Version 6.0 suggestions

[Mitchell]

Hi,

I know that this is not a bug but it is a request for perhaps version 6.0 and I didn’t know where else to post it;

As you see on my directory below I have all Australian 8 states and each state has its categories, such as photography, video, florists, etc.
http://www.weddingsonly.com.au/index.php

Now when some one add a link, can I set it up some how that they can select the state or states first and then select the categories? At this point we can add three categories only but what about if a supplier or link belongs to all states (national)?

Can we change this some how?
Can we also be able to select more than three categories?
Now another thing can we charge extra for extra categories or national links?

I think these option are important to many users and will be nice to be included in version 6.0

Here is an example of what I am talking about
http://www.weddingsonly.com.au/directory/advertise.php

Another question, can I just add <%$add_cat3%> , 4, 5 ... etc to the add_form.html, or I have to add them to another application too, where are these commands connented to?

Regards
Mitchell

[esm]

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The only thing you can do is add the link more than once. In your case, you would have to add the link three times.

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Unless you perform some major hacking to INDEX, the simple answer is NO.

As much as I think dody is a very good programmer (a helluva lot better than I am), the multiple category feature of INDEXU is a major joke. The sooner he fixes it the better. I created a true multiple category MOD for v3.2 and it is not all that hard to do. And if I can do it, I have no doubt dody could do it and do it a lot better.

Until dody, fixes it, I recommend everyone, with a few exceptions, avoid multiple categories in INDEXU. It works but....



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[Mitchell]

Nicecoder is an excellent script but one of the most important functions in a directory is categories and this is a very weak, three only? If you can have three I am sure that there should be a way to have more than three, it shouldn't be that hard, is it? I not a programmer at all and have no idea about PHP but when I look at the coding I can work things out and add some functions BUT VERY, VERY SLOW.

Also most directories belong to a country so it will be nice to be able to select the state that link or supplier is located in.

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I can ask one or two person to add their link more than once but how can you ask every one. and if so how can you manage payments, etc. especially when your database gets bigger?

I am sure if this problem is solved more people will buy the script as well, I have been playing with this script since last year, I like it very much but because of its limitations I can not move my directories to IndexU yet. Right now I am using my own customized OSCommerce but …

Here are a couple of them;
http://www.weddingsonly.com.au/directory/
http://www.weddinghost.com.au/directory/

[mpdaddy]

It is possible to add more than 3 categories. But as ESM said, it requires some major hacking of the core code. I actually made a mod to have up to 5 categories, but decided not to release it because it had a very intensive installation. I agree that the script needs an upgrade in this area, but I am sure it will not happen anytime soon. Maybe it will be re-done for IndexU 7.0.

Also, I am just curious. How many categories can you submit to at Yahoo or DMOZ? I don't know what you are trying to accomplish exactly, but why not make a National category. In reality, how many site owners want the same site in 50 seperate categories?

Wayne

[esm]

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I wanted a truely unlimited number of additional categories (at least from a programing standpoint). So instead of adding additional fields, I ended up creating another table to hold the additional categories.

Since I first started using INDEXU over 5 years ago, I've always thought that INDEXU needed two things. An advertising banner feature and multiple categories. That same year - 2003 - I created MODs for both for v3.2.

And inspireme has a MOD for banners which I may look at when v6.0 is released.

And whenever INDEXU DELUXE v6.0 is released, it doesn't look like either of those two features will be included. And that's unfortunate. Truely unfortunate.




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[Bruceper]

With Yahoo, dmoz, the Google directory, hotbot, askjeeves and many others only permit 1 category per submission

[Mitchell]

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The problem with creating a national category is that for example;



If one searches for lets say a photographer in a single state such as New South Wales they can not see nationally listed suppliers (as you see in my site below), so they have to search the national category as well to find them. So more work, each supplier has to list him/herself in each individual state as well as nationally or hack the script to automatically list any nationally listed supplier in all states as well! Lot of my suupliers wnat to list their sites in more that one state and more than one category.

http://www.weddingsonly.com.au/index.php



Not all directories are huge like Yahoo or Dmoz, because we are small so we have to have some thing different to the big ones to attract new advertisers to our directory; otherwise they may as well stay with Yahoo or Dmoz, etc. Also every one needs the script for a different reason, some use it the same way as Dmoz does and some may need it the way I do.



As ESM said too Banner is a very important feature, this is an advertising tool and it has to do its job, some might be happy with even less features but I am sure that there are a few who can do with more. We can sit there and say well the other scripts have only that many, etc. and keep the IndexU the same as what it is now but our recommendation if is taken seriously will only make it more popular and sought after script, that means more sales and revenue, more support and much stronger script, what do we have to lose by adding extra features to it, if one doesn’t need it won’t have to use it.



As I mentioned before I am using my own customized OSCommerce to have a similar one but it is not a directory, it is a shopfront so I have to do every thing myself in the admin area, banner has as been there any way

http://www.weddinghost.com.au/directory



At the end of the day IndexU works (up to some extend) perhaps more than what some people need but a few others need more features. These are all recommendations to make the script better and more attractive or sought after.

[Mitchell]

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Hi Wayne,

Would you mind kindly telling me which files need to be changed to add more categories please? I do not mind to play around a litle bit!
Cheers
Mitchell

[dody]

I'll bring this issue for indexu 7
I think it's something like 'custom field' for category.

[Mitchell]

Would some one tell me which files I need to change to add more categories please?

Thanks
Mitchell

[inspireme]

its not as easy as changing a few files, you would need to modify many many php files, it really is quite a major mod... personally i would drop the idea and work with what you have, or see if mpdaddy will send you more information ( iw ouldnt knwo where to start with it!)

[Mitchell]

Thanks mate, well I hope mpdaddy replies my note and kindly send me some info.

[esm]

the starting point would be the link.class.php. and then category.class.php. look for a variable with a name or partial name of cat1 or cat2. i think i've also seen something about a css file. also browse.php. then browse.html. look for additional_category.

if MODs are classified as easy, moderate or difficult, this would probably be difficult.

One of the problems will be downloading the category file. for example, the add.php file already downloads the whole file 3 times. did I see where that has been improved in v5.4?


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[mpdaddy]

To be honest, I spent over a week working on this and still had quite a few bugs to work out. I then moved on to a different project. It has been a few months since I tried and I did not comment my code. I still have the files I modified, but there are a lot of them and I don't remember the changes I made. I would basically have to start over. It can be done, but it is a major project.

For starters you would need to edit the category, link, and misc class files. Then comes the add.php, ajax.php, browse, detail, modify, power search, and the list goes on and on. Then comes the template and admin files. You would think it would be easy, but it's not. I had easily modified 20 files when I stopped working on it.

This would be somewhat difficult project if you were writing the whole script from scratch. Adding it to IndexU and making the changes reflect in different sections of the script is a major undertaking.

I think I might look into getting it working after version 6 is released if there is enough interest.

Sorry for the slow reply, I took a few days off to spend with the family. My idea of a mini holiday.

[mpdaddy]

I forgot to add. The way I was calling the categories was to seperate each category a link was submitted to by a comma. In the idx_link table under "category_id" it would show something like 1,15,35,45 (submitted to 4 different categories). That way you don't have cat1, cat2, cat3, cat4 rows in the database. This allows for virtually unlimited categories.

On the add.php page it would have a multiselect box where they can select up to an unlimited number of categories. Admin can define the maximum number of categories to allow users to select.