XF 1.3 Various Moderation Improvements

XenForo 1.3 also contains a number of changes and improvements to help moderators. Let's look at some of them...

Reporting a User

While this isn't related to an action a moderator would take themselves, users can now be reported directly from their profile. This can be used for users that haven't posted any content, but may have an inappropriate avatar, signature, or other value.

Thread Moderator Action History

Moderators can now view all moderator-level actions taken in a thread from a new option in the Thread Tools menu:

ss-2013-12-18_12-58-32.webp


This will display an overlay like this:

ss-2013-12-18_12-58-48.webp


Moving Posts to an Existing Thread

When moving posts via inline moderation, they can now be moved to an existing thread by simply providing the URL to that thread:

ss-2013-12-18_13-00-01.webp


This URL is processed with the same system that processes incoming requests, so it correctly handles URL modifications using route filters.

Copying Posts

Individual posts can now be duplicated via inline moderation:

ss-2013-12-18_13-00-39.webp


As you can see, the options are similar to moving posts, so you can create a new thread or copy them to an existing one.

Limited User Editing

You can now give moderators access to edit a limited amount of user information. This includes:
  • Custom titles
  • Location
  • Occupation
  • Home page
  • About
  • Signature
  • Avatar
  • And selected custom fields
The goal here is simply to allow moderators to remove inappropriate content. Moderators can edit the text of the fields as necessary, although they can only remove a specified avatar.

Each custom field now has an option to control whether moderators can edit the field value.

Shared IP Checking

To detect if a user had registered more than one account, we sometimes found that moderators were simply running the spam cleaner with only the "check IPs" option selected. This was not ideal and often not available as an option, so we've now added an option to check for shared IPs via a user's profile page:

ss-2013-12-18_13-01-57.webp


This brings up an overlay that's very similar to the version shown in the spam cleaner:

ss-2013-12-18_13-02-31.webp


Additional Warning Action Options

The approach for defining a warning action has been modified:

ss-2013-12-18_13-03-06.webp


Most significantly, all warning actions can now be specified to only run for a specific time period. Previously, only bans could be run for a length of time; groups or discouragement were applied while above the points threshold.

While this might not seem like a big change, the most significant power lies in adding a user to a specific group. Using the XenForo permission system, you can remove specific permissions from users that have crossed your warning thresholds. This is the use case that Never was designed for.

You can now create a warning action hierarchy such as:
  • Manually approve posts for 1 day
  • Manually approve posts for 3 days
  • Read only for 3 days
  • Read only for 1 week
  • Ban for 1 week
  • Ban permanently
Previously, you would have had to do quite a lot of this manually.

From a development perspective, the system for making temporary user changes has been designed to be very generic and usable in other ways. I'm sure there will be some very cool uses of this system once 1.3 is out.


Until next time...
 
This is awesome - XF already has the best mod system I have seen :)

I haven't had time to properly test out the mod system yet, but once a reported post is actioned (and I think conversations are started?) can any mod then take over or participate? This just means all mods are kept in the picture and if one mod is not around another can take over.
 
Yes, given proper content permissions, any moderator can comment (if the report is closed, it is reopened automatically) or take over handling of the issue.
 
Can we create pool in existing threads without create new thread with pool and merge with existing? Or this is not will be added in XenForo 1.3?
 
I'm not entirely sure what you are asking, but if you want to batch move posts into an existing thread, yes, you can do that.
 
XenForo 1.3 also contains a number of changes and improvements to help moderators. Let's look at some of them...

Reporting a User

While this isn't related to an action a moderator would take themselves, users can now be reported directly from their profile. This can be used for users that haven't posted any content, but may have an inappropriate avatar, signature, or other value.

Thread Moderator Action History

Moderators can now view all moderator-level actions taken in a thread from a new option in the Thread Tools menu:

View attachment 63257

This will display an overlay like this:

View attachment 63258

Moving Posts to an Existing Thread

When moving posts via inline moderation, they can now be moved to an existing thread by simply providing the URL to that thread:

View attachment 63259

This URL is processed with the same system that processes incoming requests, so it correctly handles URL modifications using route filters.

Copying Posts

Individual posts can now be duplicated via inline moderation:

View attachment 63260

As you can see, the options are similar to moving posts, so you can create a new thread or copy them to an existing one.

Limited User Editing

You can now give moderators access to edit a limited amount of user information. This includes:
  • Custom titles
  • Location
  • Occupation
  • Home page
  • About
  • Signature
  • Avatar
  • And selected custom fields
The goal here is simply to allow moderators to remove inappropriate content. Moderators can edit the text of the fields as necessary, although they can only remove a specified avatar.

Each custom field now has an option to control whether moderators can edit the field value.

Shared IP Checking

To detect if a user had registered more than one account, we sometimes found that moderators were simply running the spam cleaner with only the "check IPs" option selected. This was not ideal and often not available as an option, so we've now added an option to check for shared IPs via a user's profile page:

View attachment 63261

This brings up an overlay that's very similar to the version shown in the spam cleaner:

View attachment 63262

Additional Warning Action Options

The approach for defining a warning action has been modified:

View attachment 63263

Most significantly, all warning actions can now be specified to only run for a specific time period. Previously, only bans could be run for a length of time; groups or discouragement were applied while above the points threshold.

While this might not seem like a big change, the most significant power lies in adding a user to a specific group. Using the XenForo permission system, you can remove specific permissions from users that have crossed your warning thresholds. This is the use case that Never was designed for.

You can now create a warning action hierarchy such as:
  • Manually approve posts for 1 day
  • Manually approve posts for 3 days
  • Read only for 3 days
  • Read only for 1 week
  • Ban for 1 week
  • Ban permanently
Previously, you would have had to do quite a lot of this manually.

From a development perspective, the system for making temporary user changes has been designed to be very generic and usable in other ways. I'm sure there will be some very cool uses of this system once 1.3 is out.


Until next time...
Good work Mike. But detecting multiple accounts through IP address is not ideal, as users does not have static IP address. I think if you run detection tool based on IP and Cookies, you will get much better result.

Regards,
 
what about a device shared by two or more people?
how it can be handled?
I dont think the core software needs to analyse who is behind a computer. There are advanced functions that can be added to define if its really the same person or not, but that's probably more suited for an addon.
It's sufficient for 99% of the cases to know that the same device is used for multiple accounts. For the 1% where its not sufficient the staff can compare accounts and review the IP whois.
 
Some really cool new features :)

Will there be anything like this incorporated into these new features when posts are split off or copied to help people understand when posts are moved from one section of the forum to another or find where the first thread originated that sparked a new discussion elsewhere?
 
I dont think the core software needs to analyse who is behind a computer. There are advanced functions that can be added to define if its really the same person or not, but that's probably more suited for an addon.
It's sufficient for 99% of the cases to know that the same device is used for multiple accounts. For the 1% where its not sufficient the staff can compare accounts and review the IP whois.
I agree! its all about getting accurate and needed result.
 
I hope that the holidays will not prevent HYS threads from being posted, because if the rest of the functions are also top voted suggestions, then its likely the new functions will affect my custom development projects. It's very nice to see what features are coming.
 
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