Extra info in free listings ?!

[ideavirus]

Hello,

We all know, its possible to add free listings to categories. However, lets say, i want to allow certain premuim listings who wanna add more info to their listing, can i do that. i mean only selective listings can have that info.

<Example>

hostoholic.com being hosting directory, lets say a particular hosting company want to add its hosting plans, which will appear only in the details page for that listing, how can i do that ??


They should be able to input html code also for updating their extra info.

</Example>

This I am considering as a paid feature for those listings who are interested !


Thank you for any help in advance

Cheers

[esm]

just some thoughts off the top of my head...

in idx_link create two new fields: expire_date and acct_detail

add the <%acct_detail%> tag to the detail.html file. You will also need to add it to the modify_form.html so the user can update the info.

then add something like "WHERE expire_date < now()" to the SELECT statement in the detail.php file.

I'm sure I left something out. But I did say this was just some ideas. May not even be good ideas!!!

[ideavirus]

Thank you esm :

I am looking at something like this page here : http://www.whost.info/add.php

I would like to have those fields in the add a site section...and that extra into will appear in the details section for that listing.

That particular listing should have different look from other free listings ??

can that be done ??

Thank you

[esm]

well, I haven't tested it but my original suggestions seem like they would work. In one recent thread I did do some work with using different row formats based upon the category so you should be able to do the same. see http://www.nicecoder.com/community/s...&threadid=1473

if you are not using the sponsor feature, this could probably be hacked to do the same thing. but I might still go with the first option.

As I understand what you want to do: you want some links to have addtional data appear on the detail page. Just add the extra fields and modify the row.html file to include the extra fields. Add the data to the extra fields. adjust the add/modify html files.

you also want to use different formats for the above special links. Since you want the info to appear in the detail.html, modify the detal.php file. To do this, refer to the thread referenced above. Look for detail_link.html. You will need to execute the query to get some info from the table to run the IF. Use an IF statement ( using the expire_date or acct_detail field as the condition ) to select which detail link format to use.

So, yes, you should be able to do what you ask...

[dody]

I may missing something. Ideavirus, you want:
- the same add page for all webhost both free and paid listing
- free listing, will not display webhost plan in detail
- premium listing can have webhost plan

Is that so, I have an idea:
1. create new field: premium (varchar/checkbox), the content is 0 or 1; if 0 = free listing, 1 = paid listing
2. in detail page, check value of premium
3. if premium, load template for premium (including plan list)
4. if not, load template free listing

------ I'm thinking of giving paid service for hacking/customizing. I hope it will produce a large amount of new fresh idea, and also more *beautiful* indexu powered website will be produced. If client permit to post hack for public, then you get them all. I could spend a couple of hours doing hack.
nice huh ?? esm, you should do this too
PM me if you're interested.

[esm]

yep, I would be interested. Actually, I had thought of that too but was trying to keep my response simple.

Originally posted by dody
I'm thinking of giving paid service for hacking/customizing.

what does this mean?

[TLC]

The paid detailed page feature and that whost.info/add.php page shown is almost exactly what I was looking for, what is the cost estimation on this kind of customization?

[esm]

the hard part is creating the html pages, specifically any dropdown/radio buttons, and not anything specifically related to the mod itself.

right now in INDEXU, all the html formatting is genearlly done in the php files and then passed to the HTML pages. Although you could do this directly in the HMTL pages, mixing PHP and HTML like that is a coding nightmare.

All of this will be much easier in v4 which will be out in the Sept/Oct time frame according to the INDEXU staff. also, v4 will be a major change so many of the 3.1 mods will need to be re-done ( or not needed, in some cases ).

If you still need to press ahead, send me an email.

[TLC]

After implementing those customizations in 3.1, would it be a pain or expensive to upgade them to 4 when it comes out.

I dislike making business decisions based on products that might or might not meet their deadline.

[esm]

well, I am a user, just like you, and have no control over release dates. But they have been nice enough to let us know that there would be a major change in the next version.

your choices are: use a different software program, wait until the new version comes out hoping that it will be September and not January or bite the bullet and do it now hoping the upgrade of the hack would be painless.

[TLC]

I wasn't really complaining though, but I was really disappointed with my In-link purchase, which went almost a year (without any real updates) thats why I recently purchased Indexu because I needed unlimited custom fields and pic upload capablities, which I think are essential to this type of program.

I will be definitely be reviewing my options and Indexu before going ahead.

Thanks.

[esm]

well, I think INDEXU is an excellent program. I've had the pleasure ( actually, the displeasure ) of dealing with several other PHP programs in the past two months and the INDEXU code is absolutely the best ( by far ).

and I am looking forward to the smarty templates ( I think! ) to add the needed flexibility to the templates.

I read that the next version will have true multi-category capability.

[TLC]

Yeah, the templates are kind of driving me crazy right now, Instead of customizing, I am cleaning up code. I tried contacting Veg to buy the cleanup templates with seperate ccs file but I haven't receive a reply yet.

I read in the other column that you implemented dreamaccount with indexu. Do you know any major difference between that and amember pro from cgi-central.

If I wanted to implement a free limited listing, along with a paid detail page listing if they chose to, would dreamcost be the way to go, imean to manage transaction and different account from the visitors account.

Thanks.

[esm]

yeah, dody is squirming in his chair when you mention cleaning up templates! He deserves all the grief you can give him on that subject...!

I've even thought of just cleaning the dang things up myself but with v4 coming out in October ( according to dody's posts ), you'll just have to do it yourself or get veg's version. All I did to mine was delete the INDEXU image at the top of most. Then changed some of the css to contol most of the other stuff.

well, I have been struggling with Dream Account. I've got it all working. I just need to finalize the testing to make sure I understand how it updates and does it according to my specs. It tends to be very buggy and support sucks bigtime. All accounts for Dream Account and INDEXU ( and vB or most any other sql program ) are created, updated, suspended and deleted by Dream Account.

I have looked very closely at the free version of amember. It is better software that Dream Account with much better support but may not do as much. I have a specific need and they both do that so I haven't looked much beyond that.

I did hack the free version so that it would add users to INDEXU and vB at the same time it adds amember users, so I assume I could do the same with the update, supsend and delete accounts. It does support plugins just like Dream Account thus making integration with other software easy.

Acutually, what you are proposing is almost exactly what I am doing. Either software would probably do the job. If you want Dream Account, I might be willing to part with my license. I'm sure the Dream Account Forum moderator would gladly allow it to get me out of his hair. Their support forum is behind a protected area for a good reason!

[esm]

I am thinking I will do the same with amember. I like amember's simplicity but dream account may do more.