Aaron Lewis

GuildPortal Dev Blog

Updates from Aaron Lewis, GuildPortal Code Monkey

Entries From Aaron Lewis' Blog

RSS Feeds and a Boo-Boo

Posted 4/18/2012 3:03 PM by Aaron Lewis. 57410 reads. Share:

Going out today:
  • Authenticated RSS feeds (for the guilds that use them) have had their token system changed. You will need to update your links. 
  • Forum read/unread icons sometimes not displaying correctly should be fixed. 
  • The Star Wars: The Old Republic server status widget has been updated to work with the changes they made to their site. 
  • Blog links and posting are now working correctly. 
Now, for the boo-boo. Yesterday, I put a trigger on the Shouts table of the database that fired when a new shout was entered. The idea was, it would take the oldest shouts over the count of 50 and delete them. Kind of a self-cleaning thing, for performance. Only, I pulled the ones to be deleted back in the wrong date order. The result was, the trigger ended up wiping the newest 50 shouts. 

I'm very, very sorry about that. 

Some Enhancements and Fixes

Posted 4/16/2012 4:32 PM by Aaron Lewis. 62778 reads. Share:

Today's update includes the following:
  • A rendering fix for the iPhone (things were getting squished!).
  • The addition of tagging functionality to the custom status change notifications for calendar events. You can now include [username], [eventname] and [eventdateandtime] in your notifications, and they will be dynamically replaced in the messages that are sent out to the recipient.
  • A bug that caused the custom emoticons section of the control panel to go all whacky has been fixed.
  • Forum icons now align more towards the top, by the forum title. This will help with forums that have a lot of sub-forums.
  • Sub-forum icons will now show up when viewing them alongside the topics listing of their parent forum.
  • The standard roster will no longer show characters without names.
  • The control panel has been cleaned up a bit.
  • Blogs now support custom CSS + HTML.

Better HTML + CSS Support is Here!

Posted 4/7/2012 4:15 PM by Aaron Lewis. 25852 reads. Share:

GuildPortal has just been dramatically improved when it comes to using custom HTML + CSS. First, we've added a "Navigation" selection in the Control Panel (under Custom HTML). Clicking that takes you to three editors. You can modify the code that is output before navigation items (pages on your site), the code that is output for navigation items, and the code that is output after navigation items.

Once you specify the code, you can then use the Full Page custom HTML editor's new tag, $block[nav=html], and your pages will be rendered as the page loads, using your mark-up.

Also, three more tags have been added to the Full Page HTML: leftwidgets, centerwidgets, and rightwidgets. You no longer have to stick with designs that render the main widget body in a tabular format, and can control exactly where your widgets appear.

A new option has been added that prevents GuildPortal from rendering any style information based on your point-and-click settings in the Style Tools area of the Control Panel. This makes it so the only style info comes from your custom CSS, without any interference from GP, except for a few helper rules for margins and the like. You can enable this option in the Control Panel by expanding Custom HTML, selecting Custom CSS, selecting the Full Custom CSS tab, and checking the box at the bottom that says "Disable all GuildPortal CSS Output".

Finally, editors for all of the custom HTML, custom CSS and custom Javascript selections in the Control Panel have been enhanced with the CodeMirror editor, which provides syntax hilighting and automatic tag completion.

These enhancements, in combination with the already existing Banner, Footer, Widgets, and Full Page custom HTML and Custom CSS, provide complete control over how your site looks. Now you can bring your favorite templates from anywhere -- and there are a lot of free template sites out there. Oh, hey, and if you find any really great ones and port them to your GuildPortal site, share them, it's easy! Just open the Control Panel, expand Style Tools, and then click Share Theme.

Here's a snap of a theme developed using custom HTML and CSS from a freely-available one meant for a completely different system:

Events Enhancements and More

Posted 3/30/2012 5:43 PM by Aaron Lewis. 25710 reads. Share:

Big enhancements to the calendar system have been made over the past couple of weeks! Here's what's been done:

Event Submissions : Associate-level and higher members of your site are now able to submit events for approval by events admins. When they view the calendar, they have a new button in the top right-hand corner:



When they submit the event, event admins are notified via web mail. When they go to the calendar, if there are any submissions pending, they see the following:



Clicking the button shows them the details of the event, and gives them the option to Approve, Approve and Edit, or Reject the submission.

Simplified Sign-Up: Signing up to an event no longer requires multiple steps. Members can now sign up directly while viewing the event:


In-Line Sign-Up Admin: Like the sign-ups, administrating status and role of sign-ups by event admins has been simplified to a couple of drop-down boxes that appear in-line while viewing the event:


Enter Loot Drops from the Event: Entering drops for an event used to require several steps. Now, it's right there in the event view and much more efficient:


Enter / select the item that dropped. If you start typing the name of the item, a drop-down appears with matching items that have dropped for your guild previously. You can then use your arrow keys or mouse to select any match, or just type in the name of the item if it's something that hasn't dropped before:



Selection of the person who received the item works in the same way. You begin typing, and a list appears with matches:



Here's a partial list of the rest of what's been done over the past couple weeks:
  • New topics default to "subscribed."
  • E-mail notification is sent out when you receive web-based mail.
  • Users can delete their own posts unless the admin disallows it by clicking Edit under their forums, Options, and then checking "Disallow users from deleting their own posts."
  • Ventrilo server status was fixed.
  • The calendar now lets you choose between Monday or Sunday as the first day of the week (click Edit under the calendar, go to Display Options, and select the day from the "First Day of Week").
  • Fixed duplicate characters appearing on the default roster.
  • Added two new widgets: Rift Addons: Hottest and Rift Addons: Newest.
  • Event categories now support a background image, which appears on the large calendar display. To configure event categories, click Edit under your calendar, and then Event Categories.
  • Multiple events may now be deleted at once from the calendar editor by checking the boxes and clicking "Delete Selected."
  • The EverQuest 2 auto-roster has been fixed.
  • The forum icon legend now shows if you have custom forum icons, but can be disabled by clicking Edit under your forums, clicking Options, and checking the "Disable forum/topic icon legends" box.
  • Selected character fields now show up in event sign-ups.
  • An asterisk is displayed next to events that you have signed up for in the main calendar view.
  • If there are applicants awaiting approval, the member admin link flashes.
  • Many Web Fonts have been added and can be selected for your widget titles and widget body areas by going to the Control Panel > Style Tools > Content Boxes (Widgets). Not all of the fonts work with Internet Explorer.
  • Other miscellaneous bug fixes. =)

Mizus RaidTracker and More

Posted 2/14/2012 9:45 AM by Aaron Lewis. 20001 reads. Share:

GuildPortal now supports the Mizus RaidTracker third party Add-On for WoW guilds when used with the EQdkp Plus XML export option for loot drops. Because of its superior functionality and popularity, it replaces the GPHelper add-on for this functionality. For more information, open an event follow-up and select the Loot Drops option.

Aside from numerous other minor bug fixes, the following also went live:
  • Event sign-ups are now numbered.
  • "New Activity" link from forums main view shows you new topics since the last time you logged in.
  • Tooltips of most recent posts have been improved, especially for quoted items.
  • "Deleted" shown in sent items next to read status when recipient deleted the item.
  • Selected mail folder now bold.
  • Fixed info section editing problem.
  • Multi-event days now say which event is blocked from sign-ups, or available to be signed up to.
  • Fix for bug when editing an alliance event.