How about a feature whereby it is possible to send private messages to all the people who are logged on at once? Perhaps it could have a configuration setting where this can be enabled or disabled for users so that only moderators and administrators could use it.
Simon Wolf, Webmaster, Access All Areas <A HREF="http://www.athree.com" target="_new">http://www.athree.com</A>
I'm still (erg!) planning to do a hack to allow the admin to send private messages to all members of a certain group (all Users would be one group). I don't think this is in 5.0 from what I've seen so far and I need it because my users do not bother to read my announcements board. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" />
I don't know if this will suit your purposes, but I'll post it here whenever I get it done. Note that I said that I was going to do this sometime in the middle of last year and it hasn't happened yet. [img] /w3timages/icons/images/icons/tongue.gif [/img] I keep getting sidetracked... maybe I should keep my mouth shut!
This sounds very interesting! Please let us know how it goes if you have time to wrestle with it Phoenix. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />
I have the same problem with my board - very few read the announcements - but some users don't even seem to know that they can get private messages <img border="0" title="" alt="[Roll Eyes]" src="images/icons/rolleyes.gif" /> , as I could tell by looking into a database dump, it seemed several hadn't even looked at their "Welcome" message, even though they used the forum after signing up. However, I would still welcome this option!
They may know that they can use private messages, yet ignore the Welcome message, because they know it's a "canned" message, and assume it doesn't say anything important. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> I often ignore such welcome messages out of hand. I suspect they are aware of the feature because the screen is presented to them first thing when they log in. At any rate, I know private messaging is really widely used on my boards, which surprises me really. The other option is sending email to all users which is built into 5.0, but I feel... invasive, I guess, using that.
The funny thing about this topic is that the framework for it is already built into the program. How to send messages to "groups" is defined in w3t.pm (versions 4 and 5) but then there's no later implementation in sendprivate.pl, and only certain admin functions use those group definitions. It looks for all the world like Rick meant to set this up and then later forgot.
The zip file attached contains 3 files. They all go in the admin directory, and need to be made executable. login.pl already exists. All I've done to that file is add a link to the new group message script. The other two files are new.
All this does is use the groundwork Rick already laid to send out private messages to groups. The groups you can send to are All Users, All Moderators, All Admins, and All Moderators and Admins. Like I said, this was already built into w3t.pm, and all I had to do was create a form and a script to send the input through w3t.pm. It allows for markup to be used in the private messages.
Hopefully later I'll get some understanding of how Groups are used in v5 and I'll be able to update this so that it can address messages to user-defined groups. If I'm that clever. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> For now it can only use the built-in "Status" groups. Oh... and it does not send an email to the users telling them that they have a new private message. I haven't decided whether I want to go about trying to add that.
I am looking forward to your revision that will work with 5.0. This is really a valuable function for me. I will have a large number of different groups and would like to be able to send e-mail to each group separately! Thanks for taking the time to do this.
Do you know if there is a way for moderators to receive a notice that a posting has occurred on the board they are moderating?
Do you know if there is a way for moderators to receive a notice that a posting has occurred on the board they are moderating?
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I believe this has been mentioned here a couple of weeks ago, and I fully support that idea! As a moderator it would be a very valuable feature to get instant notification, and it would be best if the post would be included right away!
If I want to let all of the logged in users know that there is a problem or that I am about to do some maintenance then I think that it would be useful. Just being able to see who is online is Big Brother enough for me!
Simon Wolf, Webmaster, Access All Areas <A HREF="http://www.athree.com" target="_new">http://www.athree.com</A>
Yeah, that's exactly why I wanted it. I need to be able to notify people when there will be down-time, and I feel invasive about just mass-emailing them. I think many would take it as spam. Sending a private message is the least Big Brother way I can let them know, considering that very few read the announcements board... they have the boards they like bookmarked and they don't even see when there are new announcements.
One thing I'd really like is the ability to have announcements appear at the top of each forum... just as a link... it would appear if there has been an announcement made in the last X days. That would help some with the problem of users who've bookmarked a particular forum and never look at the main page. Maybe there's some way I can use the "news" script to make that happen??? I'll have to check that out.
I strongly agree with phoenix - for official announcements like scheduled downtime for maintenance, upgrading etc. it would be very valuable, and the least intrusive way (as mass mailing could be seen as spam), I think it's an Admin's right and obligation to do so via a message to all users - experience shows that the "Announcements" board gets hardly ever read.
Quite honestly, if my users feel that me giving them inportant information is intrusive then they might as well go and find another site! All of my users have to register to use the board (no anonymous postings) and 99.99% of them are intellegent and friendly so me giving them information is not seen as intrusive but rather me being helpful.
I am assuming from your comments that now that your board has been set up you for you, you are happy to let it sustain itself and have no interest in helping your visitors or informing them of what is going on behind the scenes. That's fine but for those of us who want to make a community not just a soapbox it is important that our visitors are kept aware of changes.
Simon Wolf, Webmaster, Access All Areas <A HREF="http://www.athree.com" target="_new">http://www.athree.com</A>
>>That's fine but for those of us who want to make a community not just a soapbox<<
A bit touchy. Just giving my views. My soap box, as you call it, is there to keep my customers informed on the building industry. If they want a place to gag, I'll send them to you if you like.
You make a good point. Looking at the original post, it had no mention for admin functions. >>possible to send private messages to all the people who are logged on at once<< It just seemed to learn toward spam. Being able to email based on a system problem may be be a value added feature.
>>Perhaps it could have a configuration setting where this can be enabled or disabled for users so that only moderators and administrators could use it.<<
The whole point was so that Administrators and Moderators could let people know what was going on.
I don't know what you think that I would want to spam the members of my own board via Private Messages when I could simply post a message or email them all.
Simon Wolf, Webmaster, Access All Areas <A HREF="http://www.athree.com" target="_new">http://www.athree.com</A>
I'm only touchy because you don't seem to be able to grasp what I and others would find this functionality useful for.
Your opinions are fine and I respect them but please try to understand that I do not spam my own users (a bit pointless really!) and I would like this facility to keep users who are logged on about problems and issues that may effect them imminently.
Simon Wolf, Webmaster, Access All Areas <A HREF="http://www.athree.com" target="_new">http://www.athree.com</A>
