AboutToday - Bring RSS Feeds and Daily Events to Your Site!

What is AboutToday?

AboutToday provides a central place to bring daily items of interest to your forum visitors. It includes two main components: an RSS Reader System and Local Events database System.

Please NOTE: This mod has been modified for vb ver 3.6.4. It should work on vb ver 3.5.4 and 3.6.x.

1. An RSS Reader system where the admin can enter RSS feeds that will then be displayed on the page. RSS feeds can be set to AUTOMATICALLY create threads or be set so that users can easily create a thread from a feed.. Feeds can be read via fopen or cURL.
   
   
   
   
   
   The RSS Feeds are fully intergrated with vbAdvanced and could actually be placed anywhere you want!!
   
2. A database system that can hold unlimited categories of "AboutToday" events. For example, you could have a history category (like a Today in History) with sub-categories for different eras in history. Or, you could have a daily joke or software tip of the day, etc.
   
   The "Add Event" feature is intended to help you if you want for example - Sports: Today in History. With the vb calendar, you cannot have categories and you are restricted with how far back the dates can go.
   
   
   
   
   So with the "Add Event" feature, you could have a category tree like:
   • Hockey
     • Professional
     • College
     • High School
   • Football
     • American Football
     • The Rest of the World (Soccer)
   • Baseball
   
   with the normal calendar feature, you cannot have categories. And with "Add Event" you can have any date. So, if you want an event like "Jan 1, 132 B.C. - the first ball was invented", you can do that. But, that isn't possible in the normal calendar. Also, the events in "Add Event" are fully searchable.

Installation

Copy the following files to your server in the forums directory:

abouttoday.php
includes/class.csv.php
includes/class_abouttoday.php
includes/cron/cron_abouttoday.php
includes/xml/bitfield_abouttoday.xml
includes/xml/cpnav_abouttoday.xml
admincp/abouttodayadmin.php

From the admincp, import the product file product-abouttoday.xml (Manage Products - Add/Import Product).

REFRESH your admincp window. You should now see a listing in the left column of the admincp for "AboutToday".

Getting Started

NOTE - if this is a new install, a Yahoo RSS Feed and CNN Entertainment Feed have been automatically added to give you a feel for how the product looks.

If you plan to use the RSS Feeds:

1. From the admincp, select AboutToday - RSS Feeds. Add an RSS Feed.
2. From the admincp, select Usergroups - Usergroup Manager. Add permissions so the Administrator group can use the product.
3. From your forum directory, bring up the file abouttoday.php.
4. If you want the feeds to AUTOMATICALLY create threads, go to admincp - abouttoday - settings. There you must set the userid of the account to use to create the thread. Then, edit the RSS Feed with the forumid of where the threads for that feed should be created!

If you plan to create your own "today in history" type of database:

1. From the admincp, select AboutToday - Categories. Add a category.
2. From your forum directory, bring up the file abouttoday.php. "Add" your first event to the category you have created!

Version Status
I've tested this product extensively but ... use this totally at your own risk!

Credits
I learned a lot about how to code this and used a lot of the code from what Ron1n did with ecDownloads. What I've learned from his code while helping to support ecDownloads has been invaluable.

Sites Using this Product
Visit www.armchairgeneral.com to see this product in action.

Click Install!
Please Click Install if you are using this product. Thanks!

[Sooner95]

Man this is cool. Thx for an awsome hack man.

Only thing i could see as a good addition to this, and I think someone else brought it up, would be a Module for the vBadvanced CMPS.

[dethfire]

Originally Posted by Sooner95

Only thing i could see as a good addition to this, and I think someone else brought it up, would be a Module for the vBadvanced CMPS.

and to be able to move it to a sidebar on forum home

[mholtum]

Seems to have installed correctly. Except when I try to add a comment it refreshes and nothing shows.

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by mholtum

Seems to have installed correctly. Except when I try to add a comment it refreshes and nothing shows.

Not sure what you mean. Are you trying to add a category in the admincp? If yes, that's what it should do. If you click on the category edit drop-down, you'll see that the category now exists.

[venomx]

Small HTML error...

When you click Add theres a > there that shouldnt be...

AboutToday| Category Tree| Search | Add | My Events | Manage Events | Load File
>

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by venomx

Small HTML error...

When you click Add theres a > there that shouldnt be...

AboutToday| Category Tree| Search | Add | My Events | Manage Events | Load File
>

Oops! How in the world did I miss that?? Look for an update later today.

:-)

[CyberRanger]

Version 1.1 Gold added Feb 18, 2006

• 2 Minor Bugs Fixes
• RSS Updates added to cron
• Options to run with only locally entered events, RSS Feeds, or Both
• Global Variable created for placing RSS Feeds anywhere on a vbulletin page
• Direct linking to RSS item added as optional feature
• Ability to force RSS update added
• vBa (vbAdvanced) Module supported

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by Milad

Can you make it wprk with vBAdvanced CMS?

ver 1.1 includes vBa support: :up: https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=108274

[Oddjob]

Originally Posted by westpointer

Version 1.1 Gold added Feb 18, 2006

• 2 Minor Bugs Fixes
• RSS Updates added to cron
• Options to run with only locally entered events, RSS Feeds, or Both
• Global Variable created for placing RSS Feeds anywhere on a vbulletin page
• Direct linking to RSS item added as optional feature
• Ability to force RSS update added
• vBa (vbAdvanced) Module supported

How do you go about forcing the rss update....i dont see it anywhere.

[CyberRanger]

Originally Posted by Oddjob

How do you go about forcing the rss update....i dont see it anywhere.

Once you install the ver 1.1, you will need to go into the usergroup permissions, giving the admin group permission to force an update. Then, that option will appear with the others when viewing abouttoday.php.