Topic: Social News Block

[Seth]

I'm not sure if this already exists or if I'm describing this right, but I would like to have a way for forum members to make quick posts to the front page. Sort of similar to the way the shout box works, but (and I hate myself for making this comparison) something that works more like Facebook's news wall update thing. People could leave simple messages or attach images, videos, or links which other people could then comment on.

[andy]

As the software is a message board system it uses different categories or boards. If you want something independent of that where will it be stored? I can't see that idea working.

I can see two options that will work.
Recent posts and topics blocks can be customized a lot and display on the front page. You can choose which boards to display posts from.

Or make a board specifically for wall posts and use the block for that only.


Here is a a flexible custom php block for recent posts and topics that many people use:
http://simpleportal.net/index.php?topic=9138.0

[qwert321]

have a look at this.

http://custom.simplemachines.org/mods/index.php?mod=2407#post_download


There are a lot of option and you can set it up to show post from forum or just post to it like facebook.
The share it area at the top starts a new conversation.
I am a bit of a hack when it comes to coding but I was able to modify it some(please dont ask me how i was lucky to do it once) to show some of the smiles and post pictures.

To put it in a block on your frontpage use the code posted in the SMF Mod site listed above in the mod description.



The pro version was made free
http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=375584.0;attach=146512

[andy]

That mod is outdated and unsupported now. Basically in SP you have the shoutbox or SII functions displaying post and topic information in blocks. Maybe someone will make a mod here to do what you want allowing none SMF post displayed as well.
For me I try not to spend so much time getting everything I want and accept the limitations. Also, a lot of boring stuff gets posted in those kinds of activity updates - not sure I would want it all displayed, or whether users would want their changes displayed.
Maybe you could adapt is as a block here?