Plugin with multi-widget functionality that builds an SMF Forum RSS2 feed url by user option choices; and, displays a SMF forum feed. The widget includes the additional option to include in the feed: specific boards and/or specific categories. There are also check boxes to include the feed item date and the item summary, too.
Recent Changelog:
== Changelog ==
= 1.2 =
* added feed refresh frequency (in seconds) option
* added new screenshot of option panel
= 1.1.1 =
* compatibility check for 2.9.1 completed
= 1.1 =
* added drop-down menu to option panel to choose feed type, default set to RSS2
* updated the Option Panel screen shot
NB: Although the plugin functions correctly there are some instances when this error will occur in versions of WordPress 2.8.6 or below:
- Warning: gzinflate() [function.gzinflate]: data error in ../wp-includes/http.php on line 1787
Simply refresh your page and the error message will go away. Once your blog has been updated to WordPress 2.9 this error should no longer occur.
100 Responses
100 Comments
Hi, I just installed your plugin on my site and it works great. Only one thing though, it doesn’t seem to update as soon as the a post is made on SMF. I was wondering if there’s a way around this, or to increase the frequency of the feed made from SMF? Is there any disadvantage of increasing the frequency? Thanks!
@Azari – Thanks for choosing BNS SMF Feeds. I have not reviewed any sort of feed polling, yet. The frequency of updates is also generally related to where and how the feed is being generated. Increasing the frequency via SMF would be fine, I see no reason or potential disadvantages except possibly a small server resource usage increase.
Hello again, thanks for your reply.
Website: http://www.tanggam.com
How do I control where and how the feed is being generated? Currently I’m using WordPress as the frontpage of my community forum (SMF), and I have full access to both. I’m not particularly fluent in programming, as I’m learning this on the go. So excuse me if I don’t quite catch certain terms that you use ;).
@Azari – The plugin creates the feed link, but as to the frequency of the feed being generated I cannot say. I have not looked that deep into the SMF code in some time; and, I mostly only manage SMF sites now. You may be able to find an SMF modification that can control the feed frequency at http://simplemachines.org
Thanks again for your reply and for pointing me in the right direction.
FYI … I have just added a new option that allows you to set the feed refresh frequency. I hope this will better fit yours and others needs with this plugin. Enjoy!
You know what, that is EXACTLY the thing I need. I’m sure others will to!
Rep up!
Hi,
I have just installed your plugin and it works like a charm!!!! I just want to ask one question.
Is there a way to open the forum in a new window instead of the same, when the links will be clicked?
Thx in advance for your help
Greetings from the snowy Germany
Manu
@Manu – Thank you for choosing BNS SMF Feeds! I will look into what you are asking and reply back here.
@Manu – If you delve into the heart of the plugin code … around line 151 … change:
echo "<li><a class='bns-smf-feeds rsswidget' href='$link' title='$desc'>$title</a>{$date}{$summary}{$author}</li>";… to:
echo "<li><a class='bns-smf-feeds rsswidget' href='$link' target='_blank' title='$desc'>$title</a>{$date}{$summary}{$author}</li>";This will cause the post/topic links to open in a new window/tab via the target=’_blank’ parameter. I may add this as an option to a future update, until them please make note of this change as it will be over-written otherwise.
FYI … version 1.3 adds this option.
Thx a lot for your help and the update of the plugin! 😀
Just a little note, is there a way to open the the link of the wiget-title in a new window too?
For example at my site the title is “Recent Forum Posts” – I don’t know to explain it better. :-s
@Manu – I will look into it …
PS: After further review it made sense to make all links within the widget follow the same rule to open in a new window or not. Version 1.3.1 will now have the widget title and the RSS icon follow the same “open in new window” option as the feed items.
Just installed this plugin and it works great!
on thing tho! im running two wordpress blogs (with the same SMF forum), My blogs url is: http://dailymobile.se/ and http://dailyiphoneblog.com/ this plugin works fine on dailymobile and it shows the latest 10 posts, but the same plugin wont work on the iphone blog. it doesnt display any of the feed url / latest posts. its just empty.
Any idea on how i can fix this? would be nice to use this plugin on both my blogs.
thx
@Phat^Trance – Thank you for choosing the BNS SMF Feeds plugin. I recreated your RSS feed URL with the plugin on one of my test servers and it is showing the items from your forum. I cannot see what would be causing it to “not work” on your specific blog.
Hi,
very good pluginf. After same problem with RSS i have solved and now work fine.
Thank you. The only plugin wich work fine!
Andrea.
@Andrea – You are welcome! I am glad the plugin is working fine for you.
Hi, Edward! I’m presently testing an SMF/WordPress solution on a “dead” site belonging to a friend. I’m using your great plugin (love it!) and the WordPress Post to SMF(I’ll call it WP2SMF) plugin (also works!).
With WP2SMF, when I add a new WP post, a new SMF topic/post is automagically added, in the category I specify. The SMF post has an excerpt of my WP post (as long as I want it to be, up to full text) and a link back to the WP post.
I can add a link to the WP template which suggests commenting in the forum, and which takes the user directly to that WP post’s thread in SMF.
Problem: If users can’t see the SMF comments for that post, they likely won’t want to go exploring the SMF forum. They’ll use the WP commenting if it’s available, or not comment at all.
Your plugin pulls the most recent posts from all or specified topics or boards in SMF.
I’m after a slight modification, which would require me to insert code in my template to replace the existing comments section. Here’s what I’m looking to do:
Once I publish my new WP post and it has been created in SMF, I find at the bottom of my post a link to the topic with the number of comments (that is, number of SMF posts) on that specific topic. Below this, a modification of your plugin provides excerpts (or full text) of the first, say, 5-10 comments on that specific topic. (Dynamically generated variable.)
All commenting would be carried out in the SMF, but there would be visible “commenting action” shown on the individual WP post pages, enough to draw users into the discussion and leave them wanting more.
Any thoughts on how to get there?
I tried doing this with bbPress (WordPress’s integratable forum software) but it just doesn’t get adequate development attention, and there’s nothing that works to get where I want to be (there once was, but now it’s broken). And I’m a writer, dammit, not a programmer!
This could be a great way to really build community on a website.
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!
@JennyD – This line of thought sounds very interesting to build additional internal linking for your blog, but I do not believe the BNS SMF Feeds plugin offers the immediate functionality you are looking for. As you stated:
The plugin cannot manage topic related feeds, it only works to display board and category feeds, the SMF software does not generate a feed expressly for Topics.
Besides the issue above, incorporating the necessary code into a theme as you describe it above would be a significant re-working of the current plugin.
Edward –
I was afraid of that. But I did think SMF allowed a “subscribe to this topic”. Am I wrong?
@JennyD – There may be a mod that allows for that, but to the best of my knowledge it is not part of the core SMF forum, although I do admit I have not focused on the inner working of the software for some time.
Awesome work with this plugin! I love it.
I have two feature requests:
1) I’d like to have “Click here to participate” or similar link at the bottom after topics. It’d be nice to have the ability to change this text to whatever I like from the widget settings
2) There should be an option to remove the RSS-picture and link. I know I can hide them with CSS but removing it would be better 😉
Thanks!
@Teemu – Thank you for the compliments. I will add your ideas to my suggestions list for this plugin. A couple of related questions:
1) Are you describing a link to the forum in general or the specific link to the topic?
2) The RSS icon is tied to the feed “Title”, are you suggesting to have just a simple text title that is not linked to anything as the alternative?
Feel free to write these code changes yourself and submit them for inclusion, just use the form on our Contact Us page, or email me directly if you are interested.
Yes I was curious if there was a way i can shorten the forum titles that shown up in the WP sidebar so they fit one line and if there was a way to better organize how the displayed forum links in the widget are displayed. For example, have each featured forum title right under eachother…no paragraphs.
@Crono – Thanks for choosing the BNS SMF Feeds plugin. As to the details being displayed, by default the plugin only displays the forum post titles. May I suggest reviewing the settings you are using.
Oh and if there was a way to edit the title itself. It’s centering in the sidebar for me (when all all widgets are aligned to the left) and maybe hide the RSS icon? Check my site for an example (URL is in my name).
@Crono – I would suggest “hiding” the RSS icon and removing the padding to see how that changes your layout. Look at adding additional lines in your style.css file such as these:
li.bns-smf-feeds h2 a img { display:none; } li.bns-smf-feeds h2 a { padding-left: 0; }One more question. How do I shorten the forum post summary that is shown in the widget?
@Crono – Shortening the “description” would require more code than what would be easily presented here. Although it is an interesting idea it is not one that I have any immediate plans to pursue at this time.
I get an error –
Warning: gzinflate() [function.gzinflate]: data error in D:\xampp\htdocs\Armyblog\wp-includes\http.php on line 1787
[Removed core code sample]
Any idea is where the problem – Plugin works – but above widget i get above mentioned error
Thanks in advance
@Spel – You appear to be using WordPress version 2.8, please update.
Another one issue –
Is there any option to get slider – I have forum which aggregate lots of new topics whole day (every one connected to our area of interest) – is it possible that for instance I write that I want 200 rss feeds (only names of topics with link to the smf forum), but only first 10-15 will be visible – others will be visible using slider
@Spel – That option does not exist but you are welcome to modify the plugin to add a “slider” if you wish. Feel free to submit the code back to me and I will review it for inclusion into future versions. At this time I do not have plans to add one myself.
Hi.
I have a wordpress site at http://www.centralcomics.com and a SMF at http://www.centralcomics.com/forum
So, the plugin pulls the WP comments instead of SMF topics.
Why is this happening?
Thanks,
Hugo
@Jesus – I check the feed from your forums and it appears to be requiring a
session_idbe part of the feed. Unfortunately the plugin does not include that functionality, yet. Beyond that difference I cannot say why the plugin is returning your comments in place of the forum entries. When I tested it using your forum URL it returnedNULL, which is very odd by itself.Hi!
This plugin is really great 😉
i have different website with WP+SMF.. in all i have pick the smf feed (with the
?type=rss%3baction=.xml%3bsa=newsstring) and in some cases, convert it in feedburner feeds. In both cases, the feeds works perfectly, with an adeguate refresh rate etc, but when i added the feeds in the blog with the WP RSS widget.. i have found some problem with the refresh of the WP widget (missing topic after refresh, and very long time from one refresh to another).This until 2 days ago 😀 😀
Now, with this plugin all works fine, and i have “eliminated” the standard WP rss widget 😉
Like the user “Crono”, i have removed the little rss icon, because i have already one rss icon in the forum, with the feedburner link. 😉
@Slayer – That’s great to read. I’m glad the plugin is working well for you.
I have a website at http://batmanarkhamcity.org, with the forum at http://batmanarkhamcity.org/forum.
The plugin seems to be pulling my recent blog posts into it rather than recent forum posts. Any idea on this? Do I need to have my forum and wp site bridged for this to work?
@BAC – I just tested this on one of my servers and was able to pull in your forum posts correctly.
Please review your setting for the plugin; it appears you are missing the last “/” of the forum address. This will point the rss feed reader back to your own website and you will see your recent posts as you noted.
Thanks Ed, that fixed it.
Btw, for anyone looking to get rid of the RSS icon, I just removed the img on line 467 of bns-smf-feeds.php and that did it.
@BAC – You’re welcome! As to removing the RSS image, my preference would be to add a line to the end of the theme style.css file, like this:
a.bns-smf-feeds img { display:none; }That way when the plugin is updated you won’t have to edit it; of course that will not help if the theme you are using is updated …
Thanks Ed, that worked as well! Great plugin you’ve got here!
I just installed this plugin and am very happy with it. It’s so nice to have immediate updates.
There is one feature that I would like and I am not sure if it is present with some easy tweaking or not.
Currently, the only two options are topics and posts to update. But what I am looking for is the ability to have the most recently active topic moved to the top.
What I mean is, unlike updating posts, there is no repeat topic, but unlike updating topics, a more recently commented topic would move above a new topic.
I hope that makes sense. Let me know if there is anything I can do. Thanks for the great plugin!
@Seth – The plugin simply creates a correctly formed URL for the RSS feed(s) generated by an SMF installation; I had not made any plans to extend that functionality any further especially given the unpredictable future status of the SMF software.
Hi,
Thanks for this great plugin… I am calling my forum thru an Iframe.
Is there a way that when someone clicks on a new forum message (in the widget), that this one would be called thru an Iframe too… Sorry for my poor english… here is an example of what I mean:
The forum called with an Iframe: http://www.voyage-moto.be/?page_id=991
and here without: http://www.voyage-moto.be/forum/index.php
I am calling it thru a page with this command: [iframe http://www.voyage-moto.be/forum/index.php 100% 2000px]
Thanks for your help.
@Klaus – Thanks for using the BNS SMF Feeds plugin! As to linking from the widget to the forum post via an iframe I would suggest looking at lines 154 through 158 and try modifying that part of the widget code. Be sure to make backups first though!
hi! i cant make this widget to work on my website… it keeps on saying this.
RSS Error: A feed could not be found at http://www.swimbikerun.ph/smf/index.php?type=rdf;action=.xml;sa=recent;board=;c=;limit=8
any help would be really appreciated.
@Carlos – Unfortunately I am able to re-create this error message, but as far as I can tell your SMF installation is not producing an RSS feed under any format. This plugin only reads the feed, it does not actually create one itself. Please check your SMF configuration to insure everything is correctly installed.
hi edward! I already had the widget working before. I experienced the same thing when I was first setting it up the feeds werent showing up but then for some reason it just worked.
I deactivated the widget since I was working with my sidebar and then when I put it back, it doesnt work anymore
@Carlos – If you reverse the changes you made to the sidebar does the plugin work again? The plugin working prior to you “working on” the sidebar, but does not work now, would have me thinking the sidebar “work” needs to be reviewed.
Hi there,
Perfect for my needs and its working here at Pinoy Android…
Thank you very much!
PinoyDROID
I’m glad the BNS SMF Feed plugin was able to help you with your site. Thank you!
I noticed that you commented a few months ago in the wordpress support forums about adding a shortcode to the plugin so it could be placed in a page or post. Is this feature still in development? It is something that I would be interested in as well.
@Calvin – Thanks for the reminder … I will have to look into this still but I imagine its possible; most likely just need to address the output versus adding the shortcode.
Hi,
Since yesterday, I am always getting this error:
Erreur RSS : XML error: Undeclared entity error at line 20, column 22
any idéa, it has been working just fine for months.
Thanks for your help.
@Klaus – I’m not seeing this issue when I test using your forum address. Are you still seeing a problem?
Hi,
Yes I am still getting this error using firefox, using IE I am not getting the error, but it does not show the new messages either…
Very weird… now everything came back to normal….
Sorry to have bother you…
Hi ..is there a shortcode i can use ..so i could place the output of forum in a wp-page or post?
Thank you
:-))
@Rg – There is no ‘shortcode’ … yet. Seems like a great idea though, I will add it to my TO-DO list for the plugin. Thanks!
Hey There! Great plugin, really helps out when increasing traffic to forums!
I just have one question: I have a problem creating multiples PAGE IDs on the plugin, as it will only show the first. I’ve tried just about anything lol. What I’m I missing?
@Tor – I am not sure what you are looking for with “multiple PAGE IDs” as the plugin appears to be working as expected. Are you trying to get a different parameter set for the plugin depending which page you are displaying it on?
🙂 Basicay what I want is to specify to only show two Boards. However, whenever I type in more than one ID for the boards that I want. Only one shows up :/
@Tor – I see what you are referring to now. The plugin basically “builds” the URL for the feed using the functionality found in the SMF forums. Although I cannot say for an absolute fact, what I am seeing indicates the feed URL does not accept parameters that would include multiple specific boards from the forum. I rarely do any work with SMF forums now, and essentially only maintain this widget to meet current WordPress functionality. I do not have any specific time-line to look into reviewing the SMF forum code to see if they changed their feed URL parameters but will add it to this plugins TO-DO list for future reference.
You might consider multiple instances of the widget if that is the case, where each widget is assigned a specific board feed to display.
I see the problem, I’ll use your multiple instances. Solves the problem anyways 🙂
I’ll look forward to that upgrade non the less.
Other than that, simple and great plugin! 🙂 Saves my day everyday!
@Tor – I’m glad my suggestion will work for you. I’ll try to remember to send you a note if I specifically update for multiple board functionality … it would be nice to have.
Thanks, again, for using BNS SMF Feeds, too!
Hi
I am not sure if this helps Tor or anyone else. Use categorie IDs ..whatever the latest post in any board will show, which will make you look even fresher
list IDs such as 1,2,3,ect separate ID numbers with a comma as shown. You find categorie IDs via your Admin panel.
Hope this helps.
Hi,
Thanks for your plugin. I’ve been using it for a while and it works great.
However, I upgraded to version 1.7 today and it’s been showing an error: Warning: Missing argument 3 for BNS_SMF_Feeds_Widget::widget(), called in /home/kudizone/public_html/wp-includes/widgets.php on line 182 and defined in /home/kudizone/public_html/wp-content/plugins/bns-smf-feeds/bns-smf-feeds.php on line 230
Warning: Missing argument 4 for BNS_SMF_Feeds_Widget::widget(), called in /home/kudizone/public_html/wp-includes/widgets.php on line 182 and defined in /home/kudizone/public_html/wp-content/plugins/bns-smf-feeds/bns-smf-feeds.php on line 230.
It still goes ahead to display the feeds, though. But how can I stop it from displaying that error? I use a network installation of WordPress. The address is http://kudizone.com. Thanks.
@Kudizone – Thanks for notifying me of this issue, it was a minor item I missed correcting during this last update cycle. Version 1.7.1 (just released, should be available in the next few minutes or so) should correct it.
It works perfectly now. Thanks a lot!
@Kudizone – You’re Welcome!
Hey thanks for the download and tutorial! This is a great plugin that anyone can use. I will share with others. Thanks again!!
@Jason – Thanks for the comments, it would have been nice to see this plugin in use on your site …
Hi there,
I use wordpress 3.3.1 and smf 2.0.2getting the following error:
RSS Error: A feed could not be found at http://.. .com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rssindex.php?type=rss;action=.xml;sa=recent;board=;c=;limit=5
I tried all possible rss feed variations that i am aware of,
../forum/index.php?action=.xml
../forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss
but so far no luck.any kind of help appreciated,thanks
Regards
@Sergio – This appears to be the same issue as the comment by @TKG26, please see my reply there.
Hello i am trying to get your widget working on my site. But i am having some trouble. IF i enter my rss feed with the http:// i get the following error: “RSS Error: A feed could not be found at http://www.rcottawa.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rssindex.php?type=rss;action=.xml;sa=recent;board=;c=;limit=10”
But if i enter my RSS feed without the http:// infront of it, the widget does not show up at all. The feed i grabbed from my RSS source page simply starts off with www. Any ideas?
my site is http://www.rcottawa.com
feed is for this forum http://www.rcottawa.com/forum
The actual feed is: view-source:http://www.rcottawa.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss
@TKG26 – Based on the URL you have provided I was able to set the plugin to generate a correct feed URL; but from what I am seeing in your references the feed link that is returning an “RSS Error” is also malformed. If you are still having issues please send my a screenshot of the widget options panel will all of your settings selected so I can troubleshoot this further.
Dont ask why?? LOL But tried setting it up using IE instead of Chrome my usual browser. Im not sure if this is why or not. But i grabbed the RSS feed info using IE.. I think what might be the issue is the # at the end of the feed link i found.
http://www.rcottawa.com/forum/index.php?action=.xml;type=rss#
Anyway take a look now at http://www.rcottawa.com its seems to be working on both browsers now.
thanks again for the help
@TKG26 – I’m glad it sorted itself out, but I will still add this to my notes for review with the next release. Thanks for the feedback on this plugin.
Hello. I have a problem with this plugin. It doesn’t display all the recent posts (it’s not about exceeding the “maximum amount of items to be displayed”) – from what I see, it only shows posts from one specific category, even though I haven’t specified one in the forum URL. I use the following feed “URL”:
../index.php?type=rss;action=.xml;
Any idea why this is?
@Dege – Without the actual feed URL to see what is being output by it I cannot tell what the issue might be. The most common issue with all posts not showing is the forum requires the user to be logged in to read it, the plugin only has access as a “guest” and will only display what is “publicly” available.
Hi Edward,
Great plugin. I’ve been using it for about 2 months. One question. I would like to display the output of the plugin within a page or right after the page content. I mean instead of showing the recent posts in a widget area it would show them on the front page of my blog. Is there a shortcode I can put into a post/page or php code I can put into my wordpress theme to get it to show up? Thanks.
There currently is no “shortcode” included with the plugin, but it is a good idea and I will look at adding it for the next update.
Version 1.8 is ready to be deployed to the WordPress Extend Plugins repository … just have to wait for them to bring it online. In the meantime you can download the latest version from my GitHub at: https://github.com/Cais/bns-smf-feeds
Hi Edward,
Thanks for updating the plugin. For the shortcode we put bns_smf_feeds(); into the php section of the site? Is there a way to specify options such as including the item description and how many items etc? Thanks.
OK … version 1.8 is now live in the WordPress repository. Check the ‘readme’ file (and the links in it) regarding basic usage of the shortcode.
Hi Edward,
Got it working, thanks for including this feature.
You’re welcome. Thanks for reminding me the feature needed to be added.
Hi Edward
I’m coming across an issue with not being able to define which SMF boards and categories to display within WordPress 3.4.2. Leaving these fields blank (default) will work, but when I enter the ID’s of the boards and categories to display (via the Widget) I am receiving the following error:
An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.”
Can you please advise as to what the issue may be? Thanks!
@Toivo – Thank you for trying the BNS SMF Feeds plugin but at a minimum I will need to know the forum URL for me to be able to make any suggestions as to how to address this issue. The error you are reporting is one I have not seen before either … I cannot say at this time what the root cause would be either without the forum URL.
Hi Edward, firsts thing first, great plugin! thank you for your work.
Here’s the thing, when I activate the plug in and place it on my home page and articles single pages, the wordpress installation becomes really really slow, taking up to 30″ to load.
What could be causing this? Is there a particular setting to take care of?
Thanks!
@Edgardo – Thanks for choosing the plugin. This is the first report of a slow-down in site speed due to the plugin. If anything it would be the return of the RSS feed from the SMF site if anything that would be affecting speed. All the plugin does is essentially create an RSS feed URL that WordPress can parse and display using core functionality. The same functionality used in other places in a WordPress installation.
For some reason, this is displaying my WordPress recent posts instead of Forum posts. I’ve checked that the SMF XML feed is working.
@Kelly – I didn’t see the plugin installed on your site … I’d be happy to help try to sort this out but as far as I can tell the plugin is working well in all of my tests.
Hi Edward.
==> http://abracadabraPDF.net
Your plugin works great but I have an issue and a question:
– The title is red, the same red as the background color, so it’s invisible (this red is the color for hyperlinks too…).
How can I force the title to white, even by removing its hyperlink (not really necessary since topics are hyperlinks too).
– How can remove the RSS icon?
Thanks.
@JRB – The BNS SMF Feeds plugin does not set any styles at all, it will simply be displayed how your theme renders it. If you need to make any changes I would suspect they would be theme related and if necessary you may need to add some custom CSS.
As to removing the RSS icon (which it appears you have?) look around line 209 for the code that renders it to the page.
Yes, it’s OK for the icon.
How can I just remove the hyperlink for the title?
I removed some code, and now instead of a red hyperlink it display a gray hyperlink, I guess there is some other code elsewhere…
Thanks.
@JRB – Remove lines 208 through 211 and the plugin will not add a hyperlink (or the RSS icon) to the title. Just remember to make back-ups of your changes for reference as the next plugin update will over-write them.
That’s OK.
Thank you very very very much for your help and for your plugin.
Don’ t hesitate to ask me if ever you need something related to PDF files.
😉
@JRB – Thanks! I’m glad you are able to make use of the plugin.