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 cyc

Hi

I'n this case all posts to the thread originated from our forum and where posted within 25 minutes of each other.

If the user clicks the Big Reply button, the posts will be threaded to the top message. If the Quote button is pushed, the post will be threaded under the one which one is replying.

I have some advanced gateway tweaking guide which automatically hides the big Reply button for USENET forums. I will post it somewhere later. The method needs to change vB php code, hence the advanced title.

[cyc]

I have some advanced gateway tweaking guide which automatically hides the big Reply button for USENET forums. I will post it somewhere later. The method needs to change vB php code, hence the advanced title.

Sounds good, I got around this by creating another style for usenet forums and commenting out the big replyto button. I just find some post don't thread properly :devious: dunno whats causing it.

[fonzerelli_79]

is anyone pruning their usenetgroup forum

my group has pulled about 160,000 posts so far and it keeps increasing - im fairly pleased with this in one respect in that the search engines will have plenty of pages to keep them busy which should hopefully increase traffic

however, the more and more posts there are the larger my database will be which means that backing up will be a pain just now but if i leave it as it is for a few months id have to back up a forum of millions of posts - not good

whats everyone else doing about this?

[john_rsd]

Slightly different request

Does the thread by subject query exist somehwre as a seperate item that can be run on existing forums?

What I mean is, does a query exist to run on the currently non-threaded posts in the forum to thread them?

Would be nice to tidy up the posts currently existing while threading by subject was not available. Manually doing it would be a terrible task ....

John

[Sanjiyan]

I am using 2.2.1 but I have a question, is there away for it to when it posts to the forums, to use the date it was posted to usenet and not the time it was posted to the forums?

I prefer to have the posts (time/date stamp) to be relative to the time/date it was posted originally to usenet, and not the time/date the script posted it to the website (forums)

[Princeton]

fantastic job on the upgrade!!!:up:

[NietzscheKid]

Hello.

I am very frustrated. I'd so love to install this mod but it does not work for me.

I have done what you recommended in post #3 about adding a new value to the registry key. But that did not change anything either. I still get this error:

Gateway version 2.2.1 1 group(s) gatewayed.
Could not connect to NNTP-serverNot connectedNot connected

I also do not have access to ssh or telnet so I cannot test it there either.

So, I am hoping that perhaps you have any info or tipps for this or is my case hopeless?

I do not run vb in debug mode. Is that the problem?

Thanks for any advice/help.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by NietzscheKid

Hello.

Gateway version 2.2.1 1 group(s) gatewayed.
Could not connect to NNTP-serverNot connectedNot connected

I also do not have access to ssh or telnet so I cannot test it there either.

Thanks for any advice/help.

There is nothing one could help you.

It basically means the script can not connect to the server. Either you entered the server wrong, or your web server does not allow you to connect on port 119. Perhaps email your host will get more information.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by Sanjiyan

I am using 2.2.1 but I have a question, is there away for it to when it posts to the forums, to use the date it was posted to usenet and not the time it was posted to the forums?

I prefer to have the posts (time/date stamp) to be relative to the time/date it was posted originally to usenet, and not the time/date the script posted it to the website (forums)

Too many options starting to become a problem.

If you go through the settings control panel, you will find the setting for this.

[lierduh]

Originally Posted by john_rsd

lierduh

This was not threaded with the other posts even with 'Re' in front. Its common for mail lists to have a prefix like [name] so could 2 instances like this cause a problem?

AW is a common prefix also for reply.

What you think?

I just checked your forums, the messages seem to be threaded together probably. Are you sure those two messages were not imported before you turned on the option?

If you see AW (what language?) as a common reply prefix, you you simply add AW: to the existing re: fw: line in gateway.php. That will be easy to hack.