VigLink 1.1.3
- Thread starter Brian Lovett
- Start date
Sal Collaziano
Well-known member
So annoying that "thread starter" gets VigLinked on all my forums...
OakleyForum
Well-known member
Any way to keep the links out of the footer/post editor / forum titles etc. outside of using excessive amounts of "nolinks" div class? Feel like this should be built into an add-on, to ONLY insert links into posts and not various other areas. On XF1.5 this is how it worked, now they're just everywhere!!
Sal Collaziano
Well-known member
Yeah, not crazy about this either. VigLink got bought out by Sovrn. I don't think anybody is paying attention here anymore...
Wildcat Media
Well-known member
Yes, this needs to be fixed. It should only be targeting "post" areas.
One cure for that is to contact your rep and have them blacklist the phrase "thread starter" on their end. That should prevent it from being linked. (The blacklist is a way they can disable phrases that shouldn't be linked.)
Sal Collaziano
Well-known member
If there's a "post" template, I'd put it there. In the footer, you'll have the links showing up everywhere you don't want them. I'm just not sure which template would cover only the post table... That's where I'd like to manually put my code...
Sal Collaziano
Well-known member
Another hassle with this plugin is that any new member who signs up and posts a message that VigLink picks up - and links - needs to have their post approved, as I don't allow links by brand new members... Not enough thought went into this plugin...
Wildcat Media
Well-known member
I do, unfortunately, and it is showing up in phrases like "thread starter" and even post and poll titles, where it shouldn't be.
That is why a comprehensive plug-in is needed or at the very least, some way to disable the linking in all areas except for the bodies of forum posts. I want monetization as much as everyone else, but it needs to happen where it is expected, not in any random text. We can't blame the VigLink system for it, since its job is to find keywords and change them into monetized links--it can't know what is or isn't supposed to be linkable, just due to the fact that it is used across so many different platforms. That would leave them with only two options. 1) Add a ton of extra code, such as conditionals, that detect which platform it is installed on, and adjust automatically; this is just added bloat that will slow everyone's site down. 2) Create different code for each platform, which is tedious for them to maintain, especially given how many different installed versions of each platform still exist out there in the wild.
I have to look at this issue myself, since I have quite a few sites using it. If I come up with edits to the templates that will help, I'll let everyone know.
That's odd, since the JavaScript should be acting on the text as it is loading in the visitor's browser, not inserted into posts that get added to the database. We have that same spam protection on our forums, and given the tens of thousands of moderated posts our forum staffs have approved over the past several years, it's never come up. I'll keep an eye on it though--anything is possible!
Big Dan
Active member
Try disabling the Insert feature of Viglink. I have that disabled on my primary API and don't run into those problems.
Wildcat Media
Well-known member
I thought of it, but we make a substantial amount from Insert. (Depending on which site or forum it is, we sometimes disable Insert for logged-in members.)
JacquiiDesigns
Well-known member
@Brian Lovett - I just made a post from a news story about Colorado.
The world Colorado was then linked about 20 times in the article post. How annoying.
Is there any way to stop this type of multiple linking of the same word within a post???
Thanks,
J.
The world Colorado was then linked about 20 times in the article post. How annoying.
Is there any way to stop this type of multiple linking of the same word within a post???
Thanks,
J.
askandy
Active member
@Rudy - have you made any progress with conditionally disabling Viglink, or disabling it in certain areas?
We need to disable Viglink on certain threads (all the posts within the threads) and I found my way here.
Looks as though we may need to hire a Xenforo plugin developer to either extend this plugin to get what we need, or code a custom Xenforo plugin to get the functionality we need.
We need to disable Viglink on certain threads (all the posts within the threads) and I found my way here.
Looks as though we may need to hire a Xenforo plugin developer to either extend this plugin to get what we need, or code a custom Xenforo plugin to get the functionality we need.
Wildcat Media
Well-known member
I have been working on other projects and haven't touched this issue as of yet. But mainly I want to eliminate links in the postbit and in thread titles, and that shouldn't be too hard to modify a couple of templates to do it.
BushcraftUSA
Member
I just upgrade to XF 2.1 and need to get Viglink working again, but not linking text, just URLs that are inserted by members. Any chance of this add-on being fixed or is there another alternative?
Big Dan
Active member
Has anyone had trouble with Viglink inserting garbage onto their page? One of my more technically adept members got a malware warning on my forum linking to known bad domains like dx . bigsea . weborama . com & ce . lijit . com . As soon as the Viglink JS was removed the problem went away. I know VG sold last year or the year before and hope it's just a temporary issue on their end. It's nice to make a few bucks off affiliating links but not if they're going to pull stuff like that.
torontotim
Member
I was using Viglink (for years now) and just moved from SMF to XF2. I might just ditch them and look at alternatives.
Big Dan
Active member
I got in touch with VigLink (Sovrn) it seems they rolled out a new ad exchange feature and that's what was causing the junky domains to be called via VigLink. Currently working with them on setting up an API key that affiliates links only without all the other junk.
Something similar happened a year or two back they rolled out a feature rewriting product links to the vendor that paid the most commission. It upset some of my members. Of course it was switched on by default.
