Mini Mods - Welcome Headers: Notices System Default Messages & Settings to Drive Participation

Out of the box, your forum isn't personalized to assist or address your visitors. As a result, guests entering on a page other than the homepage (which is most often the case) have no idea what to do or why to register. Additionally, there are no visible status indicators, making it confusing for unconfirmed, unapproved or new members to know what to do or where to begin. But with a little customization, the use of the vBulletin Notices System and Welcome Headers, you can solve these issues in just a few minutes.

What is Welcome Headers?

Welcome Headers is a set of predefined messages and rules designed to help you get started in personalizing your site's notices using the vBulletin notice feature. The default templates are just that, default ? I highly encourage you to modify and add to the language and rules to meet the needs of your actual community environment.

Modifications/ Instructions:

Plugins: 1 (creates notices rules and phrases)
This template hack should take under 5 minutes to implement and customize.

Installation/ Upgrade Instructions

1 ? Install the attached plugin file
2 ? Customize the notices to include your site's name

For detailed instructions on each step please view the install.html file included with this addon.

Support

Please post any enhancement or technical questions you may have and I will do my best to respond in a timely manner. Please note: I can not guarantee an immediate response and am unable to assist with integrating this addon with other addons or with HTML related questions.

Why use this when the notices system exists?

Welcome Headers have been around since before vBulletin 3.0 but as of 3.7 the functionality of the system was no longer needed as vBulletin added its own native feature to handle notices. However while the notices feature lets you show welcome header style messages it doesn't give you any to start with. The notices version of this addon does not add any functionality but instead provides a set of 4 notices that have been time-tested and help your forum grow and function better for guests and members.

Please be sure to customize and add to the messages from this addon to match the individual needs of your forum!

Older Version Support (Templates)

While most users are choosing to upgrade to the notices system, there are some advantages to the "old" system mainly in that it does not rely on a rules system and can be configured as designed with code changes. Additionally, the "old" version has automatic interfacing with several other addons which the notices system does not. For this reason, the old version is still supported being developed and will appear as a seperate file to download.

Updates from 3.7/3.8

Minor code changes to support 4.0, no changes to the functional mod.

[cloferba]

amazing screenshots :S

[Ted S]

Originally Posted by cloferba

amazing screenshots :S

Why not give me a few minutes to upload some? This mod has been up for more than 6 years, getting new screenshots was not the first priority compared to getting it online but they will come. I know it's asking a lot but being polite gets much better mods than sarcasm.

[AzzidReign]

I posted in the other welcome thread...what's the difference between your 2 threads?

[Ted S]

Originally Posted by AzzidReign

I posted in the other welcome thread...what's the difference between your 2 threads?

As explained in the addon thread, this version uses notices while the other uses templates. In this version what you're getting is just a set of time tested, predefined notices to get you going.

[Zaiaku]

I may have to use this on my new site. Great work!

[Eric]

Thanks for this Ted, I've been using Welcome Headers since vB 3.5

[naoba]

Thanks Ted. This is exactly what i was searching for.

[Ted S]

Originally Posted by SecondV

Thanks for this Ted, I've been using Welcome Headers since vB 3.5

Glad it still works for you!

[kall]

Hey Ted!

On install (with a 5.0.2 Welcome Headers installed but disabled) :

PHP Code:

Database error in vBulletin 4.0.0:

Invalid SQL:
INSERT INTO notice (noticeid,title,displayorder, persistent,active,dismissible) VALUES (1000,'Guest Message',1,1,1,1);

MySQL Error   : Duplicate entry '1000' for key 1
Error Number  : 1062
Request Date  : Tuesday, December 29th 2009 @ 08:09:05 AM
Error Date    : Tuesday, December 29th 2009 @ 08:09:05 AM
Script        : http://www.nzboards.com/xxx/plugin.php?do=productimport
Referrer      : http://www.nzboards.com/xxx/plugin.php?do=productadd