Blog Documentation Book a Demo
Vanilla 1 is no longer supported or maintained. If you need a copy, you can get it here.
HackerOne users: Testing against this community violates our program's Terms of Service and will result in your bounty being denied.

Guest Post

MinisweeperMinisweeper New
edited October 2008 in Vanilla 1.0 Help
Guest Post
«13456

Comments

  • Lussumo BotLussumo Bot New
    Uploaded version 1.3 of Guest Post.
  • Lussumo BotLussumo Bot New
    Uploaded version 1.4 of Guest Post.
  • MinisweeperMinisweeper New
    Right. I've included Wanderers version of Captcha for those who wanted it. I also added a new definition to the top of the file to let users turn it off if they dont want it. I tested it a bit up to v1.3 but I've not tested v1.4 (very minor changes no reason it should break anything but i'm getting way tired and meant to be in bed 2 hours ago).
    As with all things I develop, I dont expect it to work. But I think it does and should. Please try it out see if you can make it freak out or get past it. Post any bugs (and fixes, if possible) in here and I'll take a look when I get chance.

    Remember, it's free. I've done these changes cause I was stupid enough to get bored and not decide on my bed as the best plan of action. If it dont work dont shoot!
  • WandererWanderer
    Great mate...
    It needs a little tidying up cosmetically but it works...

    I love the polite message...
    You do not have permission to add comments to discussions.

    Posted: Thursday, 15 March 2007 at 1:56PM (AEDT)

  • MinisweeperMinisweeper New
    Thats the standard vanilla message :) Tidying up in what way? The layout? If you get it how you want it I'll merge your changes.
  • WandererWanderer
    Um, my version of "tidying" up may not be everyone else's cup of tea. pic

    See my mods here and feel free to test it.

    Thanks sincerely mate great work and quickly too, now go get some sleep.

    I hope this puts a spanner in the SPAMbots' works. pic

    Posted: Thursday, 15 March 2007 at 2:26PM (AEDT)

  • MinisweeperMinisweeper New
    Well if anyone else wants to vote on which version they prefer the look of or provide me with their own then I'll do whatever most people like best. I dont use it so i dont really care how it looks :)
  • WandererWanderer
    Don't worry about it mate, you've done your bit, I have not had one spam message since I activated it (touch wood)!

    It's easy enough to modify the look of it, I have also added more codes, eventually I want at least 50 random codes, that should keep the suckers away. pic

    Posted: Friday, 16 March 2007 at 8:12AM (AEDT)

  • MinisweeperMinisweeper New
    One thing to add, since all these debates about cutting down JS are flying around, I forgot that during testing I added vanillas new PathFinder function to the randy.js file cause i was testing on an outdated version of vanilla (smooth) - I'm not gonna upload a new version but if you wanna open up the js file and just cut the entire function out that should be fine...
  • WandererWanderer
    Done!
    Over 24 hours since GuestPost on steroids was installed, not one SPAM message has gotten through! pic

    Posted: Friday, 16 March 2007 at 11:21AM (AEDT)

  • Lussumo BotLussumo Bot New
    Uploaded version 1.4 of Guest Post with the correct name (thanks to wanderer for the heads up). I also took the unnecessary function out the JS file.
  • TomTesterTomTester New
    Thanks Mini. I'm very happy with the CAPTCHA though... very happy, though the whole 'nickname' thing is a bit confusing...

    Bug/issue
    Adding NOTHING as a user name causes$DiscussionForm->Comment->Body = "<strong>".$DisplayName.":</strong><br /><br />".$DiscussionForm->Comment->Body;to leave an empty line with just a bold ':'

    My ideal implementation:

    If NICKNAME functionality is to be retained, rename 'Username' field to Nickname (and hide 'Password' field)

    If not required, remove the username/password completely (like W) and insert a simple text ABOVE the comment box, e.g. 'Registered users please login before posting...' (links to people.php)

    Move the anti-spam image BELOW the comment box, BEFORE the buttons, and use smaller & prettier anti-spam images (but I think I can change that myself)

    Idea: FORCE publication of IP address in Guest Comment to avoid abuse?
    Idea: LIMIT posting to XX posts per hour as guest from same IP address... After XX limit is fulfilled prompt user to register or wait 1 hour.
  • WandererWanderer
    TomTester, I think Minisweeper did a great job coding this gadget, everyone has their ideas about how it should look, it's fairly easily customised from the supplied base.

    Yes, the username/password fields take up too much space, I hid them.
    I couldn't work out the nickname thing, I ignored it.
    Display the IP address? If it was an option I guess I'd use it.
    Prettier images? I'm deeply hurt :-)
    Limiting posts? Overkill.
    Move image below comment box? That makes sense.
    CAPTCHA. I think this gadget should avoid using this name, it's a similar concept but not CAPTCHA.

    Posted: Sunday, 18 March 2007 at 7:56AM (AEDT)

  • Lussumo BotLussumo Bot New
    Uploaded version 1.4.1 of Guest Post to fix the bug reported by TomTester which leaves a single bold : if no nickname is entered.
  • MinisweeperMinisweeper New
    Tom - as wanderer says, If you want to hide or rename the username and/or password boxes you're welcome to do so and it's fairly simple but I dont really see the point of removing the existing functionality in case there are any users out there who enjoy it. I could add IP displaying functionality but I'm not in any hurry to do so. If an admin suspects abuse then they can easily enough check out which IPs have been used but I'm not sure it's right to go displaying those IPs to general users incase that causes further abuse. Limiting posts would be a LOT of work, I think. I'm not really ready to go into that. Moving the image below the comment box I guess I could do if more people vote for the idea... Dunno what the difference between this and Captcha is but then again I dont really care. It seems to prevent spam, nuff said :)
  • TomTesterTomTester New
    Mini,

    Both IP display and posting limits suggestion are 'means to an end':

    IMHO guest posts, though convenient, are rarely good for a community in the long run
    1 - Makes discussions more difficult to follow
    2 - Allows/supports abuse/spam
    3 - Allows 'drive-by posting' -> which leads to 'orphaned discussions', i.e. 'guest' asks question, community members answer, guest never returns
    4 - Often lead to more admin overhead (difficult to 'clean' after abuse)

    Hence I'm strongly in favor of anything that PROMOTE/INCREASE registrations.
    Showing IP addresses is one way (non-anonymity, just register to avoid)
    Posting limits another (annoyance factor, register to avoid)

    Note: the latter could be implemented with JS/cookies too (simpler/quicker).

    Cheerio, and thanks for the update!
  • MinisweeperMinisweeper New
    If you devise a way for me to implement posting limits without too much difficulty I will do but at the moment this is a fairly simple extension and I'd kinda like to keep it that way. The thing is that I'd actually suggest against using this extension at all for the exact reasons you mentioned. Imo if someone cant be bothered registering then they probably wont be much use to the community anyway. I only made it to cater for popular demand.
  • TomTesterTomTester New
    IMHO the most user-friendly thing would probably to ONLY display the guest post options while guest posting
    is allowed    , if only to prevent frustration of entering long comment only to be denied...

    Not sure if you meant for me to describe this or include actual code, but here goes:

    Check for availability of cookie functions (place test cookie, read test cookie) (No ) -> Alert user and disallow guest posting (or simply don't display at all, without notice) (Yes) -> Check for availability of last-posted cookie (No ) -> Place Last-Posted cookie (date/time-stamp or encoded date/time-stamp) -> Display guest post options (i.e. continue) (Yes) -> Read Last-Posted cookie (date/time-stamp or decoded date/time-stamp) Date Today? (No ) -> Clear last-posted cookie and Display guest post options (i.e. continue) (Yes) -> Read post-count cookie. Post-count reached max? (No ) -> increase counter, update post count cookie -> Display guest post options (i.e. continue) (Yes) -> Don't display guest post options (i.e. HIDE) -> Alert user of need to register(*) -> Display link to registration form. (*) "This forum limits guests to XX posts per day. Please register, it only takes a minute."

    Prefer simple cookie implementation as it requires only local storage (no database calls etc.).
  • WandererWanderer
    --ONLY display the guest post options while guest posting is allowed.
    Isn't this the case already?

    --Posting limits.
    These are available already in general settings?

    --Everything else...
    Please keep this add-on simple, it does one thing simply and effectively, over-complicating it defeats the purpose.

    Posted: Sunday, 18 March 2007 at 12:25PM (AEDT)

  • truthmastertruthmaster
    I'm NOT getting HTML formatted text in the comment. I'm getting the comment with the HTML tags visible. Any ideas? Truthmaster PS: Thanks again Mini for helping me before.....
Sign In or Register to comment.