I would like to see a feature added to the Admin section that allows the Admins to delete all posts from "some" user. At some point in time a User may want to change names or has some other issue and they request that you delete their name (which is easy) and delete all of their posts. Well lets say this user has been posting for a while and happens to have 261 posts. The only way I see to delete those is to go into each post one by one and delete them and well thats a hell of a lot of work. I have ran into this on 5 different occasions in the last 2 months. So, Scream can you please add the feature to delete all posts from "X" User or can someone please create a Hack for it. I am sure I am not the only one that would like this feature.
The reason you give for wanting this seems really weird to mee <img border="0" title="" alt="[Roll Eyes]" src="images/icons/rolleyes.gif" /> ... why would you want to change name and then delete all the rest? Just because you changed name?! Weird youd wanna do this. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />
Ayway, it could be an interesting feature if you´ve been off for a week and when you come back you discover XName user has been spamming your board everywhere.
Ayway, it could be an interesting feature if you´ve been off for a week and when you come back you discover XName user has been spamming your board everywhere.
[/quote] Exactly! Been there, done that... took me several hours to clean up the mess... so, I'm all for this feature request!!!
I put this feature into my Miva forums, and it's been very useful. I set it up so that, in the admin section, I can list every post made by a certain user and choose which posts to delete. This would be a very handy feature with W3T.
It should be relatively easy. I mean, at it's core, its just something like: $sql = DELETE FROM table WHERE U_Username = '$username'; with all associated w3t checking and body codes.
Actually, it might not be that easy, when I did some work on trying to develop a "move post" feature, I found out that you have to be very carefull with the posts, otherwise all replies will be "lost", i.e. not showing any more, even though they are still in the database. I think that's why Scream has it set up that when you delete a post, and there are replies, the post doesn't really get deleted, but replaced with something saying "post deleted by...", only if there are no replies to a post, it is safe to remove it from the database, as far as I remember, so I would use great caution with this mySQL command.
You hit the nail right on the head Gerritt. Couldn't have said it better myself;). Since I'm working on the admin area, I can try and add a function to do this.
you might try something like... if it's the parent post, delete all replies also, and if it is a reply (child thread) link all replies to it to the one it was linked to... (does that make any sense?) <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> matt
It does make sense, but that should be optional, because the replies to a child might not make much sense without the child, so maybe replies to a child should optionally get deleted as well.
well, it would be preferred to be able to really clean it up and not have a troublemaker's Username all over the place with so-called "deleted" posts everywhere...
True, and I hate that "Deleted by..." thing. Your moderators do their job at deleting, but at doing so with a problematic person they might be asking for trouble in doing so.
If anything should be entered I´d either say "Deleted by the administration...". But *DELETED* posts are really ugly...
It just seems as if there is going to have to be a compromise in the utility. Otherwise the script is going to have to evaluate a lot of different cases in order to successfully run: - Is it the first post?
- If yes, are there replies to this post?
- Is this post a reply to another post?
- If yes, are there replies past this post?
...and so on It seems like it would get very messy and complex. Especially if follow-up posts contained text originating within the offending post. I like, personally, having posts with text akin to "Post deleted by administration." It provides a sense that there is some governing body on the board that's actively attempting to make my user experience as good as possible. As for the offending username, you have two options: 1) Change the username in the portion of the script doing the query. Apply a moderator's name or something where the offending user's name appears, or
2) Alter the HTML at that portion so you have one single row spanning the two columns, and your "Deleted by..." text. Basically what you have is just a place holder in the post tree.... --------- Shalazar <a target="_blank" href=http://www.charisma-carpenter.com>www.charisma-carpenter.com</a>
Your number 2) gave me an idea... how about having showflat and showthreaded check for the "post deleted" and if the body only consists of that, then why show it... have it skip that... as if it wasn't there... If there's really a troublemaker spamming the board overnight, I'd still hate to see my board plastered with thoses posts even if they say "post deleted by Admin". I really prefer for Admin deleted posts to have the option to dissappear. Maybe both paths could be implemented, by giving Admin/Moderator the option to purge the post (or mark it in such a way that it won't be shown anymore, see my idea above) or just mark it deleted with the "post deleted by Admin" part.
_ Reparent children of posts to parents of deleted posts _ If children exists, mark post as "Deleted by admin" to preserve heirarchy _ Pillar of Fire: Destroy the posts, and all their children leaving no trace of abusive_user's existence.
I say let's bite the bullet and give the Admin the power to delete the whole thing , Parent AND children. We could always warn the Users NOT to reply to 'suspect' posts because they WILL be removed!
I tend to agree with you on this... because 99% of the time any replies made will make little sense without the child, and they would be orphans... let's take care of the orphans, I agree.
yeah... I was referring to the optional "let's just remove the text and change the username" solution proposed up above by gerrit and company... <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" />
actually.. I don't think I suggested to remove the text... nor to change the username... I am all for radical action... I just thought it would be nice to make it optional, in case someone wants to run their boards like that. My idea mentioned was with a hack to make deleted posts disappear... even if they have to stay for database integrity reasons....
oops! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> sorry gerrit... I was reading through much too quickly... all the posts kind of ran together... <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />
Just a followup on this. I've got the code in place for this feature. Anyone interested can check the <a target="_blank" href=http://www.wwwthreads.com/changes.html>CHANGELOG</a> for more info.
From Changelog - "Finished with one of the most complicated, ugly pieces of code I have ever written. "
------------------------ *Sniff* ... makes me feel guilty and like a bad person for suggesting this and having scream figure a way to do it... sorry! But I am ever so glad it is done!!! Is it released yet?
Actually the code from this came in handy. I was able to use portions of the same code so admins/moderators will be able to move a branch of a thread to its own thread. This isn't available yet but it will all be in the next release with the administration upgrade.