LAST EDITED ON Nov-19-06 AT 02:40 PM (PST)
This is a Fast Read Me for early users.Fast Read Me
1) Project name
2) Feed Source (if you make a mistake it goes back to first.).
3) Forum software, make sure you have the right one (if you make a mistake it goes back to original.).
4) Forum root. If you have any problem with this put in the login url.
5) Post Type (try create a new topic)
6) Skip category topic and put in the complete url of the forum you want to post in.
7) Forum user name
8) Forum password.
9) Schedule: Testing, Daily, Weekly, Monthly
Castle
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-22-06, 01:04 AM (PST)
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3. "A Comparison of Blogs and Forums"
In response to message #2
LAST EDITED ON Oct-22-06 AT 01:07 AM (PST)
Fresh content.
Search engines want fresh unique content. That has been the advantage of blogs. Post in your blog then ping.
Blogging and pinging.
If you were the only person to post to your forum your forum would be like a blog.
Add an rss feed and except for a difference in look your forum would be almost exactly the same as a blog, especially if you were the only poster, posting on a regular basis.
But a forum is a far more powerful creature.
A forum invites users to post their content. That is free, unique user created content.
A forum requires members to give an email address. Your forum members become a potential list.
Your forum can mass email, ever see a blog do this?
See the differences and similiarities. See the power.
Blogs: post. Forums: Post.
Blogs: feed. Forums: Feed.
Blogs: ping. Forums: Ping.
Blogs: limited comments, often turned off. Forums: Unlimited comments, commenting is encouraged.
Blogs: does not create a list. Forums: creates a list.
Blogs: cannot mass email. Forums: can mass email.
Blogs do not really invite response. Forums: Invite response.
Blogs: Mostly one person show. Forums: invites people to participate
Blogs: Mainly one person. Forums: Many voices and people.
Blogs: Can auto post. Forums: Can auto post with Forumz.
Blogs: Autoposts do not entice responses. Forums: ForumZ auto posts can generate responses.
Blogs: Autoposts come from one person the blog owner. Forums: autoposts can come from multiple persons. You could almost have a conversation.
Blogs: Categories Forums: Categories,
Blogs: are not discussion Forums: are discussion.
Blogs: do not have private categories Forums: have private categories.
Blogs: do not track Ip’s. Forums: track Ip’s
Blogs: do not have PM. Forums: Has PM
Add links to your other sites.
As you can see Blogs are basically a monologue, a single person conversation. One person talking to themselves. Forums, although not commonly used in this fashion could also be a single person conversation but their potentiality provides for and encourages far more: public conversation and public interaction and input, unique user created content.
Forums are clearly more powerful.
Forums provide the opportunity for member created input and conversation. Forums provide the opportunity for a dynamic world. Would you rather create all the content or have your members provide it for you?
Kickstart your Forums and Forum posts with Forumz. Create the illusion of a busy happening place. Encourage people to participate.
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-26-06, 11:39 PM (PST)
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4. "Forums Read Me"
In response to message #3
Read Me
Before buying forumz you should have downloaded and tested the free download of Tuelz at http://tuelz.com/download.html.
Forumz will arrive in an email attachment as Forumz.mod
Download and save this mod.
If you do not already have a forum download and install either a phpbb forum from phpbb.com, or a Simple Machines Forum at simplemachines.org
It is very easy to install a forum. The hardest part is creating the database. If you don’t know how to create a database check the Create a database in Cpanel video at
http://s174848735.onlinehome.us If you don’t have cpanel you will need to determine how to add a database to your site.
Read the instructions for installing your forum. They are quite easy and fast. Basically they consist of going to where you installed your forum, for instance, http://yourdomain.com/forum and following the instructions on the screen. In phpbb you have to change the properties of the config file (in the instructions) from 644. I usually just change it to 777 because when I am finished installing I will change it back to 644, which you need to do also.
After the forum is installed.
If Tuelz is open then close Tuelz by right clicking on the Screw icon and selecting exit.
Find where you saved the Forumz mod. Copy the mod. Open the Tuelz folder and place the Forumz mod inside. Restart Tuelz. You should now see Forumz as one of your choices.
Before you can use Forumz you will need to add some feeds to the Newz Tuel. This is very easy to do. First find some feeds. Then add the feeds where it says: Add Custom feeds. Wait a moment to make sure they are added. Once you are sure they are added go to Forumz.
This is the exact procedure you will use
1) Project name
2) Feed Source (if you make a mistake it goes back to the very first feed.).
3) Forum software: phpbb or SMF. Make sure you have the right one (if you make a mistake it goes back to phpbb.).
4) Forum root. If you have any problem with this put in the login url.
5) Post Type (try create a new topic first)
6) Skip category topic and put in the complete url of the forum you want to post in.
7) Forum user name
8) Forum password.
9) Schedule: Testing, Daily, Weekly, Monthly
I suggest trying Testing mode in the beginning, which is every 3 minutes, to ensure it works. Make sure you turn off testing mode when you are done and select daily or weekly.
Now that you understand how it works you can add more feeds using post within post etc.
Once you have chosen post within post you cannot go back to new topic every post without re-entering the new more general url that you would need to use for new topic for every post. (There cannot be a new topic for every post inside of a post.)
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-26-06, 11:43 PM (PST)
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5. "Simple Machines Pheed"
In response to message #4
LAST EDITED ON Oct-27-06 AT 12:12 PM (PST)
Simple Machine Forum Pheed
Enable XML/Rss feed in Admin/Edit Features & Options/Basic Forum Features
The simplest way to create a Simple Machines Pheed is to add:
index.php?action=.xml;type=rss2 after the folder in which your forum is, as in the following example.
http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss2
This Pheed does not show up in browser window but does show in the Newz Tuel feed reader and most feed readers.
This is the simplest way to do it. Here follows some more complex methods taken from the forum at http://simplemachines.org
The default pheed is the 5 most recent posts:
http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?action=.xml
There are several "sub-actions" available to this action, specifying exactly what to display:
Recent Posts (displays the most recent posts that you can see)
"Sub-action": recent
Default: Shows 5 most recent posts
Available options:
limit=x - display the "x" most recent posts (if number is less than 5, it will display 5. If number is larger than 255, it will display 255).
board=y - display only the recent posts from board "y"
Example: http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?action=.xml;sa=recent;board=72;limit=10
News (displays the first post from the most recent topics that you can see)
"Sub-action": news
Available options:
limit=x - display only "x" items
board=y - display only news topics from board "y"
Example: http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?action=.xml;sa=news;board=72;limit=10
another example: http://forum.yourdomain.com/index.php?action=.xml;limit=20;type=rss2
Members (displays most recent members) - note: There was a bug in the current version of SMF that prevents this from working right - see Latest Members XML Problem for the fix
"Sub-action": members
Available options:
limit=x - display only the "x" most recent members
Example: http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?action=.xml;sa=members;limit=10
Profile (displays the "profile summary" data in a nice XML pheed for the specified user)
"Sub-action": profile
Required option:
u=x - display the profile info for user whose ID is "x"
Example: http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?action=.xml;sa=profile;u=150
Autodiscovery Code: You can add the following code to the header of your index template.php to advertise your feed. Please use a backup! Also please add the code to Textpad or Notetab before adding to your index template.php, otherwise hidden characters and qualities in this document may be transferred.
index.template.php
Code:
// If RSS/XML news is enabled, indicate that an RSS feed is available
if (!empty($modSettings<'xmlnews_enable'>)) {
echo '
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="Most Recent Posts" href="', $scripturl, '?type=rss;action=.xml;limit=20" />
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="News" href="', $scripturl, '?type=rss;action=.xml;sa=news" />';
// If we're in a board or topic, indicate extra RSS feeds for that board.
if (!empty($context<'current_board'>))
echo '
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="This Board Most Recent Posts" href="', $scripturl, '?type=rss;action=.xml;sa=recent;board=', $context<'current_board'>, ';limit=20" />
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="This Board News" href="', $scripturl, '?type=rss;action=.xml;sa=news;board=', $context<'current_board'>, '" />';
}
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-26-06, 11:51 PM (PST)
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6. "Phpbb Pheed"
In response to message #5
LAST EDITED ON Oct-26-06 AT 11:57 PM (PST)
This is very simple to install. Just download.
Then upload the contents of each folder to the same folder on your server or hosting.
For instance there is a folder called "includes" upload the contents of this folder to the folder by the same name on your server or host.
rss.php goes into the root forum folder on your host. All the others go into the appropriate folder.
If you are using a different template than subsilver then you will have to put the appropriate file in the different template.
It may not work 100% of the time in different templates but it did work in the templates I tested.
Here is a summary of the files and what you do with them:
copy rss.php to rss.php
copy includes/rss_config.php to includes/rss_config.php
copy includes/rss_functions.php to includes/rss_functions.php
copy templates/rss.xsl to templates/rss.xsl
copy templates/subSilver/rss_body.tpl to templates/subSilver/rss_body.tpl
copy templates/subSilver/atom_body.tpl to templates/subSilver/atom_body.tpl
You can download the zip for rss for phpbb here:
Phpbb Rss Zip
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-26-06, 11:52 PM (PST)
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7. "Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #6
Forumz Strategies
There are many different Forumz strategies, many you will think of on your own. I will herein give you a beginning to start with.
1) The simplest strategy. Support and boost your forum. News posts create a busy forum, the sense of activity. They give your members something to respond to. They populate your rss feed and give the spiders a reason to keep coming back.
2) Take links from your very own sites. Do you own a lot of sites with feeds. Use those feeds for your new content, give links back to your own sites.
3) Stealth: Mix in a few feeds from feeds that are not your own.
4) Add links to your signature.
5) Post as multiple different people. Each person or feed can have a different sig.
6) Distribute you forum feed. If other sites pick up your feed that will be free links to you.
7) Distribute your forum feed to services such as Technorati.
8) Ping. You can ping manually but the best way to ping is with the optional Pingz. Pingz allows you to set a ping schedule for any site, including your forum. You can set the schedule, you can set up ping proxies, you can add and subtract ping services for as many sites as you want. Definitely recommended.
9) Nurture your forums. Add comments to the posted news feed in the forum. This dedupes the feed and gives it even more legitimacy and value.
10) Create multiple forums as many as you want. Create forums that are primarily for people and others that are primarily for providing links.
11) Using forums for linking purposes in the manner of blogs is new. This gives forums extra power and stealth.
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kelvin brownmoderator
Member since Dec-11-02
331 posts Oct-27-06, 07:48 AM (PST)
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8. "RE: Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #7
Castle,
What is needed to post to a forum that I do not own?
The reason I ask is that it seems that we could easily build a network of forumz users. All posting on topic to each other forums.
Let's say each participant has 5 sites/forums. It would only take a few minutes to find a relavent rss feed to post to each.
With just 10 members, that would have us posting to 50 automatically. A few times a week.
And if you switched up your sig file from time to time, you could quickly have 50 links pointing back to a single site or mulitple sites you own.
Need to build quick PR. Seems that you could quickly get 50 links back to you. In the mean time each site gets 50 or so new post a day or week. Always fresh.
kelvin
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Kurtadmin
Member since Dec-5-02
5886 posts Oct-27-06, 09:36 AM (PST)
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9. "RE: Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #8
LAST EDITED ON Oct-27-06 AT 09:37 AM (PST)
>Castle,
>
>What is needed to post to a forum that I do not own?
>
>The reason I ask is that it seems that we could easily build
>a network of forumz users. All posting on topic to each
>other forums.
>
>
>Let's say each participant has 5 sites/forums. It would only
>take a few minutes to find a relavent rss feed to post to
>each.
>
>With just 10 members, that would have us posting to 50
>automatically. A few times a week.
>
>And if you switched up your sig file from time to time, you
>could quickly have 50 links pointing back to a single site
>or mulitple sites you own.
>
>Need to build quick PR. Seems that you could quickly get 50
>links back to you. In the mean time each site gets 50 or so
>new post a day or week. Always fresh.
Hi Kelvin,
This is actually something I've thought about. Really, all that should be needed is a forum user name/password for each, then set up duplicate projects, substituting the proper URL for each.
If this was done using Scrubz, we could create a lot of good, high quality content/forum posts for eachother.
For example, 7 people select slightly different, but related topics and edit their pheeds using Scrubz once a week.
Each person would only need to spend 10-15 minutes a week, and each would have high quality RSS/news added to their forums every day.
The key would be to find other fourms that have similar themes and topics.
-Boom boom boom boom. John Lee Hooker
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-27-06, 11:00 AM (PST)
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10. "RE: Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #9
Hi Kelvin
I think Kurt answered your question. All that is needed is a user account, name and login, and you can post to a phpbb or SMF forum. I haven't really mentioned this because while it is a good strategy as you and Kurt have suggested I don't want people to randomly start spamming forums. If that happens code will be written to block autoposting.
Castle
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kelvin brownmoderator
Member since Dec-11-02
331 posts Oct-27-06, 12:24 PM (PST)
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11. "RE: Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #10
Castle,
Yes, kurt answered it.
The reason I spoke of a group of members, is so we could figure on most people in the group playing nice, and expecting the auto posts.
Just within our small community we should be able to find 50 to 100 sites to post to.
kelvin
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Castle
Member since Nov-9-03
497 posts Oct-27-06, 11:32 PM (PST)
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12. "RE: Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #11
Kelvin
You are thinking from a clever strategic perspective that I am also interested in. We just need to set a plan in motion.
Castle
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kelvin brownmoderator
Member since Dec-11-02
331 posts Oct-28-06, 09:58 AM (PST)
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13. "RE: Forumz Strategies"
In response to message #12
I see it as very simple, at least to begin with.
And it may require a seperate participation thread. And it may need to be behind closed doors.
Step: 1
create forumz
Step: 2
List the forumz that you have created that you want included in the membership.
Step: 3
List the general requirements for posting in your forumz
example: No more than 1 auto post a day, No more than 3 a week. No more than 5 categories a day.
kelvin
Bombers Please Note: This is a moderated forum and posts need to be approved. Unfortunately I did not realize I could approve posts. I still don't know how to do it. As a result I answered Kelvin in private emails. I am now posting the emails here as this information should have been in the forum. My apologies.
From Kelvin:
Castle,
Can you please explain the details of forumz.
Can't tell if it's the program or me.
==========
I set it to post 2 items.
Then I chose " create new topics for each post". When I do this, I
can't tell where one topic begins and the next ends.
See:
I was hoping to make a new thread for each topic.
http://famousinternetmarketer.com/forums/index.php?topic=8.0
=============
Also, forumz appears to take the content of the whole post. Some
bloggers may have a problem with you coping the whole post.
Question: Can we set a numerical limit. Such as 300 characters?
Kelvin
From Kelvin:
Hi Castle,
I found a minor bug.
When using SMF, forumz returns an " invalid field" error, if you have search engine friendly
URLs turned on.
As soon as I turned it off, the posting worked.
Kelvin
From Castle:
Hi Kelvin
Tuelz is a moderated forum so I can't answer in the forum till the post has been approved, so I will answer here. (private email)
Thanks for the update about the bug.
Kelvin: "Can we set a numerical limit. Such as 300 characters?"
Actually I set a limit of 250 characters. I think it may not be obeying it in phpbb. Here is the delimiter in the code: {description=250}, unless it got changed (by accident) when it was encrypted that is what it should be. (I had thought of making it larger to allow pictures, but that would require an input to set the limit-- that's an idea!)
I will likely have it looked at.
If you choose create a new topic for each post, it does do that but if you set it to 2 or 3 items it puts all those items in one post.
Best work around for that right now is just have more than one poster name, and set it to 1 item.
"Use an existing topic" works best if you enter the topic category in the setup and then it will make all the posts to that category.
And create a topic for all posts is supposed to create a new topic and then put all new posts in that topic. I had some trouble with this but when I tested to recreate the problem for the programmer it worked, yet I have some reservations because I am almost certain it was not.
I will try and have the 250 character limit fixed, and check into the "bug".
Providing I don't make any mis steps this will be done this week.
Castle
From Kelvin:
Thanks for checking into this.
But it seems to me SM that is not obeying the 250 character limit.
http://famousinternetmarketer.com/forums/index.php?topic=8.0
I was testing it to see if i wanted to use it. To take advantage of
your plugin. I like the idea of monteizing the forum.
So, i am actually using 1.07 because I dont have your plugin. Not sure
if that will make a difference.
Kelvin
Also,
if it takes the whole rss feed, it makes its, so you do not want
to autopost to anyone elses, forum.
So you may want to put in a warning, about this.
From Castle:
Kelvin
Thanks for your testing and observations. I am going to look into getting it to obey the 250 character limit, and or having the ability to modify it.
It was obeying initially but at some point it seems to have gone awry. I am wondering if the wrong character number was applied when it was encrypted. I have an unencryped version too, so I will do some experimenting with this.
Providing everything goes OK with me I will get this fixed and provide you with the update.
"So, I am actually using 1.07 because I dont have your plugin. Not sure
if that will make a difference."
Here is the SMF plugin in (as an attachment), if you don't have it. Install the plugin first in 1.07 then upgrade to 1.08 from within Simple Machines. (Do not upgrade to 1.08 before installing the plugin.) Do not extract the plugin! Install it exactly as it is from within SMF. SMF recognizes tar.gz There are video instructions here: http://s174848735.onlinehome.us/
Thanks for your support.
Castle
From Kelvin
Thanks, I will ad this and keep you updated.
NOTE: on phpbb, i noticed that it makes the same post day after day.
This is because the feed was not updated by the blog owner.
Suggestion: Include a way for forumz to note if it already posted the same
exact title in say the last week. Maybe have it cache recent posts, and then
read from the cache, with an if / then statement.
If the cache equals current feed, do not post.
IF the cache does not equal current feed, post now.
This should also be noted on your readme, because it could be embrassing
to keep posting the same thing over and over, not realizing it. That is a sure
way to get banned from posting to other blogs.
Kelvin
From Castle
Kelvin
Thanks for all the good feedback. I will have this looked into also. Providing I am successful in having Forumz updated, I will send the updated version to you once completed (and any other bombers who want it. I will post here when it is done).
Castle
