1 (edited by the-golem 2011-09-29 11:54:52 am)

Topic: Forum Extensions

Making this thread for me to have a "proper" place for me (or, anyone really) to put suggestions for forum extensions and the like. Right now I have three suggestions:

1) (official) pun_pm: Allows for PMing members. Not exactly necessary, but it is sorta a staple for forums, and users might want or expect this type of thing.

2) StopForumSpam: Cross-checks registering user's IP adress with StopForumSpam.com database. Could be very useful.

3) WYSIWYG: Optional, but there seems to be a decent one here. I know that for myself, at the least, having to manually type the bbcode is annoooooying. Also, it'd be nice if there was a list of bbcode that was accepted by the parser that was always visible when making a post.

2

Re: Forum Extensions

Right now you can send email through the forum, I prefer this over pm's unless I can make those turn into emails automatically.

The other plugins sound very useful.

3 (edited by Tobbe 2011-09-29 11:55:44 am)

Re: Forum Extensions

1) I'm with Acidfire on the pm plugin.

2) We can probably wait with 2 until we actually have a spam problem

3) I don't like wysiwyg editors. I don't use them, and they are (usually) slow to load

But I would like a gravatar plugin! smile http://punbb.informer.com/forums/topic/ … -gravatar/

4 (edited by the-golem 2011-09-29 12:16:34 pm)

Re: Forum Extensions

Tobbe wrote:

BTW the-golem:
"I have two suggestions:"
1)
2)
3)

tongue

Jerkface big_smile

Tobbe wrote:

1) I'm with Acidfire on the pm plugin.

Meh. I guess this is fine.

Tobbe wrote:

2) We can probably wait with 2 until we actually have a spam problem

IMHO, Waiting is a completely horrible idea. That's like saying "Wait to get an antivirus until you actually have a virus."

Tobbe wrote:

3) I don't like wysiwyg editors. I don't use them, and they are (usually) slow to load

Well I do. A forum wysiwyg isn't the same as a normal website-style wysiwyg. Forum wysiwygs just auto-wrap tags around selected texts. I'm not saying get one like TinyMCE or CKeditory, which are gigantic bloated pieces of junk. In fact, Punbb forums has one, which loads like instantaneously.

Tobbe wrote:

But I would like a gravatar plugin! smile

I don't even know what this is. What's wrong with normal avatars?

--------------------------
4) Allow posts to have Attachments.

5

Re: Forum Extensions

good stuff... I'll get to work on this as soon as I have time (my weekend is starting, so it might be a few days before I have a lot of time again)

keep the suggestions coming!

using LS since 1998. Old FPN site operator, owner of ShellFront, keeper of other LS domains
State of the Step 2011

6

Re: Forum Extensions

2) We can probably wait with 2 until we actually have a spam problem

Thats not a good idea, once you get forum spambots its almost impossible to eradicate them.
Read moar here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forum_spam

7 (edited by Tobbe 2011-09-29 22:08:30 pm)

Re: Forum Extensions

the-golem wrote:
Tobbe wrote:

2) We can probably wait with 2 until we actually have a spam problem

IMHO, Waiting is a completely horrible idea. That's like saying "Wait to get an antivirus until you actually have a virus."

That's what I do! Works well for me smile And when the virus is gone I uninstall the antivirus again.

Baron Bruce wrote:

Thats not a good idea, once you get forum spambots its almost impossible to eradicate them.
Read moar here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forum_spam

Say what? Just delete the posts and ban the user. Can't be more difficult than that, can it?

8

Re: Forum Extensions

Tobbe wrote:
Baron Bruce wrote:

Thats not a good idea, once you get forum spambots its almost impossible to eradicate them.
Read moar here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forum_spam

Say what? Just delete the posts and ban the user. Can't be more difficult than that, can it?

Are you kidding me? Spambots can easily change IPs and re-register.

9

Re: Forum Extensions

Ohh, yes, of course they will try to re-register smile
But then we know we actually have a spam problem, and then we would have already installed the plugin the-golem mentioned. So the second time they try to register they'll be stopped by that IP filter smile

10 (edited by Tobbe 2011-09-30 06:15:34 am)

Re: Forum Extensions

the-golem wrote:
Tobbe wrote:

But I would like a gravatar plugin! smile

I don't even know what this is. What's wrong with normal avatars?

Nothing per se. But gravatars are so convenient (if you already have one, which I do, because they use that at github)! Wordpress supports gravatars out of the box too. I've grown so used to pages having support for gravatars so now I just get annoyed when I actually have to upload a specific avatar somewhere smile

the-golem wrote:

4) Allow posts to have Attachments.

Yes! At least images and zip files. So users can post screenshots and themes (to get help - I'm not suggesting this forum should be a theme page).

11 (edited by Anomareh 2011-09-30 13:55:48 pm)

Re: Forum Extensions

1) I'd much prefer a PM system. I personally hate random people on forums being able to send me email. Especially when you take spam into account.

2) I think any preemptive anti-spam measures are fine as long as they don't hinder the average user. (e.g. something when registering is fine, when posting not so much). I think anything that starts checking at the posting level or anything should be held off on till we actually have a problem.

Also, I think a simple reCAPTCHA would be better than that plugin you listed.

3) I personally hate WYSIWYG editors and BB code too. Would LOVE to just be able to use Markdown instead.

4) I REALLY hate post attachments. 90% of the time you have to be logged in to view them which is really annoying if you're searching for some info or a file and aren't a member on that forum. Also, almost all of them display horribly.

I think it's much better to have people host things off site and just link. There are plenty of great free hosts out there (imgur/omploader/cloudapp). Perhaps have a sticky or announcement with recommended sites if people aren't familiar with places other than crap like imageshack or photobucket.


Lastly, +1 for gravatars. I've come to find them convenient as well after initially not liking the idea so much.


EDIT: 5) Allow edits shortly after posting to not be considered an edit. I hate that damn edit text when I fix a typo right after posting :s

12

Re: Forum Extensions

Anomareh makes some excellent points.

1) I don't have anything against PM systems, as long as I can set them up to email me whenever I have a new PM. The reason I see for *not* having that plugin would be to keep the number of plugins down, to make upgrades/maintenance easier.

2) First an XKCD comic wink http://xkcd.com/810/  And then a link on why captchas maybe aren't such a great idea: http://www.allspammedup.com/2011/01/goo … a-cracked/

3) Markdown would be awesome, but last I checked there weren't a markdown plugin for punbb

4) Yeah, they have to be viewable/downloadable even if you're not logged in!

5) Me too!

13

Re: Forum Extensions

2) Although captchas aren't the best solution, mainly because they're annoying as shit and are sometimes completely indecipherable, I think it's a good enough and better solution than checking against IPs.

Unless for some reason the site starts getting hit really hard by bots I doubt it will be a problem. That article lists a 17.5% success rate. I doubt anyone would target this site hard enough with such a small amount of activity that it would be an issue with that success rate.

With how common dynamic IPs are, I could see that IP checking plugin catching more legit users than bots.

14

Re: Forum Extensions

Yeah, false positives are worse than false negatives in my opinion

15

Re: Forum Extensions

remember that this is PunBB... not vBulletin. It's fairly limited, but simple to work with and pretty quick. I'm not sure that a lot of the features or settings listed are available even via extensions, and I know they aren't available within the forum code itself. But feel free to suggest any extension you find..

using LS since 1998. Old FPN site operator, owner of ShellFront, keeper of other LS domains
State of the Step 2011

16

Re: Forum Extensions

Anomareh wrote:

4) I think it's much better to have people host things off site and just link. There are plenty of great free hosts out there (imgur/omploader/cloudapp). Perhaps have a sticky or announcement with recommended sites if people aren't familiar with places other than crap like imageshack or photobucket.

Problem with these sites are that the image (or whatever you upload) only stays there for a little while. After a few months, when the image is gone from imgur or wherever, the forum post is probably pretty much useless sad

That's why I like forum attachments. They tend to live as long as the actual forum itself!

17 (edited by Tobbe 2011-10-03 11:02:28 am)

Re: Forum Extensions

rootrider wrote:

feel free to suggest any extension you find..

Hopefully I'm listing all wished features/plugins here:

PM: pun_pm
WYSIWYG:
    http://punbb.informer.com/forums/topic/ … yg-editor/  (not official)
    pun_bbcode  Not actually wysiwyg, but at least you get the buttons for generating bb code. And it's official too.
Attachments: pun_attachment If there is a guest group I think you can enable downloads for that group
Spam prevention:
    pun_antispam
    pun_stop_bots
Gravatars: http://punbb.informer.com/forums/topic/ … -gravatar/  (not official)
Don't show as edit if it's close to initial post time: http://punbb.informer.com/forums/topic/ … ce-period/  (not official)

18

Re: Forum Extensions

Tobbe wrote:

Problem with these sites are that the image (or whatever you upload) only stays there for a little while. After a few months, when the image is gone from imgur or wherever, the forum post is probably pretty much useless :(

That's why I like forum attachments. They tend to live as long as the actual forum itself!

I said not crap hosts :p

I have things up on cloudapp I uploaded over a year ago, imgur's policy seems to be 1 view every 6 months otherwise it may get deleted, and ompldr has no such restrictions.

19 (edited by the-golem 2011-10-03 20:46:28 pm)

Re: Forum Extensions

Tobbe wrote:
rootrider wrote:

feel free to suggest any extension you find..

    pun_bbcode  Not actually wysiwyg, but at least you get the buttons for generating bb code. And it's official too.

Yeah, I found that out recently myself. This is actually all I really want. I'm okay with this.

Edit: Although, if there was a Markdown post parser, I'd be all over it like stripes on a tiger.

20

Re: Forum Extensions

lol, stripes on a tiger eh? I like that expression!

21

Re: Forum Extensions

Also, normal users can't post in the GD :::/

22

Re: Forum Extensions

Baron Bruce wrote:

Also, normal users can't post in the GD :::/

You're a normal user, and you seem to be posting just fine. In fact, so am I, and here I am, posting.

23

Re: Forum Extensions

does he mean guest users?

using LS since 1998. Old FPN site operator, owner of ShellFront, keeper of other LS domains
State of the Step 2011

24

Re: Forum Extensions

If he does, I don't think we want that! Would make the spam problem much worse than it is today.

25

Re: Forum Extensions

We can't post topics, we can post replies.