z Forum – the forum that this user will moderate. He or she will also be able to moderate any child forums.
z Moderator Username – the name of the user that will become the moderator.
z Change Moderator’s Primary Usergroup to – if you wish to change the user’s usergroup when the become a moderator, you may do so here. The most common setup is to put all moderators into a Moderators usergroup that will then have access to a special forum.
z Make Moderator a Member of – if you do not wish to move the moderator to a different usergroup but instead wish to add that user to one or more groups, making them a secondary user in those groups, you may do so here.
All other settings should be self explanatory. If you are unsure of an option, simply click the inline help icon for a further explanation.
To add a new forum, go to Forums & Moderators > Add New Forum. You will be presented with numerous settings.
These settings are detailed below
z Title – the title of the forum. This will be displayed on the forum list, in the nav bar, and in the forum jump.
z Description – the description of the forum that will be displayed below the forum title in the forum list.
z Forum Link – if you want this forum to be a link to somewhere else, enter that URL here. Be sure to include http:// at the beginning!
z Display Order – the ordering of the forums within a level. Lower numbers are displayed first and a display order of 0 causes the forum to not be displayed in the forum list. However, it is still accessible if the direct URL is known.
z Parent Forum – the name of this forum’s parent. Use this to group forums into logical groups.
z Default View Age – default amount of time that threads are shown for when a user views the forum. Users may manually override this in their profile or by clicking on the drop down when viewing the forum.
z Default Sort Field - the default field to sort on. This will be used unless a user explicitly overrides the sort order using the controls at the bottom of a list of threads. You may sort on a number of fields, including thread title and number of replies. This is set to last post time by default.
z Default Sort Order - the default direction a list of threads is sorted using.
z Show Private Forum - this controls the behavior of this forum when a user does not have permission to it. The options have the following meaning:
{Use Default - uses the value of the global setting 'Show Private Forums'.
{No - users without permission to view this forum will not see it anywhere. This is often useful for forums that only administrators and moderators can see.
{Yes - Hide Post Counts - users without permission to view this forum will see it in the forum list, but they will not be able to see the number of posts in the forum.
{Yes - Display Post Counts - users without permission to view this forum will see it in the forum list and will even see the number of posts in the forum. However, they will not see the last post information until they have permission to view the forum. This is useful if have a forum that only paying users can access and you wish to entice users to purchase a subscription.
Adding or Editing a Forum
Back to Topz Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Post – a list of email addresses to send an email to when a new post is made in this forum; this includes new threads. Separate each with a space. Any email addresses you enter here will also receive emails when a new post is made in a subforum.
z Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Thread – a list of email addresses to send an email to when a new thread is made in this forum. Separate each with a space. Any email addresses you enter here will also receive emails when a new post is made in a subforum.
z Moderate Posts – requires an admin or moderator to validate posts before they are displayed. This refers only to replies to threads.
z Moderate Threads – requires an admin or moderator to validate new threads before they are displayed.
z Moderate Attachments – requires an admin or moderator to validate attachments before they are displayed.
z Warn Administrators – causes the 'report post' feature to send its messages to administrators in addition to moderators of the forum.
z Custom Style for this Forum – use this to specify a specific style for the forum. If a user has not specified a custom style in his or her profile or cookies, he or she will always see this style.
z Override Users’ Style Choice – if you have specified a custom style for the forum and wish to ensure that all users see this style, regardless of the style set in their profile or cookies, set this to yes.
z Prefix for Forum Status Images - Forum Status images are usually shown alongside the forum in the forum listings. This allows you to specify a prefix for the status images on a per-forum basis, allowing you to have a custom set of status images for each forum
z Forum Password – if you wish to password protect this forum, specify the password here.
Administrators, super moderators, and moderators of the forum in question will not be prompted for a password. Passwords are not automatically applied to child forums; use Apply This Password to Child Forums to emulate this function.
z Apply This Password to Child Forums – if you have changed the password for this forum, setting this to yes will apply the specified password to all child forums. This can be used to emulate inheritance of passwords.
Note:
This option is only displayed when editing a forum.
z Can Have Password – this function prevents a forum from inheriting a password with Apply This Password to Child Forums and prevents a moderator from specifying a password in the moderators’
control panel. As an administrator, you may still specify a password for the forum.
z Act as Forum – setting this to no causes the forum to behave as if it were a category. This prevents posting in the forum and changes the template used to display the forum in the forum list.
Note:
If this is no, the template used will contain a _nopost suffix, as opposed to a _post suffix.
z Forum is Active – setting this to no prevents the forum from being displayed in the forum list. If a
user still knows the forum’s URL, he or she may still access the forum.
z Forum is Open – setting this to no prevents users from posting to the forum. This setting has no effect if Act as Forum is no.
z Index New Posts in Search Engine – setting this to no prevents posts from being indexed for searching. Therefore, posts from this forum will not be found when a search is run.
z Allow HTML – setting this to yes allows users to use arbitrary HTML in their posts. This is NOT recommended except when all users who may post in the forum are trusted.
Warning:
Setting this to yes in a situation where users may not be trusted may compromise account security! Users may also inadvertently ruin your layout.
z Allow BB Code – this allows users to use default and custom BB codes to add markup and formatting to their posts. This is much preferred over allowing HTML.
Note:
Disabling BB Code will disable the editor toolbar for posting in the forum.
z Allow [IMG] Code – if you have enabled BB codes with Allow BB Code, this setting allows you to control whether users may display images inline with their posts. If this is set to no, images will be displayed as links.
z Allow Smilies – if this is set to yes, when a user types a smilie, such as :), it will be automatically translated into an image.
z Allow Post Icons – if this is set to yes, users may specify an icon to go with their post. In new threads, this icon will be displayed on the thread list; in posts, it will be displayed at the top of the post, next to the title.
z Allow Thread Ratings in this Forum – this setting allows users to rate threads from a scale of one (worst) to five (best).
z Count Posts Made in this Forum Towards User Post Counts – allows you to control whether new posts in this forum increase a users post counts. For example, if you have a testing forum, you may not want users’ posts there to increase their post count.
z Show this Forum and Child Forums on the Forum Jump Menu – this setting allows you to prevent a specific forum (and child forums) from being displayed on the forum jump. This allows you to remove clutter and rarely accessed forums from the forum jump.
This page (Forums & Moderators > Forum Permissions) is simply a link to the Forum Permission Manager. That section is detailed here.
To quickly view all moderators and each forum they moderate, go to Forums & Moderators > Show All Moderators, this also shows any super moderators and allows permissions to be edited accordingly.
Each moderator listed is in a group which has super moderator permissions. To edit these permissions click [Edit Permissions].
Note:
Super moderator permissions can be combined with regular moderator permissions for a more granular approach.
Each moderator will be listed on this page, with each forum he or she moderates listed below. If you wish to remove this person from moderating all forums, click [Remove this Moderator from All Forums]. To edit or delete a moderator from a specific forum, click [Edit] or [Delete] next to the appropriate forum.
Forum Permissions
Back to TopShow All Moderators
Back to TopView Permissions
Back to TopThe View Permissions (Forums & Moderators > View Permissions) section allows you to view what permissions a specific usergroup will have in a forum. This allows you to check that you have setup your forum-permission structure correctly.
Select the Forum and Usergroup you want to test. Now choose the individual permissions you want to check;
if you are not sure what to select, click [Check All]. Now click [Find] and you will be presented with a screen like this:
This displays what each permission you selected is set to. In this example, the Administrators group has full permissions in the Main Forum.
The Podcast Settings (Forums & Moderators > Forum Manager > Podcast Settings) section allows you to configure iTunes specific settings for your forums.
Podcast feeds will work inside of iTunes (and other aggregates that support enclosures) without any information on this page being filled in. These settings are used when you wish to submit one of your forums as a podcast to iTunes as a podcast that can be searched for and seen from within iTunes.
Podcast Settings
Back to Topz Enabled
This setting enables the output of the information entered on this page.
z Category
This setting corresponds to categories defined within iTunes. This list is subject to being updated by Apple and the latest list can be found at Apple - iTunes - Podcasts. You can update the categories that you are able to choose from by modifying a file in your forums directory that contains the categories that vBulletin displays for your choosing. The file is located on your server in your forums directory at /includes/xml/podcast_vbulletin.xml
z Media Author
This is shown in the Artist column in iTunes.
z Owner Name
Your name, or the name of the person to be associated with control of this podcast.
z Owner Email
Your email, or the email of the person to be associated with control of this podcast.
z Image URL
This tag specifies the artwork for your podcast. iTunes prefers square .jpg or .png images that are at least 300 x 300 pixels.
z Subtitle
The contents of this tag are shown in the Description column in iTunes. The subtitle displays best if it is only a few words long. If this is left blank, the Summary will be used.
z Keywords
This tag allows users to search on text keywords within iTunes. Use commas to separate keywords.
z Summary
The contents of this tag are shown in a separate iTunes window that appears when the “circled i" in the Description column is clicked. It also appears on the iTunes page for your podcast. This field can be up to 4000 characters. If this field is left blank, your forum description will be used.
z Explicit
Set this to Yes if your podcast contains Explicit material. Not setting this properly can result in your podcast being banned from iTunes.
Warning:
There are several caveats that you must be aware of for this process to be successful.
Requirements:
1. vBulletin Options > External Data Provider > Enable RSS Syndication must be enabled.
2. vBulletin Options > External Data Provider > Enable Podcasting must be enabled.
3. The forum in question must be viewable by guests.
4. You must set Enabled to Yes and select a Category.
5. The feed to your podcast must be called with the forumid of the forum. You can not combine multiple forums into a podcast that includes iTunes specific information.
Ex: http://www.example.com/forums/external.php?forumids=2 6. iTunes only support six filetypes: .m4a, .m4v, .mp3, .mp4, .mov, and .pdf
There are two options to add the enclosure to the podcast. The first option is to add an attachment to the first post of the thread. This option is limited in that:
1. Attachments in the forum must be viewable by guests.
2. Due to the decision of Apple to limit valid enclosure urls to those that end with the extensions listed above, podcasting via iTunes will not work on IIS servers and possibly others. If you need help verifying that podcasting will work on your server, please contact vBulletin support. Hopefully, Apple will come to realize that there are better ways to determine valid urls and will lift this restriction in the future.
The second option is to enter a URL in the Podcast URL field when submitting a new thread in the podcast forum.
This page (Forums & Moderators > Thread Prefixes) is simply a link to the Thread Prefix Manager. That section is detailed here.
Thread Prefixes
Back to TopvBulletin includes a powerful calendar system that can act in many ways, from a personal diary for individual board members to a schedule for forthcoming board events.
Using the Calendar Manager you can create a number of different calendars, add specific holidays and events, and create Calendar Moderators to oversee the use of each calendar.
In the same way as you can set permissions for forums, you can use the Calendar Manager to set permissions at a usergroup level for individual calendars and calendar types.
The vBulletin Calendar system is a full featured system, comparable to many stand alone calendar packages on the market today.
The basic premise of the Calendar system is that it follows the same design as the forums in its approach. You create multiple calendars, as you do forums, in order to categorize your subject matter.
Real world examples would be:
z Birthday Calendar - A calendar that only displays your forum members' birthdays.
z Holiday Calendar - A calendar that only shows upcoming holidays, either those you define or the included holidays.
z Private Calendar - A calendar that allows members to keep track of their own private events.
z Event Calendar - A calendar that lists upcoming forum events.
The choice is up to you and don't think you are limited to just these examples. You can create a calendar that displays holidays, birthdays and events, all at the same time!
The first step in managing calendars is the Calendar Manager (found at Calendars & Moderators -> Calendar Manager).
From here you can add, delete and modify your calendars, modify calendar permissions, and manage calendar moderators. Yes, calendars can have moderators also!
After pressing the [Add New Calendar] button, you are presented with the following options:
Title - Choose what you want to call this calendar. This will appear at the top of the calendar as well as in the calendar jump menu at the bottom of the calendar.
Display Order - Order in which the calendars appear in the calendar jump menu. Also the calendar with the lowest order, that the user has access to view, will be the default calendar for the user.
Custom Fields - See Below.
Email Addresses to Notify When There is a New Event - An email detailing the event details will be sent to any email address listed in this section. if you moderate events, you will probably want to put the email addresses of your calendar moderators in here so they will be notified about new events.
Moderate Events - If enabled, this will cause all new events to be placed into moderation. They will not appear on the calendar until a calendar moderator approves them through the Moderator Control Panel. Events posted by any of the following users will appear directly on the calendar, bypassing moderation.
z Forum Administrators
z Forum Super Moderators
z Calendar Moderator (of this calendar)