VAForum 2

[Tom]

So it does, how foolish of me not to notice that. Issue fixed and new version uploaded on first post

[TAV1702]

Ahh not foolish man. Things happen occasionally right? We all over look things from time to time. Thats what I chalked it up as was an over sight is all.

Glad you got it sorted out. Totally digging the new look. Some tweaking here and there to get it lined up with skin and she is good to go. Thanks for all the hard work! +1

[Tom]

Yay more progress! I had a day off today so I've added user-customisable signatures this morning.

Any other feature requests? I want to try and pack as much as possible into an update so I don't annoy everyone with loads of them.

[TAV1702]

Oh the list could be endless. If I could think of a couple few things that could easily be done I will come back and post. Rest assured.

[Tom]

Oh even if it wouldn't sound easy to do, I can always give it a try!

[Kyle]

Something like a forum profile? Brithday, ETC............

[TAV1702]

Latest Post Info like a regular forum would be sweet for starters. Can you do a generic skin that brings it all together in one solid forum? Right now from default it looks ok, but maybe if it had a border around the entire thing to bring it all together as 1 unit. I have begun working ont hat but have been met with difficulties. Why I am not sure that procedure should be cut and dry but that is another topic all of it's own. Maybe sub forums somewhere down the road.

Keep up the great work on this. I thank you for all the time and effort thus far.

Ray

[Tom]

I think the users airline profile fits the criteria, other fields can be added there if needed.

As for the border, I will add a div around everything for people to style.

I'm also going to spend some time going through all the templates and removing the unnecessary tables etc to make styling easier.

[TAV1702]

Sounds great. And I added divs until I was blue in the face and got no where real fast with no such luck. I'm not real slick with all the div stuff yet. I'm still old school with tables and all. Bad habbit I am trying to get away from.

[TAV1702]

Another thing I was thinking of as well. If you have Simpilot's Events module installed you know that he integrated it into the admin panel. I'm thinking it would be cool if the forum had controls in the ACP. That would leave only a link to the moderator control panel like a phpBB or any other forum.

[Kyle]

Good idea tav1702!! That's what would we need!!!!!

[Tom]

Yeah that's exactly what I was thinking - didn't know if it would be practical - but if I do it that way I'd like to be able to make use of the existing permissions system.

Does anyone know if its possible for me to add custom permissions?

[Kyle]

Hey tom, I asked that question about custom permissions and Nabeel said it's likely hard to add new permissions but you can look for that topic in supports from me called "custom permissions" or anything like that.

[simpilot]

@Tom

I have been messing with the permission system but the way it is built in to phpVMS right now has created somewhat of a limit. The concept of how it is built is outlined here -> http://www.litfuel.net/tutorials/bitwise.htm I have spent enough time on it to make me cross-eyed but have yet to be able to add custom, or additional permission sets beyond what is built into the system now without destroying what is there, which means rebuilding all the existing permission values. I have had to resort to connecting values I needed to existing ones in the system. ie - I tied the events module in the admin panel at my va to the edit_schedules permission. I think a custom permissions set built as a sql table may be the best answer, then use a data model to check the table for perms, similar to the groups table now existing in the database. Sorry for the long post....

[TAV1702]

I sure am glad I am in school trying to learn all this stuff so I can understand what the hell you guys are talking about. Starting Visual basic tomorrow. Good times eh?

And any how, thanks for the work guys. Please do know that it is much appreciated!

Ray

[Tom]

Simpilot, long posts are good! I love knowledge

I had a look through too and ran into exactly that... annoying. I think until (if ever) the permissions system for phpVMS is changed, adding this to the admin panel just isn't practical - combining it with normal permissions working out whether users can see the admin link, then deciding what they can see: to many template (and possibly core code) edits.

[TAV1702]

If I read correctly, and I have been known to be wrong once or twice in my life , Simpilot stated that he tied into the existing permissions for the events module to work. If I recall correctly, we did not have to edit any core files at all to get events module to work.

I do understand where you are coming from though.

[Tom]

I suppose I could tie it to the ACCESS_ADMIN permission, then people can access it but not touch other things, correct?

In fact, I will tie it to the ACCESS_ADMIN permission - that way I can ensure they can access the admin pages as normal, but you can also prevent them tampering with other options.

[TAV1702]

I guess in the long run what that is going to do is clean up the footer of the forum a bit and put all controls admin side. I would say it is more of a aesthetics reason above all else. Not that I am king of having a clean looking site , but every little bit helps.

[Tom]

As well as removing the clutter at the bottom it also improves security somewhat, I don't have to rely on tons of if statements to check.

I might also just provide the edit signature link as a piece of code to put into the pilot centre rather than including it where I have it at the moment.

[TAV1702]

Yeah that would be kind of cool. In profile settings where you adjust password and such. Have it there for forum signature.

[TAV1702]

Can Moderators see the admin only forums? Not so sure moderators need to be behind the scenes that much, but would be cool if they had forums NOT public so they could discuss users posts etc etc. If it does this already, my apologies as I must have missed something.

User groups would be awesome so we can create forums for moderators, admins, hub managers, etc etc. I can only imagine how much of a headache that would be after reading Simpilots post on permission issues he had.

[Tom]

Well, at the moment I believe moderators can see the non-public forums. I guess that's a good idea, so I probably will end up making a new permissions system (I don't like the old forum one, it's a bit dodgy) with groups...

[TAV1702]

I firmly believe with that tweak to the permissions and being able to have the admin side moved in to the ACP, between Simpilots and your work, this forum would be a well rounded add-on for phpVMS. I think it simply amazing with what you guys have done with it thus far. AS always, thanks for all the hard work you guys do.

On a side note, I wonder if we could sneak some code from the forum and add it to the airmail module to add breaks in the lines so it actually has a paragraph structure. That is the one thing that airmail lacks and I can not find in the forums what makes that possible.

[Tom]

After I've finished my last exam I'll have a look further into the permissions.

As for the line breaks, when adding a message you should use

nl2br($message);

and then when displaying the message you can use

ForumData::br2nl($message)

[TAV1702]

Ok cool. I'll look into it. Thanks for that.

And you doing some schooling to are ya? I don't have any major exams coming up for about 7 more weeks. Going for an associates in IT.

[Tom]

Yeah, I'm still in school, doing A levels!

[TAV1702]

Say just for sh*ts and giggles I wanted to toss a div up around the entire thing. Where might I start to do that at? As I said in another post, I tried and tried until I was blue in the face and all I did was badly bust up the template.

Also, I am working on a mouse over function so when you mouse over a particular forum it will highlight. It is pretty slick. Once I finish it up I'll let you take a peak and if you wish to use it then it is all good by me.

[TAV1702]

Hey I just found something. It is not major by any means at all. Once a topic is locked, not even a admin can post in that topic again. That is actually kind of wrong. If I go to my announcements forum and a topic is locked so users can not post in it, a admin still should be able to.

Is the fix going to be something as simple as adding in an else statement to allow admin to post? Not critical by any means, but nice to be able to post in a locked topic if one is an admin for various reason.

[Tom]

To put a div around it you literally just have to put <div> at the start of each template, and </div> at the end.

And sure, I'll have a look at the mouseover.

I'll also add that to the list of things to do for next release, so admins can reply when locked.