End-User Options - Navbar Forumjump- Adds a DHTML "Forum Jump" menu to your Navbar

Navbar Forumjump

This mod adds a popup menu to the navbar with quick links to all your forums.



If you like this, you can show your support by Rating it, Marking it as installed, Nominating for MOTM, and/or Donating to the author. Thanks, you rock.

Why would you want to install this?

1. Increases usability for your members.
2. Decreases server resources/usage.

How does this increase usability?

In forums I often find myself clicking on the "forum home" link to see the list of forums and then choose one to visit. With this mod, you simply click the "Forum Jump" menu, and down drops a dynamic menu with all your forums (represented in correct hierarchy of parents/children, and organized by category). The user can more easily visualize the structure of your forums, and can get to where they want to go quicker. And this is a lot prettier and better placed than the forum jump at the bottom of the pages.

How does this reduce server resources?

With this mod installed, the users will go directly to the next forum they want to visit without first going to the forum home. This saves the HTTP requests associated with a pageload, as well as the database queries required to generate the page.

All Features.

• Installation is a snap, just import the XML file
• The popup menu looks identical to the other built-in vB popup menus.
• Automatically generates the menu, if you add or remove forums, that's automatically reflected in the menu.
• The menu can optionally display a small icon that links to the last post next to the forum name.
• Respects forum permissions, hidden forums, etc. If the user is not permitted to view the forum, it won't show up, just like on the forum home page.
• No template edits needed.
• Admin control panel that explains everything, and offers many configuration options:
  • Enable / disable the mod
  • Show menu to everyone or only to logged-in members.
  • Optionally specify forums to exclude from the menu.
  • Choose to display the forumjump popup on the left or the right side of the navbar.
  • Choose to display the menu as one column, or separate each category (with its sub-forums) into its own column. You may also specify how many categories to display per column.
  • You define the characters to prepend to the forum titles to show the indented hierarchy of forums
  • Options to configure CSS styles and sizes for the menu. This allows you to shrink the menu if you have many forums by reducing the font size and the cell padding in the menu.
  • You may optionally style the currently selected forum differently than the rest (with CSS).
• The mod is fully phrased, including the ACP options and descriptions.

Changes it makes

Adds one plugin and a control panel options section (and its associated phrases). The menu is attached to the navbar using a template hook.

Installation

1. Download and uncompress the zip file.
2. Import the XML product file in the Admin Control panel.
3. Visit the Options page and see if you want to change any of the default settings. (If you're using less than vB 3.6.8 you'll need to visit the options and see how to manually insert the menu into your templates.)

Changelog/History

Version 1.0.8 Bug fix (Oct. 13, 2007)

Fixed bug when using the forumjump with vBa. (See post #145)

Version 1.0.7 Bug fixes and workarounds (Sept. 18, 2007)

Integrated fix for Smoothie's problems (Post #76 and on)
Fixed display bug from post #101
Workaround for logging out display problem (post #104)
Completely separated the auto-insert code from the manual template inserting.

Version 1.0.6 New Features (Sept. 17, 2007)

Workaround for menu display problem in Opera
New option to add a relative URL to prepend to links (helps when using vBa)
New option to not auto-display menu via template hooks. Provides better compatibility for vB < 3.6.8 and when not displaying menu in the navbar template.

Version 1.0.5 Internal Development - Not released

Version 1.0.4 New features (Sept. 12, 2007)

Added optional link (icon) to the latest post in each forum
Added admin options panel help system.
Added compatibility with vB 3.6.0 to 3.6.8

Version 1.0.3 New features (Sept. 11, 2007)

All error messages output as HTML comments (better end user experience)
You may now specify how many categories are displayed per column

Version 1.0.2 Bug fix (Sept. 10, 2007)

Fixed bug introduced in Version 1.0.1
Added more error checking
Added useful error messages for debugging.

Version 1.0.1 Bug Fixes and Enhancements (Sept. 10, 2007)

Fixed a bug when URLs have session IDs in them.
Added Option to disable the menu for non-logged-in visitors
Added Option to exclude forums

Version 1.0.0 Initial Release


Screenshots



Menu with the icon link to last post enabled.

[carubmun]

Question....

Is there a reason this only seems to work with the "default" vB skin?
Im running the current version of vB btw.

Ive installed a few free skins ive downloaded, but the Forum Jump link doesnt show up on any of them.

Still, great add on for vB, props to the coder.

[Smoothie]

I can get the pop-up to work on the default skin only. It will not work on the custom skin. The link shows in the header, but when click for dropdown it doesn't work.

[Smoothie]

Is there a css class defined in the plugin for this link that perhaps isn't in custom skins?

[Analogpoint]

Originally Posted by carubmun

Question....

Is there a reason this only seems to work with the "default" vB skin?
Im running the current version of vB btw.

Ive installed a few free skins ive downloaded, but the Forum Jump link doesnt show up on any of them.


Still, great add on for vB, props to the coder.

Are your other skins vb 3.6.8 compliant? do they have $template_hook variables in them? If not, you'll need to put $template_hook[navbar_buttons_left] in your header or navbar template. Also, PM me your URL if you'd like me to take a look.

Originally Posted by Smoothie

I can get the pop-up to work on the default skin only. It will not work on the custom skin. The link shows in the header, but when click for dropdown it doesn't work.

Could you PM me your URL and I'll see if I can deduce anything from the error messages in the HTML source.

Originally Posted by Smoothie

Is there a css class defined in the plugin for this link that perhaps isn't in custom skins?

No, there is some CSS included in the output of this plugin, but there isn't anything that would need to be defined elsewhere.

[NitroXploit]

Very useful modification, suggestion if you are willing to take one, an option to limit the number of characters appearing on the name of the section.

[soulface]

Originally Posted by Analogpoint

Is it showing any error message in the HTML source code? (search for navbar_forumjump).

Since I'm using a custom skin, i had to manually put a navbar link matching with the skin and they were working fine in older version. But with this new version, the popup wont showing.. and not im not getting any kind of error msg..

[carubmun]

Originally Posted by Analogpoint

Are your other skins vb 3.6.8 compliant? do they have $template_hook variables in them? If not, you'll need to put $template_hook[navbar_buttons_left] in your header or navbar template. Also, PM me your URL if you'd like me to take a look.

Could you PM me your URL and I'll see if I can deduce anything from the error messages in the HTML source.

I still havent found a template that i like, just installing random free ones.
Here is my site.

The skin is supposed to be 3.6.8... but im a noob at this so dont know much about hte other stuff you said.

[letsjoy]

you rocks

[Analogpoint]

Originally Posted by carubmun

I still havent found a template that i like, just installing random free ones.
Here is my site.

The skin is supposed to be 3.6.8... but im a noob at this so dont know much about hte other stuff you said.

Make sure you have $template_hook[navbar_buttons_left] in your navbar template.

[Analogpoint]

Originally Posted by soulface

Since I'm using a custom skin, i had to manually put a navbar link matching with the skin and they were working fine in older version. But with this new version, the popup wont showing.. and not im not getting any kind of error msg..

Could you PM me your URL and I'll see if I can deduce anything from the HTML source.