file and uploaded it, now when I run it I get

Global symbol "$from" requires explicit package name at ./newnews.pl line 787.
Execution of ./newnews.pl aborted due to compilation errors.

Line 787 =

PHP Code:

my $from = $vbconfig{bbtitle}." Mailer <$from>"; 


--James

[fastforward]

Originally posted by WildWayz
Hi again

Thanks so much... I got that file and uploaded it, now when I run it I get



Line 787 =

PHP Code:

my $from = $vbconfig{bbtitle}." Mailer <$from>"; 


--James

Hehe.. I just edited that line before I uploaded it. It was hard coded with my email address. I guess I should have tested it. As a quick fix, just change the '$from' to your email address. You need to add a backslash before the @ sign.

So for me, it looks like:

   my $from = $vbconfig{bbtitle}." Mailer <admin\@dbforums.com>";

[WildWayz]

Thanks

This is a really cool hack!

--James

[WildWayz]

Hmmm

doesn't look like new posts or replies are being sent to the usenet group.

Posting message by James Kapherr to uk.media.dvd... Sent
Clean disconnection from news.clara.net:119

Expiring usenet articles older than 120 days...
-> uk.media.home-cinema... OK
-> uk.media.dvd... OK
Expire completed.

Says it has sent it ok - but it isn't showing.

Any ideas?

BTW - do u have a paypal account - wanna tip you for your help

James

[fastforward]

No need to worry about tipping.

Are these threads visible? In the post table is a column called 'visible'. newnews.pl will only send posts that have this column set to one. This means unmoderated posts will not be sent. The other criteria is the post must be made in a forum that exists in the usenet_group table and the usenet group must be turned on in the control panel.

The other obvious thing is set the 'Send posts to usenet?' in the control panel to Yes.


Check those things and I'll see if I can figure out what else might cause it.

[WildWayz]

Hi ya

in user_groups, enabled = 1.
in posts, all posts are set to visable = 1.
send posts to usenet = yes.

The reply to usenet post was working until I installed that newnews.pl u gave me above (but it wasn't posting new topics to the newsgroup).

Since updating, I cannot post new topics or reply to others (in terms of posting them to the NG).

James

[fastforward]

Hmm. You'd better revert back to the old one for now. When I get home this evening, I'll see what I can do.

[WildWayz]

Hi ya

to narrow it down, I have found it to be like this (using the newnews.pl from the 1st page in the tar.gz file).

New Threads = doesn't show in newsgroup
Reply to = doesn't show in newsgroup
Quote = DOES show in newsgroup

So in order for it to post to the newsgroup, it seems I have to click on Quote then submit. Then when newnews.pl updates via cron, it posts it.

Otherwise I get it rejected by the server.

--James