Thread Category / Prefix Hack

Thread Category / Prefix Hack

Version: 1.3.7
vBulletin Version: 3.0.7
Developer: Mystics (www.vbulletin-germany.com)
Hack-Language: English & German & French (thanks to ReadWrite)
Install-difficulty: Medium
File-edits: 19
Template-edits: 16


Brief Description of the Hack

With this hack it is possible to assign a category/prefix to a thread. To do this you are able to select an appropriate category from a list beside the title while posting a new thread - for example 'Help', 'Problem', 'Search' etc.

The categories displayed in this list may be defined by a moderator for each of his moderated forums (Forum Tools -> Manage Categories); of course an administrator is allowed to do this for every forum.


Features

• Moderators are able to create own categories for each of their moderated forums
  (Forum -> Forum Tools -> Manage Categories -> threadcategory.php)
• Display of the categories on forum display, search results, subscribed threads and within the thread itself
• It is possible to change the category with editing the first post of a thread or with the thread tools available for moderators at any time

Settings in the Admin CP

• Maximum categories per forum
• Thread Category required: Users have to select a thread category for their threads
• Default Thread Categories: You may set default categories which will either be shown only in forums without own categories or be shown in addition to existing categories
• Show Thread Categories in extra column or in front of the thread title in the same column
• Alignment of the categories (if 'Show in extra column' is enabled): Align left, align right, center
• Show Category in 'Last Post' column
• Category HTML Markup: Specify an HTML tag with which to display the categories (bold, italic, red etc.)
• Allow Thread Category search: If enabled, the categories of all forums the user has access to will be grouped in a list and displayed in the search engine.
• Per Forum: Allow categories in this forum.

Screenshots

See attachments.


Version-History

1.3.7 (02-22-2005 - 09:00 pm)

• Modified instructions for vBulletin 3.0.7
  (3 more changes within the search_results template)

1.3.6 (01-15-2005 - 06:10 pm)

• Modified instructions for vBulletin 3.0.5
  (only the third modification of the template FORUMDISPLAY has changed)

1.3.5 (11-02-2004 - 11:00 pm)

• Bugfix: File: newthread.php
  Preview error with categories containing "&" fixed

1.3.4 (09-25-2004 - 04:00 pm)

• Update: Template SUBSCRIBE (colspan have to be increased since vB 3.0.2)
• Bugfix: File: includes/functions_forumlist.php
  Include category length in length of the shown last thread title

1.3.3 (04-08-2004 - 08:55 pm)

• Bugfix: File: forumdisplay.php
  Selected category got lost when browsing through forum pages

1.3.2 (03-27-2004 - 05:45 pm)

• Bugfix: File: clientscript/vbulletin_quickreply.js
  Javascript error when using Quick Reply
• New: Added modification for postbit_legacy template (same as postbit modification)
• Modified instructions for vBulletin 3.0.0 'Gold' (only the first modification of postings.php has changed)

1.3.1 (03-06-2004 - 00:20 am)

• Bugfix: Template: threadbit_deleted
  Incorrect display of category column in this template

1.3 (02-23-2004 - 08:40 pm)

• Bugfix: Don't display a category in a thread if categories are not allowed in the forum
• Bugfix: Critical bug in threadcategory.php related to the option 'Update existing threads with changed categories' fixed

Upload the new threadcategory.php as soon as possible!

1.2.1 (02-14-2004 - 02:15 pm)

• Bugfix: Template: forumdisplay_announcement
  Wrong 'colspan' value used, if categories are displayed in an extra
  column and forum contains announements in addition

1.2 (02-11-2004 - 11:30 pm)

• New: Display category in notify mail next to the thread title
• Bugfix: Improved display of the categories in "Who's Online"

1.1 (02-10-2004 - 11:55 pm)

• New: Display of last category in the 'Last Post' column (may be disabled in the admin cp)
• New: Display of hack version in the admin cp at the vBulletin options (for example 'Thread-Category Hack v1.1')
• Bugfix: Show link to 'Manage Categories, if DHTML menus are disabled
• Bugfix: Don't show categories from forums where categories are not (longer) allowed
• Bugfix: Convert HTML code within categories

1.0.1 (02-08-2004 - 11:30 pm)

• Bugfix: Correct display in "Who's Online" while managing categories

1.0.0 (02-08-2004 - 4:49 pm)

• First version

Installation

1. Upload the files categoryinstall.php and categoryinstall_text.php to the admincp directory of your forum
2. Open this file with your browser:
   http://www.yourdomain.de/forum/admin...oryinstall.php
3. Log in and follow the instructions
4. You may delete the two files after the installation of the hack

Time needed for installation: approx. 30-60 min.
Tested for version: 3.0.0 RC 3 (and above).

Note: If you have already used the vBulletin 2 version of this hack (only available in german) and the categories are still stored in the vB3 database, you may convert them for the vB3 version. You will see a note to that in step 2 of the hack installation.


Update hack

1. Upload the files categoryinstall.php and categoryinstall_text.php to the admincp directory of your forum
2. Open this file with your browser:
   http://www.yourdomain.de/forum/admin...oryinstall.php
3. Log in, select the version you want to update from (at Step 2 -> 'Update Hack') and follow the instructions

Short overview of the needed modifications

1. Files that need to be edited:

• editpost.php
• forumdisplay.php
• moderator.php
• newthread.php
• postings.php
• search.php
• showthread.php
• subscription.php
• admincp/forum.php
• clientscript/vbulletin_global.js
• clientscript/vbulletin_quickreply.js
• clientscript/vbulletin_stdedit.js
• clientscript/vbulletin_wysiwyg.js
• includes/functions.php
• includes/functions_databuild.php
• includes/functions_forumlist.php
• includes/functions_newpost.php
• includes/functions_online.php
• includes/functions_search.php

2. New files:

• threadcategory.php

3. Templates that need to be edited:

• editor_clientscript
• editpost
• FORUMDISPLAY
• forumdisplay_announcement
• forumhome_lastpostby
• newthread
• postbit
• postbit_legacy
• search_forums
• search_results
• search_results_postbit
• SHOWTHREAD
• SUBSCRIBE
• threadadmin_editthread
• threadbit
• threadbit_deleted

4. New templates:

• threadcategory_listbit
• threadcategory_modify

5. New phrases:

• Too many to list them all - they will be created automatically by the install script

Final words

If the hack doesn't work correct after installation, please verify all modifications you have made within the files and the templates. Be sure you have uploaded all edited and new files.

The hack was tested extensive and will function properly if installed correct.

Thanks to ReadWrite for his french translation.

Have fun with the hack.

Please click Install if you have installed it

[Mystics]

Small update to 1.3.3:

Edit forumdisplay.php and find:

 		$pagenav = construct_page_nav($totalthreads, "forumdisplay.php?$session[sessionurl]f=$forumid", "&sort=$sortfield&order=$sortorder&pp=$perpage&daysprune=$daysprune");

Replace it with:

 		$pagenav = construct_page_nav($totalthreads, "forumdisplay.php?$session[sessionurl]f=$forumid", "&sort=$sortfield&order=$sortorder&pp=$perpage&daysprune=$daysprune" . iif(!empty($_REQUEST['threadcategory']), '&threadcategory=' . urlencode($_REQUEST['threadcategory'])));

Otherwise the selected category got lost when browsing through multiple forumdisplay pages.

[djohn]

Thanks for the update.
I wanted to know if there's a way to make the Thread Category dropdown menu (on forumshow) be the same as others? See attached screenshot, the Thread Category dropdown menu is a little bit narrower than the others. It's the same in Opera.

[Yapluka]

Very nice hack, works like a charm for me !

Just a little thing : when editing the first post with QuickEdit, the category is lost. Any suggestion for that ?

Thanks anyway !

[Mystics]

Originally Posted by Yapluka

Just a little thing : when editing the first post with QuickEdit, the category is lost. Any suggestion for that ?

What do you mean with "QuickEdit"?

If you edit the first post, you are able to change the current category.

[Yapluka]

Sorry, I mean the QuickEdit hack : https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...245#post500245

If you edit the first post using QuickEdit, the thread will lose its category.

[gwhooooey]

Any way we can choose different colours for different categories?

[trinitym]

_Excellent_ hack, well done and will prove to be quite useful. *clicks install* I don't think I've ever edited so many files in one sitting.

I do have a question though. I wonder if there's a way to have it so that categories are required only in certain forums and not required in all that have categories assigned to them. For example, I don't really need categories to be required in say "the bugs, complaints & suggestions" forum, but I'd like for categories to be requried in the "fanfiction" forum since I'm going to have the ratings be the categories.

Either way, love the hack-age.

[influence]

The installation setup was great. It looks like you will be setting a trend and hopefully every hacker will setup their installation pages this way.

Excellent idea and great hack. I have been looking for this.

Thanks for the amazing hack.

*click*

[influence]

One quick suggestion or maybe a request addon for future versions. I am trying to set this up so that members can select which category his/her thread should be in. On my list of category, I have 3 categories only mods/admin and SM should be using (annoucement, featured thread and Rules ) . My question is , is there anyway to set this up in a way for me to specific certain categories registered users are restricted from using?

That would be great

[bmckain]

I've installed this hack and I have to say it is well done, I did seem to make a small error somewhere though. I can add categories from the AdminCP - Options but when I try to do it from the forum manager I get the following error:

Not Found
The requested URL /forums/threadcategory.php was not found on this server.

Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
Apache/1.3.29 Server at www.lwg3d.org Port 80

Any ideas on what I did wrong?

[Majik?]

Originally Posted by bmckain

Not Found
The requested URL /forums/threadcategory.php was not found on this server.

Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
Apache/1.3.29 Server at www.lwg3d.org Port 80

Any ideas on what I did wrong?

You dind't upload the "threadcategory.php" file or put it in a sub-folder when it should be in the forum root.

[bmckain]

Originally Posted by Majik?

You dind't upload the "threadcategory.php" file or put it in a sub-folder when it should be in the forum root.

Opps, (blush), that's too easy... Thanks

[bmckain]

Well, that worked like a charm!

After getting a feel for how this works, it's led to another request.

Would it be or is it possible to have the search ognore all other parameters other than "catagory"? It would be really nice to allow members to just choose a cataegory and have the search engine list all threads under that particular category independant of author, title, etc.

[djohn]

I repeat my question again, Mystics, sorry about nagging. That thing just bugs me the whole time. I've liturally spent hours trying to find where can decrease the width of the dropdown menu in any forum. The screenshot is there: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/attachmen...chmentid=18043

Notice how the All Categories dropdown menu is a little bit narrower than the others? Where can I adjust it? The closes i've come is the bit in FORUMDISPLAY template:

<td class="smallfont">$vbphrase[threadcategory]:</td>
			<td>$threadcategories</td>

I guess the $threadcategories is what i am looking for, but where can i adjust the width of the dropdown menu?

I've tried everything, even crazy stuff like

			<td>$threadcategories</td>

			<td><select name="threadcategories" style="width:125px">

<option>$threadcategories</option>

			</select></td>

still doesn't work. It seems to me that since $threadcategories array is dynamic, it cannot be used with <option> and <select> tags. If so, then whe??where does the script know, how wide is the dropdown menu going to be?

Many thanks for the hack, waiting for a reply.

[bmckain]

Originally Posted by Mystics

Thread Category / Prefix Hack

Please click Install if you have installed it

Call me silly, but I couldn't find the "Install" link to click on.