The Arcive of Official vBulletin Modifications Site.

Links and Files Database · **Released**: 01-17-2004

The VB3.0 version is no longer supported although there have been no reported problems for some time

See here for the VB 3.6 version of this hack, which is now the supported version. This version currently also works with VB 3.5
See here for the VB 3.5 thread for this hack.

What's new in v1.60?

Option to display associated thumbnail images
Option to accept/not accept new entries if these already exists in database
Code for mass edits (accessed via admincp) tidied up
VB phrasing completed
Includes a full French and a partial German translation (thanks to cclaerhout, Allan and LeeWicKeD), handled properly by installation script.
Various bugs fixed and tested against php4 and php5:
Better database validation (on startup/in admincp: links with invalid associated forumids, categories with invalid parentids)
Alternative linkbit templates provided (default uses a fieldset, the other is the old-style table row)
Alternative category selection templates (pull down menu/list of checkboxes),
Star rating displayed using standard VB stars rather than in text form
Series of minor bug fixes
See file change.txt in zip file

What it is/does

- Provides a searchable database of weblinks and/or downloadable files, for example manuals, music files, pictures, etc.
- Integrates within VBulletin, without requiring any code changes.
- Transparently handles links and file downloads. (If you want to provide downloads from your own site, you need a separate tool to upload these files. This hack does not and will not include a file uploader.)
- Provides unlimited nested categories.
- Each link/file can be a member of multiple categories.
- Link and category title and descriptions can use all BBCODEs, giving the possibility to add images, colouring, etc, as you wish
- Viewing/access permissions controlled using VBulletin forum system
- Users can rate links, in a similar manner to VB thread rating.
- File downloads are semi-leechproof, i.e. the user does not see where the file is stored and can only access the link if she has access to the associated forum.
- Audio files playable via Windows Media Player can be offered as a jukebox .
- Tracks who downloads what
- Validates links on entry/editing, and provides admin facility to validate the entire database.

Installation/upgrading instructions

Read instructions.txt in the zip file. Installation script works out whether to install or upgrade.

To upgrade from an earlier release of this hack, simply re-run the installation script. If you modified the templates in the top styles, you will lose these modifications unless you back up and re-edit.

PLEASE BACK UP YOUR DATABASE

See also

For screen shots, see attachments.

Tested with

VBulletin 3.0 and higher
PHP 4.1.1 and 4.3.4, should work with all 4.x versions, seems ok with 5.0.4
MySQL 4.0.
Reported ok with MySQL 4.1 but not exhaustively tested

Credits

Initially inspired by drkFusion's vb2 hack "vb Link Directory" v.2 and discussion about v.3 on Vbulletin.org. This is a complete rewrite with many more features. Every credit to the VBulletin folks for providing the infrastructure and to those on vbulletin.org who have helped with testing.

Integrations/Conversions

Natch has written extensions to integrate this hack with VBindex and VBAdvanced.

For convenience, this hack includes fully integrates with, but does not install, his VBIndex hack - i.e. the required template and code are provided, and the admin panel handles the configuration settings. Please refer to his thread for instructions.

Integration with VBadvanced is described in thread 1319 at vbadvanced.com.

The zip file includes a script and instructions for converting from vbLinks v2 (see thread 44551

AndrewD · #**802** 01-16-2005, 07:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Slave

Just upgraded 1.50Beta to 1.51Beta .. No problems to report.

The things you've added are superb ..

.. and the "Show Anything" is much better than a single random link feature ..

If I were to be picky ..

In the "Show Anything" page you get links showing more than once ..

When you turn on Sub-categories to show in the catbit .. shouldn't it be "Sub-categories:" and not just "Sub-categories" .. (I did say picky

)

Can you split up the normal settings and the "portal" setting .. I take it the portal settings are only if you have some extra portal hack? If not can you tell me what "categories_seen_on_portal" does as I've just spent 10 mins trying to see what it does without success .. heh

Thanks.

I'll have a look at the links showing up more than once - I think that is down to SQL's ORDER BY RAND() which dowsn't guarantee uniqueness - so needs an extra filter.

I hijacked the portal settings for other purposes - categories_seen_on_portal has no effect in the main hack. (The portal code was written by Natch, and an updated version of it, get_hotlinks.php - is in the natch subdirectory).

Natch · #**803** 01-19-2005, 07:24 PM

You can use the "SELECT DISTINCT" instead of just "SELECT"... should do the trick

AndrewD · #**804** 01-20-2005, 08:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Natch

You can use the "SELECT DISTINCT" instead of just "SELECT"... should do the trick

Indeed, thanks. Had just to check that this worked ok on a complex join and that there weren't other cases where we wanted duplication. It does and there weren't

.

AndrewD · #**805** 01-22-2005, 05:33 AM

Version 1.51 is now the supported release. See first post in thread.

Slave · #**806** 01-22-2005, 06:06 AM

Upgrade went without a hitch ..

.. and I can't find anything to say!

[high]* Slave goes off to have a think ..[/high]

Slave · #**807** 01-22-2005, 06:53 AM

Ok .. had a think .. feature requests ..

Allow users to comment on links
Show -> New Comments
Allow users to subscribe to categories (if new link added they get an email)
Show -> Subscribed Categories
Allow users to subscribe to links (if link gets updated they get an email)
Show -> Subscribed Links
Show -> What's updated
Instead of "rated 5 star" .. have a pic of 5 stars (use the same gfx that vb does?)
Pick link rating from a dropdown menu instead of links 1/2/3/4/5
In Category column if a category has a new link or sub-cat this is highlighted next to the category name

I think that should keep you going .. but only if you want to

AndrewD · #**808** 01-22-2005, 07:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Slave

Ok .. had a think .. feature requests ..

Ha, Ha.... I do try to live a life, you know. Actually some of these have already been suggested, thought about, done...

>Allow users to comment on links
>Show -> New Comments
>Allow users to subscribe to categories (if new link added they get an email)
>Show -> Subscribed Categories
>Allow users to subscribe to links (if link gets updated they get an email)
>Show -> Subscribed Links

These have been long-standing suggestions. I've given them some thought but would require quite a lot of effort to implement properly.

>Show -> What's updated

OK, will think about this

>Instead of "rated 5 star" .. have a pic of 5 stars (use the same gfx that vb does?)

Someone's already shown how to do this. It's a simple edit of the linkrate template.

>Pick link rating from a dropdown menu instead of links 1/2/3/4/5

You could probably achieve this also with the linkrate template

>In Category column if a category has a new link or sub-cat this is highlighted next to the category name

This already happens - categories with new entries appear in bold.

Slave · #**809** 01-22-2005, 07:56 AM

Quote: