Other Non-Administrator Forum & Group Managers

[Bluedrake42]

Hello everyone.

I'm slowly realizing that my community is starting to bust from the seams of Xenforo. I think our needs are starting to exceed what Xenforo (or any currently available Xenforo resources) is capable of. So I'm hoping to spend more time being a part of this forum community, and possibly get a better idea on what we can do to improve our forums.

The issue I'm currently facing, is my sub-community leaders want tools and permissions to manage THEIR section of the forums... but NOT permissions to edit any other forums outside their own. Same with groups... the community leaders want control ONLY over their sub-community user groups, and NOT others.

Currently I can find no way to do this. The closest I've found is Nobita social groups, but that doesn't create forums in the primary node tree... and it also doesn't allow forum-specific user groups.

Does anyone have any idea how I might accomplish this?

 

[Alpha1]

I am afraid that you cant do this in XF without custom development. I have been thinking about the concept a lot.

 

[Bluedrake42]

No, I know.

I'm actually asking from a development standpoint. Like... how could we execute this.

Even before I start hiring people, I think its important to understand how Xenforo's framework works... and how we can adjust it to accomplish the above idea.

 

[Alpha1]

Correct me if this is not what you need, but how I see it is this:

We need forums that members can join.
What this means is:

• members who join the forum node(s) watch the forum and receive alerts about new content.
• members who join the forum node(s) are visible in a list.
• if the node is set to private then only group members can see its content.
  
• group managers have a set of moderating permissions over their forum node(s). Optimally there are several group manager levels.

Also see: https://xenforo.com/community/threads/what-functions-do-you-want-for-social-groups-crowdfund.73200/

 

[Bluedrake42]

No not really, much more simplistic than that.

What I need is:

• I can assign user groups as "sub-forum managers" of a specific node tree, giving them control over creating/deleting/moving/renaming/editing all nodes (and children) in that SPECIFIC tree
• I can assign user groups as "sub-group managers" of a specific user group (or multiple user groups) giving them control over assigning/promoting/demoting users only for that SPECIFIC user group

That's pretty much it.

I appreciate this however, this is half the battle. Just figuring out how to most succinctly explain what we need done, and hopefully also how to do it.

Edit:

So for instance, EACH of these communities listed below are separate communities that just use my forum. We all are in the same larger group, but the sub-communities for the most part run themselves.

What I need to do, is give each of these community leaders the ability to edit/manage JUST their own community forum tree... and NO one else's. Same with user groups... some of these communities have their own user groups (like "Iron Armada: Developer" or "Grand Theft Auto: Administrator") and I need to give those community leaders the ability to promote/demote users ONLY from their user groups.

 

[sbj]

@Bluedrake42

Pardon me, English is not my native language, so I could have understood you wrong.

From what I understand you want that some people can only manage specific sections of your forum, right?

Why don't you just create some usergroups, assign the right users to the usergroups, and then make it that only that usergroup handles the specific forum/category it is assigned to?

First create a usergroup. Then:
ACP->Applications->Display Node Tree->Permissions (pick the permissions of the forum you want)->Pick a usergroup(now you see all usergroups you have).

Now configure the permissions there. Those permissions will only be applied to that forum (for example: "feature suggestions forum").

So you have to create a usergroup, assign users to that usergroup and configure the permission in the nodetree.

Or you could do it without usergroups. But then you have to configure everything for each user/moderator one by one.

 

[Bluedrake42]

@Bluedrake42

Pardon me, English is not my native language, so I could have understood you wrong.

From what I understand you want that some people can only manage specific sections of your forum, right?

Why don't you just create some usergroups, assign the right users to the usergroups, and then make it that only that usergroup handles the specific forum/category it is assigned to?

Because unfortunately that isn't possible. I want my users to be able to physically edit children nodes for only their specific forum, such as the ability to delete a child forum, add a category, edit a link forum, and so on.

Right now within Xenforo you have the options to do two things, add users as moderators for a forum (which allows them to moderate the forum) or add users as administrators who can edit the node tree. There is no option to add users as administrators who have access to edit only a specific node tree. There is also no option to add users who can only promote users to specific user groups. Currently the option is only all or nothing.

 

[sbj]

Ah, I get it. You want them to create nodes etc.
I understand the problem.
Don't forget that many nodes slow the forums, so I don't think it is a good idea to give bunch of people the power of creating nodes as much as they want.
But still I see a use case for what you want. Sorry, that I don't know a workaround for that problem other than hiring a developer.

 

[Bluedrake42]

How do you think I should most succinctly describe this to a Xenforo plugin contractor?

Sometimes I think I spend half the time just explaining what we want... and then they go and build something entirely else anyways haha just because they have difficulty understanding what we're looking for.

 

[sbj]

How do you think I should most succinctly describe this to a Xenforo plugin contractor?

Tell him/her that you are looking for sth. like this:
https://xenforo.com/community/resources/infisjsc-topic-thread-starters-permissions.24/

But obviously that you don't want that permissions, but the permissions you are looking for. Like "can create node", "can delete node" etc.
So he/she has to strip out the permissions of an admin (partially) and make that into one addon.

 

[Bluedrake42]

How about group assignment permissions? How do you think I should assign a permission for a user to promote/demote a user from specific user groups?

 

[sbj]

Maybe with this?
https://xenforo.com/community/resources/promote-and-demote-user.2104/

Btw. Nobita is doing custom work as far as I know for fair prices. So if you have the money, you could contact him for example.

 

[Bluedrake42]

Oh wow that's really close, unfortunately it doesn't seem to be use-able only for certain groups. Only an all or nothing solution, but still really useful looking. I'm going to check that out.

Hm yeah, I'll contact Nobita. We're already using his social forums system, but its a little too complicated for what we need.